Hola.
I recently read that when Jerry Seinfeld was asked why he didn't continue with the series "Seinfeld", a huge success on American TV, he said that 9 years was the perfect length, that if he had added one more digit it would already be too long, that people would think it was taking longer than necessary.
The Beatles also lasted 9 years together, from 1963 to 1972. And they also separated at the height of their career (pun intended, with the concert on the roof of the Abbey Road recording studios).
These are coincidences, but they made me think of a conference I once attended from one of my all-time favorite agencies, R/GA.
They said that every 9 years the team of managers of the company met to redefine the agency, to describe what the next 9 years would be. It should be remembered that R/GA was founded by Bob Greenberg and his brother Richard in New York in 1977 designing credit titles for films such as Ridley Scott's "Alien". Now it is another type of company very different from that year 1977 and they have had several changes of course.
Perhaps we professionals also have to pause every 9 years and think if we are doing what we want and if we can do something to change if we don't like what we currently have. Something similar does the designer Stefan Sagmeister, who takes a sabbatical year every 7 years.
But life goes too fast and we are not able to make that pause. We make excuses for not doing it. Or we are not brave enough.
— W.
The links
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