In the corporate events business, there’s often a tug-of-war taking place between our desire to make a powerful creative statement and the need to honor the clients’ key business message. This dichotomy has been going on for longer than you think. Remember the scene in Milos Forman’s film “Amadeus” when Mozart asks the King what he thinks of his new opera “The Abduction From The Seraglio”? While the King struggles to find the right words to express his frustration with the complexities of the music, one of his sycophantic court advisers offers the pithy suggestion, “Too many notes Majesty?” To which the exasperated monarch replies “Yes, that’s it, too many notes.” Mozart’s petulant response is to declare that the opera has precisely the right number of notes, no more, no less. It is perfect.
Mozart’s opera is indeed perfect. Most of us however, are not tasked with creating such canonic works on a regular basis. Yet despite less lofty goals, don’t you find yourself fighting a similar battle? Whether it’s a web article, a keynote speech or a video script, don’t you sometimes get stuck trying to juggle the clients needs with your drive to find that magic combination of mots justes and pithy phrases that will constitute the perfect piece? I know I do.
You craft and you craft until you think you have it; a piece of writing that contains the optimal number of words in the right order, no more, no less… a piece that has the ideal mix of creative juice and on message business content. But often the client may decide it contains “too many notes.”
The trick is to realize that this is a fight you don’t need to win. Ultimately what’s good for the client is good for you. The business message is the reason we’re there in the first place. Our job is not to reinvent the message but to create the perfect packaging.
And occasionally, both sides win. Creatively speaking, things turned out pretty well for Mozart.
