Why? Because each client deserves a unique solution to their specific problem. We should not be shoe-horning the client into our vision, our job is to help them develop a vision of their own. Advertising and marketing is not about its creator, the designer. It is not even its sponsor, the client. It is about its audience, the prospects—the people we want to take notice and move to action.

Don’t get me wrong, there are times when a formula solution is perfectly acceptable. Not everyone can afford the time and expense it takes to create a unique approach. As long as the client knows they are getting a formula solution to their problem, that’s fine. But even then, if we apply the same look and feel to the solution, we lessen its impact.

The truth is, the sum of a truly creative equation is never the same. When you multiply a client’s unique product, service, or idea by its one-of-a-kind audience, and add its unique position in an ever-changing market, it is virtually impossible to arrive at the same solution for any two organizations.

Here are a few ways to keep your solutions new and fresh:

1. Retain your anonymity.

Think of yourself as a ghostwriter. The challenge is to apply your skills for communicating ideas to the client’s project without anyone realizing it—to make the transfer seamless. Remember, it’s not about the designer. Our job is to raise the stock of the client in the consumer’s eyes, not to leave them wondering who designed the client’s brochure.

2. Keep your opinions to yourself.

A client project is not the place to express your personal political views, moral opinions, or to vent a provocative sense of humor. It is amateurish to base a message on material that you know will provoke a negative reaction from a significant number of a client’s prospects for nothing more than attracting attention. Let me say that again: gambling a client’s reputation for the sole purpose of attracting attention is the sign of an amateur.

To the client: Why would you ever settle for an approach that is guaranteed to turn off a significant percent of your audience? Opinionated, provocative solutions that offer no critical advantage reveal the author’s lack of creativity and marketing know-how—whether it is small design studio or one of the world’s top ten advertising agencies.

3. Keep opening new doors.

It is difficult to discover a brilliant solution for one client and restrain yourself from applying it to the next—but that is the challenge. You come in the next morning, paint over the last solution, and start with a clean canvas. To be clear, we certainly need to apply what we learn through our successes. But the gauge of a good designer is their ability to devise different approaches to similar problems.

That said, don’t blame the messenger for the message. The reason I raise this issue is because I struggle with it myself. No one is immune from the desire to grab some of the spotlight for themselves. I simply propose you delegate self-expression to the design of your workspace, to a side business for developing your own products, and to sharing your opinion through articles, books, and blogs. That you consider the proposition that day-to-day work for clients is not the place for self.