What happens when I press submit..? 4iP Commissions

[Ewan McIntosh]

Part five of a series of posts on the elements that have made the best propositions to 4iP work well.

I was at a Channel 4 event in London two weeks ago and, in the after-speech drinks, I was told by an indie producer that "only stupid people submit ideas through the website; the people getting their ideas commissioned see the commissioner face-to-face". Let's say I, eh, put the record straight.

With well over 500 ideas in a little less than two months, face-to-face pitches are out and our online submissions system, while concise and simple, is the key to our commissioning process and more often than not the starting point for face-to-face discussions. But what happens once you've pressed 'submit', and your idea enters the ether?

1. I pressed submit and the idea disappeared. What happens?

Not quite. In draft form the commissioners can't see your idea at all, so once you press submit you reveal it in our version of the 4iP.org.uk site. It will be dealt with quickest when you've specified the region in which your office or your production is based and, when you work out of Scotland, Northern Ireland or the North East, it falls into my dashboard. Every day I check to see what new ideas have appeared and 'pick them up' virtually, downloading their PDF version to my Mac for reading in depth later on.

2. What was it Geldof said?

I happen to love Mondays. The 4iP team meet face-to-face, normally in London though as soon as the other commissioners are in place we'll be traveling about a bit more (other people can have the 4am starts). We spend time on the ideas that we're sure are great, try to find ways to work them up and make them better. We also look at those ones that, on a first glance, aren't so clear cut.

3. "Sorry seems to be the hardest word"

Most ideas, by now, have been not been given the green light. We use the same system on which you submitted your idea to keep a tally on where each project is at, hence the automated email when your idea is accepted, put on hold (which means we think it might fit in to something we're planning later on, or that the idea needs rethought significantly) or is rejected. The rejected emails contain some automation, but most of them contain advice on why the idea was rejected. The most common reasons by far are:
* Ideas that fail to take account of competition, or to differentiate themselves enough from the competition ("ours is better" doesn't quite cut it)
* Ideas that make great (or alright) businesses, but which don't take into account Channel 4's values or the Next On 4 outlook (i.e. they're not public service broadbanding)
* Ideas that don't have collaboration and participation as key, which are about viewing stuff online more than interacting with other people or collaborating on- or offline to create change.

Where we can, we also try to help identify who else might be interested in the idea.

4. Accepting ideas in principle and working them up

Rarely does an idea come in perfectly formed, and part of the commissioning process is not just £s, but is also working up those ideas together so that they'll work now, as they build into the mid-term and thrive well beyond 4iP's involvement. Every week I meet without about a dozen producers, programmers or writers to see how far we can take their idea; during this time we draw up a more detailed Case File, which contains more information than the initial pitch:
* Deliverables, timescales and costs
* Potential risks
* Rights and IPR details

It's also about this time that we start to involve co-funders in the project. These could be private companies with an interest in the idea's success, or public partners, such as those that form structural partnerships as part of 4iP (Scottish Screen, Northern Ireland Screen, Scottish Enterprise...)

It's also at this point that quite often I'm finding myself trying to marry expertise that could help make the idea come to fruition. Most ideas can't be produced by one indie or one individual - they need partnership not just in the funding but in the making, too. It's a lot more hard work, but it's hopefully going to make stuff that's better for it.

5. Legal, compliance and finance sign-off

Another Monday, another meeting. This is where the new information on some of the detail of the idea is worked through by our team of experts in legal, compliance and finance, and also where decisions are made to pay for projects. Sometimes the idea won't make it past this (it's happened just once so far), and often it's either just small tweaks or sound Ts&Cs that need confirmed.

6. Commissioned

A few clicks on a C4 app (the only time I'm obliged to use Windows, eurgh) and contracts can be drawn up and money put through the system. Your work on the idea begins.

Conclusion: The waiting game...

With over 500 ideas in the system, some of them still in draft phase and most of them needing some degree of partnering up to get to commissioning stage, the initial relatively speedy return to people is countered by a little more time than we'd like getting the right teams and the right funders together. However, it's still a lot faster than telly, and faster still than many startups would manage going it alone. Add to that three or four exciting equity deals on the cards in Scotland and we've got our work cut out in 2009 to create not only great ideas that change the lives of people in Britain but also to create and build up some great new companies, too.

Pic of C4