Working with startups and small businesses often feels like running a therapy session. At KIAI, we’re not just building websites or logos — we’re guiding founders through the emotional layers of bringing a vision to life.
We talk about features, positioning, competitive advantage — but the real magic happens when the authentic spark of a brand finds its voice through the founder’s story. That moment when purpose, vulnerability, and vision align — and the brand finally breathes like a living story.
Authenticity, however, is not always where the client thinks it is. And that’s the delicate balance we navigate every day.
The Want: When Desire Meets Design
The client’s will is not always the most effective route, but authenticity still passes through it.
Many times, what a client wants conflicts with the design process or the best practices agencies rely on. It is rarely because the client is wrong. Most of the time, they are trying to express something deeper that words or visuals cannot yet capture.
Designers, especially those who care about strategy, know they cannot create a logo for a brand that does not yet know who it is. The challenge lies in translating a client’s intuition, often raw and unrefined, into a structured and strategic creative process.
When that connection happens, even confusion becomes creative fuel. The client’s desires stop being obstacles and start becoming insights.
But it is difficult to reach that point when your own emotions get in the way. As human beings, getting rid of emotions is not an option. They are part of the creative process.
What I have learned through experience, and yes, through therapy 😅, is that it is possible to release those emotions instead of resisting them, and to become more aware of them in clients and team members as well. If the client needs time, it is just as important that you learn to give yourself time too.
That is where empathy becomes strategy. Because reading emotion, not avoiding it, often leads us to truly authentic work.
The Psychology Behind the Brand
After more than a decade in this field, I’ve noticed that about 70% of creative projects are influenced by limiting beliefs — often coming from the founder or leadership team.
It’s human. Launching something new can trigger self-doubt, perfectionism, fear of visibility, or a need to control every detail.
That’s why managing a project in a creative agency often means managing emotions as much as deliverables. It takes empathy, vision, and courage to help a client move past fear and open up to possibility.
Sometimes that means holding space. Sometimes it means giving them time to find their own pace — even if it slows the project down.
And yes, from a business operations perspective, this can be challenging. It might stretch schedules and disrupt flow. But in small and medium-sized businesses, these slower moments often lead to something deeper — stronger brand perception, genuine team engagement, and a renewed passion for the company’s mission.
Those are outcomes that don’t fit neatly into a Gantt chart, but they shape how a brand is felt, shared, and remembered.
Growth vs. Essence
Every growing brand eventually faces a paradox: growth can dilute essence.
As businesses expand, new people join, processes take shape, and systems replace the spontaneity that once made the brand feel human. The founder’s voice gets quieter. The spark that once inspired the story begins to fade under the weight of “what works.”
But authenticity doesn’t mean resisting growth — it means integrating it. Keeping the essence alive while allowing the form to evolve.
At its best, branding becomes a mirror of the founder’s own evolution. When the leader grows, so does the brand.
Systems help — and as we know, branding thrives on consistency. So if the brand evolves, its system and visual consistency should evolve too.
It makes sense, right? When the brand still operates as a direct extension of its founder, authenticity feels natural — you can see and feel it. But once the brand becomes managed by a rotating team or different people replicating the founder’s vision, it takes strong guidance, brand pillars, and clear frameworks to keep that essence intact.
And even then, it will never be exactly them.
People evolve. Energy changes. And true spontaneity — the kind that makes a brand feel alive — can never be predicted pixel-perfect, especially when running campaigns at scale.
That’s why the most human brands aren’t the ones that never change — they’re the ones that keep evolving without forgetting who they are.
In Summary
Authenticity is not a static quality — it’s a relationship between truth and change. Our job, as brand strategists and designers, is to translate that tension into meaning.
Because in the end, a truly authentic brand doesn’t just express who someone is — it reveals who they’re becoming.
