Sourcegraph’s in-house Brand Team

Why have a vision and mission statement?

To provide direction—The statements serve as a “North Star” that keeps everyone clear on the goals and direction of the Brand Creative team. They tell everyone why we exist and what we’re doing today to take Sourcegraph, our work, and our audience where we all want to go in the future.
To provide boundaries—The statements give us a framework for thinking throughout our team that sets boundaries and guardrails to help us (and our internal partners) stay on the path to our preferred future.
To provide alignment—The statements get everyone on the same page when it comes to what the team does and how and why we do it, which leads to better effectiveness and efficiency.
To facilitate improvement—These statements help us understand what to measure and how to measure it so we can get better and better at what we do and how we serve.

Common challenges faced by in-house Brand & Creative teams†:

1. Volume, velocity and variety of creative work mushrooms. According to a recent survey, the volume and velocity of work are the top challenges facing creatives today; a variety of work – accommodating the plethora of new creative specifications across digital channels and social media – ranks among the top five challenges.

2. Creative briefs and project intake lead the list of process challenges. The creative brief and project intake – the first steps in the creative process – are also the biggest challenges in creative workflow (42%). Some 67% of respondents said obtaining the necessary information just to begin work was difficult or very difficult.

3. Making time and headspace for creativity is squeezed by administrative work. Most respondents (46%) said they spend between 3–7 hours per week on administrative tasks; about one-third (24%) said they spend seven or more hours per week on admin tasks. That’s about one full day every week, or 20% of creative time spent annually.

†2018 In-House Creative Management Report, InSource/InMotionNo.

Benefits of Having an In-House Brand & Creative Team

Cost savings
Speed/cycle time (not always sourcing, vetting and onboarding vendors)
Agency-caliber creative and production quality
Lower error rates and intuitive brand adherence
Brand knowledge and audience awareness
Historical knowledge of products/assets/deliverables
Shared values/goals for the company
Compliance/legal requirements knowledge
Innovation + strong sense of what will fly vs. when to push boundaries
A fun, collaborative team environment that fuels creativity