Stop calling your work ‘brave’

Firefighters. Nurses. Astronauts. These people are brave. A creative director thinking up ideas to sell cereal from the comfort of a beanbag in Shoreditch, is not.

By calling our work ‘brave’ are we reinforcing the myth that middle-of-the-road is somehow ‘safe’?

Aside from the unappealing self-aggrandising, the idea of ‘creative bravery’ also has a much darker legacy — it perpetuates the myth that the status quo is somehow ‘safe’.