Professional Ethics: Working with Competing Clients

What do you do when you have to work with direct competitors?

The thing about getting hyper-specific about what you do as a creative and being really good at it is that you have a higher chance of being approached to work on projects for direct competitors at the same time. So, what do you do when you are caught in a situation like this? How do you navigate maintaining those relationships without feeling caught in the middle of (un)healthy business competition by virtue of your involvement in those projects? What do you do with the conflict of interest?

First, let’s establish that the reason working for two direct competitors in the same capacity, around the same time, gets tricky is how creative synthesis tends to work. Even when you have no plan to transpose ideas from one project to the next, the wealth of knowledge you gain while working deeply on one project is very likely to influence how you go about the next couple of projects you work on. In this case, you could subconsciously utilise critical information—like the new insights you gained on the audience type, or even market demands and inclinations—from one competitor to execute on the other brand’s project.

Honesty is not just an endearing quality in a person; it also plays an important part in building a lasting creative practice. And as with countless other instances on your creative journey, honesty is needed to mindfully and ethically navigate working with competing clients. First off, you need to be honest with yourself. How much overlap is there likely to be if you are involved in both projects at the same time? There’s a high chance both brands enlisted your services due to your expertise in that sector, so evaluate both projects, briefs, and expected results to uncover the likelihood of a great overlap if you take on both projects at the same time.

In cases where the project timelines intersect or are not too far apart, you also need to be honest with the parties involved. Let them know about your involvement with their competitors. Although you don’t have to go into great detail on your involvement, your disclosure gives them a chance to make a well-informed decision regarding your involvement in their own project. Some clients may not mind as long as there are clear guardrails around your use of the information they provide while you work on the project. And, some other clients would refrain from working with you solely for that reason. Whatever the case, your choice to disclose things honestly would leave a mark on that client that you can be trusted, for the most part.

If you run a somewhat robust studio, a good way to navigate this conflict of interest would be to assign different teams to handle both projects. While the studio model and creative scene generally thrive on collaborative energy, it would be a lot easier to transfer ideas from one brand’s insight to the other if the same hands and minds were to work on the project. Keeping projects from competing brands to different teams helps safeguard the brand’s interests in some way.

The truth is, it would be really hard to avoid the conflict of interest that may arise from working with direct competitors around the same time, but you can minimise the impact on your reputation and the results of the projects in concern by taking some of these steps.

Have you ever worked with competitors around the same time? Tell us how you tend to navigate such situations.