The Creative Economy
Image: Abby Williamson of IMG Models. Photo: Daniel Baud

By Rita Bratovich.

The economy is in decline and the job market is shrinking.

That’s what you might be tempted to believe given the frequent headlines about large businesses folding and massive redundancies. Yet there is one sector of the economy that is growing – one that was once not even considered legitimate – the Creative Industry.

According to the NSW Department of Industry: “In NSW in 2015-16, more people directly worked in creative industries (206,000) than in the state’s financial and insurance services industry (186,000), and more people than in agriculture, forestry and fishing (88,000) and mining (38,000) combined.”

Based on a Creative Industries Innovation Centre (CIIC) report (2013) the creative sector contributes around $90 billion in annual turnover to the national economy, with NSW accounting for a significant portion of that.

So what is the creative industry? The term “creative” might once only have been applied to occupations where imagination and expression were abstract and evident. Now, however creativity is recognised across a wider field of pursuits. The CIIC study defines seven distinct economic segments: music and performing arts; film, television and radio; advertising and marketing; software and interactive content; writing, publishing and print media; architecture; design and visual arts.

NSW has the largest share of the industry, with Sydney being a noted creative hub. Growth continues appreciably, with significant employment increases in computer system design and related services and creative and performing arts activities.

In response to recommendations in the CIIC report, the NSW Department of Industry introduced a Creative Achievement Award in 2014 consisting of the NSW Creative Laureate and NSW Emerging Creative Talent awards. A spokesperson from the department says:

“NSW is home to some of the world’s most creative talent and the NSW Creative Achievement Awards shine the spotlight on the achievements of individuals and businesses that help raise the global profile of NSW Creative Industries.”

This year’s winners of the Emerging Talent Award are Anna Plunkett and Luke Sales, the fashion entrepreneurs behind the avant garde, uber-cool label Romance Was Born.
“For us it’s extremely exciting to be recognised on that government level and also for a fashion brand to be acknowledged as a creative achiever,” says Plunkett.

She and Sales began working together ten years ago when they met at college and discovered they had a mutual passion for music and similar artistic aesthetic. They designed outfits for musicians and friends and were encouraged enough by the feedback to enter a competition which resulted in them being flown to Italy and offered an internship with mega designer, John Galliano in Paris – which they turned down.

“We weren’t expecting it… we weren’t ready…and we didn’t have the maturity to go ‘oh that’s a really good opportunity’ either,” explains Plunkett.

That experience gave them the validation and confidence to come home and develop their own brand which has grown in steady strides. Retail giant, David Jones picked up their label after a show, and they are starting to get traction overseas. Plunkett acknowledges the help that was available in their early days:

“We were very lucky because when we started there was a lot of government support in terms of exporting and different sort of grants. We were able to find a business coach and implement some software that helped us with our production.”

Those grants no longer exist, but Plunkett feels awards such as the Creative Achievement Awards will at least inspire and highlight creatives in business. As for the riskiness of choosing such a volatile and competitive career, Plunkett says,

“We never really thought about it because we weren’t business people; we were just really loving what we were doing.”

That attitude once defined a “creative type” but it has gradually been displaced by a more professional, business-savvy sensibility. Monica Davidson, owner of Creative Plus Business, saw a serious gap in the market when she, as a young film-maker doing what she loves realised she also needed to do her accounting. With nowhere to go for specific training in creative business she taught herself, then set up a business so that she could teach others.

“People think creative people are crap at business because they’re stupid. Creative people are crap at business because they haven’t been taught,” says Davidson.

Davidson runs workshops for creatives in business, teaching practicalities such as getting an ABN, registering a name, copyright, invoicing, managing money, getting work, getting paid, insurance, contracts, marketing and pretty much all the basics of running a creative business. She has definitely seen a change in numbers and ideology of creative practitioners. They are less inhibited about what they do and more likely to seek business opportunities for their creative skills.

“People are now, generally speaking, feeling like they are entitled to be treated with respect…as a business,” she says. Creativity itself has gained status alongside traditional workplace skills as a desirable, even necessary trait.

“All businesses have to be creative. In the modern world everybody has to be creative in their approach to their business,” says Davidson.

Conversely, people need to be business-like in their approach to their creativity and Davidson feels that more education, especially as part of arts qualifications, is required. Her observation is that people in visual arts, performance, and creative writers tend to have less business acumen than film makers, designers, architects – people whose work crosses over with other fields or involves collaboration.

“They’ve been in business for a while, they’ve had dealings with business clients, so those practitioners understand that they’re in a business to business environment,” she explains.

Creative Plus Business won the NSW Government Business Connect contract for Creative Business. It’s part of an initiative that subsidises workshops and mentoring for businesses in the creative industry, providing coaching and advice on the basics of business.

Davidson expects to see a surge in interest in the creative industry when results from the 2016 census are analysed.

“There was a huge jump in the number of people who reported that they worked in the creative industry [after the 2011 census]. A massive jump. And I actually think we’re going to see another one.”

So, finally, being a creative is a real job.

  • www.industry.nsw.gov.au/
  • www.romancewasborn.com
  • www.creativeplusbusiness.com

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