What is Creative Consulting?
Have you ever felt stuck in a creative rut, wondered if putting feet to your vision could create a more tangible change in the world, or wished you knew someone to brainstorm with who cared as much as you do about your cause? As a creative consultant, I come alongside you, your community, or your businesses, to spark creativity, help you explore fresh ideas, collaboratively innovate solutions, and integrate them to help you further your vision and create a meaningful impact. While each venture is unique, most of what I do falls into four general categories: arts consulting, product development, curriculum development, and facilitation. Learn a bit about each of these roles or check out previous projects I have collaborated on to understand how I might be able to serve you.
Arts Consulting
This is an incredibly collaborative process as I first get to know your community and the arts that exist within it. Understanding a community and its arts requires ethnographic research, and communities are best understood through relationships. As I interview individuals and learn about the challenges and aspirations of a community, I help them to collectively identify goals and discern which art forms and genres can be used to help reach those goals. I use participant observation to study the chosen artistic mediums and genres in-depth and create opportunities to ignite a community’s creativity and to collectively improve or refine their work. This iterative process may include, but is not limited to, identifying or developing new art forms, commissioning artisans, being commissioned, designing safe creative spaces, building community, hosting events, or stepping into a variety of other roles across numerous artistic mediums.
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Working with a waste management company to develop up-cycled art forms to help rural women secure sustainable livelihoods.
Product Development
If you are looking to create products that connect to your customer segment, it can be helpful to have someone on your team with an outside perspective who is empathetic to your end user and has a sharp eye for both aesthetics and detail. I want to help you think of your user’s experience as they get to know your brand from the first point of connection to receiving their first product to ultimately building a long-term relationship with your brand. I wear many hats and can step in to support your needs, be that designing or refining products, ensuring quality in manufacturing, setting up supply chains, creating consumer surveys, helping you expand your market, or designing packaging materials to help tell your product’s story.
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Developing product lines using up-cycled art forms.
Curriculum Development
For adults, learning happens when we connect new ideas or concepts to ones we already know. The more engaging and holistic the content is, the better. Learners need the freedom to wrestle with ideas and respond to content. Whether you already have the content and are looking for ways to help learners better connect the dots, or are starting fresh in developing a module, lesson, or curriculum, I am not only focused on what information you want your audience to walk away with but am invested in making sure it sticks and is applied when they leave. Learning is not passive. I want your content to resonate with and impact your audience whether in person or online. Using principles of andragogy, I will help you discover activities that get your audience thinking critically, wrestling with information, and practicing what they are learning.
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Developing Language Learning Curriculum to help refugees foster confidence and resilience as they begin learning English
Facilitation
Being lectured at is rarely the best way to learn. As a facilitator, my role is to guide learners through activities to help them explore and understand concepts for themselves. This has looked like anything from question-answer sessions with college classes, hosting online and in-person modules for cohorts, facilitating holistic arts-based reflection workshops, and leading professional development or skills training sessions. I prioritize working with a group to create a safe space for learners to share ideas, wrestle with content, and learn in a collaborative environment. Previously I have facilitated modules covering topics such as: language learning, orality and storytelling, ethnography, non-verbal communication, and a variety of other cross-cultural learning topics.
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Facilitating cross-cultural learning modules for learners from Hindu and Christian religio-cultural communities.
The best place to Start is where you are.
I want to affirm your creative process, how far you have come, and where you are going. Know that creativity is rarely ever linear, and it is okay to meet with me in the mess. I warmly invite unfinished thoughts and “rented” ideas (ideas you aren’t sure you are fully behind yet). In order to dive in, I am simply looking for a place to begin. Where you are…let’s start there.
You have…
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You have already identified a big picture concept or vision that you are eager to breathe life into but want someone to help you to explore the possibilities. I would love to brainstorm with you and help you stay grounded in your vision while helping you think outside the box and organize your thoughts.
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You already have a defined idea but want to refine it or flesh out the details and are looking for an outside perspective. I would love to offer that perspective as well as share any tangible skills, knowledge, or experience I possess to help make your make your idea a reality.
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Perhaps you have identified a complex problem that you long to play a part in resolving, and you are eager to come up with innovative solutions, identify stakeholders, and rally troops behind your cause. Problems like these often require a great deal of research and sensitivity. I would love to bring awareness and insight to whatever problems you are currently tackling.
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Maybe you have a group or community, and you are eager to collaborate, collectively identify problems and come up with creative solutions for solving them together. I would delight in facilitating this process and walk alongside your community as you come up with and implement grass-roots solutions.
Steps to Create Impact with Studio Rachanā
Introduce Yourself
This is a free 30-minute exploratory meeting where we mutually get to know each other and discern if our values and timetables align. I want to answer any questions you may have about Studio Rachanā and get to know your venture and how you hope to make an impact.
set up a Meeting
Through these initial meetings, we will establish a safe collaborative space to share ideas, brainstorm, identify your goals as well as the challenges you are facing, and start planning the next steps centered around the impact you would like to create.
Review proposal
I will share with you a working proposal for your review with the goals we have identified, what we have collaboratively brainstormed, the ways I am able to contribute, as well as an outline for how we will implement the plan to make your vision a reality.
Implement for Impact
While this looks different for every venture, this is where we follow through on the objectives we identified in the proposal. We will schedule additional meetings to collaborate, mitigate challenges that arise, and ultimately create the impact you desire.