A Creative’s Guide to Conflict, Resolution, and Actually Getting Sh*t Done
By Nick Hinckley, FMK Agency
Let’s just get this out of the way: Conflict isn’t the enemy. Avoidance is.
In the creative, marketing, and tech worlds—especially when agencies, platforms, consultants, and internal teams all collide—there’s this weird pressure to always be nice. To keep things smooth. To “collaborate” in the most passive, surface-level way possible. Smile in meetings, vaguebook the feedback, loop in more people, and hope the problem dissolves on its own.
Spoiler: it won’t.
Here’s the truth no one wants to say out loud: real collaboration requires conflict.
Not toxic, ego-fueled drama. Not who’s-right-and-who’s-wrong energy. I’m talking about productive friction—the kind that pushes ideas forward, breaks bottlenecks, and gets everyone closer to actual outcomes.
The difference between teams that ship great work and teams that just stay busy? One is willing to get uncomfortable.
Conflict Is a Creative Tool
Every killer brand, tight integration, or high-functioning product I’ve ever been part of? It was born from friction.
It came out of disagreement, clashing perspectives, uncomfortable feedback, strong opinions, and late-night “WTF are we even doing?” debates.
If that doesn’t happen, chances are no one cares enough—or worse, they’re checked out entirely.
The trick is knowing how to ride it.
Unmanaged conflict becomes chaos. Ego-driven conflict becomes politics. But intentional, honest, open conflict? That’s leadership.
Sometimes It Means Calling Things Out
Sometimes, it means being the “difficult one” if that’s what it takes to clear the fog and move the work forward.
People can call me blunt. Difficult. Confrontational. Whatever.
But here’s what I am:
- Pro-resolution
- Pro-clarity
- Pro-doing-right-by-the-client
Even when that path is uncomfortable.
The Key Lesson?
Hire good people and get out of their way.
Because resolution doesn’t always come from the top. In fact, it usually doesn’t.
The real magic happens when you stop running interference, pair your doers with other doers, and let them align without the noise. Once we pulled the sales noise out of a recent integration nightmare and let two actual problem-solvers work together?
They fixed it. Clean. Collaborative. No drama. Just good people doing good work.
We didn’t need more meetings. We didn’t need more process. We needed fewer obstacles between the problem and the solution.
The FMK Agency Takeaway
Creative businesses don’t die from conflict—they die from avoiding it. At FMK, we help marketing teams, internal creatives, and cross-functional partners lean into the right kind of tension—because that’s where the real momentum lives.
So if you want better outcomes, better work, and better teams, stop trying to keep the peace at all costs. Instead, build a culture where friction isn’t feared—it’s expected.And then make damn sure everyone knows how to use it.
