The Contingencies of Creative Work in Television

ABSTRACT

This paper analyses research evidence about the creative environments in the UK television production sector. The industry is reviewed across a number of dimensions: the evolving sentiments and structures of collective creativity; the perception of the actual and the ideal creative environment for television production; the growing levels of uncertainty associated with freelance work; and the key qualities which underlie creative work. A central argument of the paper is that there is a critical link in the television production process between contingent conditions which will, because of the project nature of programme production and the limited timescales, almost always be marked by levels of uncertainty and relative disorder, and this will have a direct impact on the creative outputs. In this situation, fundamental to optimum creative environments in production companies are the connections between individual talent, collective creativity and innovation. The research suggests that the contemporary organisational set up and the reordering of the work regime in television production has developed with insufficient attention to this dynamic and the spaces within which it occurs with uncertain consequences.