We spend a lot of time at Sundae helping organisations tell their stories, but some of the most useful work happens much earlier, before there’s a press release to write, a website to fill or anything to shout about.
New funded organisations and projects can have years of work behind them before most people ever hear about them. Throw different organisations, funding applications, plans for the next few years and a huge amount of knowledge spread between them into the mix, and there’s a lot to bring together before you start explaining it to the outside world.
Bringing us in at that point gives us the chance to talk to the people who know it inside out, ask loads of questions and get all of that information out of people’s heads and into something we can work with. From there, we can work out what needs to come through and find the language that makes it come alive.
We’ve been doing exactly that with Creative Tendring, a new three-year Arts Council England funded initiative creating more opportunities to experience and take part in creativity and culture throughout Tendring.
Arts Trust Productions, who we’ve worked with for years, are delivering it alongside Tendring District Council, Community Voluntary Services Tendring and Harwich Arts and Heritage Centre. Programme Director Kayleigh Boyle has a clear idea of what she wants Creative Tendring to be and, just as importantly, how she wants it to work.
Our conversations with Kayleigh covered everything from the funding and partnership to the different places Creative Tendring will work in, the organisations already doing brilliant things there, the new jobs being created and the first projects getting underway. We also talked about what somebody in Harwich, Jaywick or Brightlingsea might actually want to know when they hear the name Creative Tendring for the first time, rather than what those of us close to it might instinctively want to tell them.
A big part of that is Creative Tendring being visible in the places it serves. It isn’t arriving with years of activity already decided. The team will be out in towns and villages, getting to know what’s happening, building relationships and giving communities a say in how the programme develops.
All of that gave us what we needed to start turning the thinking behind Creative Tendring into messaging that works for different audiences and situations. What we tell the media won’t always be the same as what a partner needs to explain the project, or what somebody coming across Creative Tendring for the first time needs to know, but it all comes from the same place. The team now has something to draw from across press, web, social, partner communications and whatever else comes next, without everybody having to repeat exactly the same lines.
This part of the job might not be the most visible, but we love getting under the skin of something new, asking loads of questions and turning years of thinking into something clear. Creative Tendring now has language it can use and build on long after our initial work is finished.
Not every new organisation needs an agency working with them for years either. Sometimes a few sessions at the beginning, followed by some work pulling everything together, can give a new team what it needs to get going. In other cases there’s more to do and the relationship continues.
We’ve loved helping Creative Tendring get that first bit in place and can’t wait to see what comes next.
Sundae x
