Another question the Ragan Recognition Awards posed had to do with design. The editor of the gorgeous employee magazine must have thought he at least had Bill Sweetland here. Not so fast.
I am only telling you what you already know when I say that your magazine is put together beautifully. But mere elegance and good taste and restraint can wear on the nerves intolerably, unless there is also an abundance of ideas, passion for work, solid content, and even a deep tinge of convention-upsetting, mold-breaking content to boot in the printed words. Beware of looking too good! I mean this.
Passion for the company's work! That is what is missing in your design as well as in your news articles, Mr. R., and until you get this in the publication you will be spinning your wheels, no matter how much praise you get from Senior VPs who don’t know any better telling you that your magazine must feature the “human side of our employees.” Until you concentrate on the idea or ideas you want to get across to employees about the business they’re in, your magazine will lack that idiosyncrasy, that spark that sets it apart from the standard corporate print offering.
Tomorrow, Sweetland turns to the headlines. Duck.
“But mere elegance and good taste and restraint can wear on the nerves intolerably”
So yesterday he’s an elitist, and today he’s a hell-raising redneck? Oh, I’m sorry, he’s a middle class proper buffoon with a “deep tinge” of hell-raising redneck.
His ship is sinking.
On the other hand, if I submitted my material to Ragan, I would want Bill to critique it. His critique would be his honest opinion and clearly understandable. And it would have multiple levels of entertainment and discussion value.