Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, Attitude & Aptitude, Pitch, Reputation, Respect, Teamwork, Trust
I love pitching.
I love the feeling of possibilities and potential.
I love being around people where we’re all focused on how a problem can be tackled in an interesting way.
I love the debate and the pushing of working out what’s the real problem we need to focus on.
I love watching the journey from everything to something …
Possibilities to a defined point of view.
It’s the thing that still gives me the most excitement … that triggers my insatiable desire to win better.
But – and it’s an important bit – that only works if we’re all are leaning in, because one thing I absolutely fucking detest is the backseat driver.
The people who are never short of opinion but always short of getting their hands dirty with the rest of us.
Who ask for meetings but then ask someone else to send the invite.
Who sit in reviews but do everything except what they’re supposed to do.
Who watch everyone working their ass off but never offer to help beyond a half-hearted enquiry as they are about to go home.
Who make their comments the morning after because they didn’t stay with everyone the night before to discuss the decisions.
Who sit around distracting everyone but not doing much for anyone.
Look, I get these things can happen occasionally and I also appreciate pitches often impact your life in ways that they shouldn’t – or you hope wouldn’t – but the people I’m talking about can be described by the very simple trait that they expect everyone to serve them rather than ‘muck in’. They convey an air of superiority regardless of their experience or level. And yet – should you succeed – you can be sure-as-hell they’ll be one of the first to insert themselves into any celebrations, acclaim or award, even though no one can actually define what exactly they did.
It’s why I love what someone told me they called them when I lived in Singapore.
Tai Chi Experts.
Not because of their calming influence.
Nor because of their clarity and control.
Because they are masters at one thing and one thing only.
Deflection. Deflection. Deflection.
Which is why for all the systems and processes the industry likes to claim it operates by, the reality is it’s driven by what I call ‘co-ordinated and synchronized sweat’ … which is why the people who ‘perform’ may still experience the kindness and care of their colleagues, but not the trust. And if that happens, then you’re probably fucked.
Which is why the best advice is to never be known as the Tai Chi Expert.
That doesn’t mean you have to destroy yourself to prove yourself, but it does mean you have to add to the process rather than just commentate on it.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Anniversary, Australia, China, Dad, Death, Family, Jill, Love, Mum, Mum & Dad, My Childhood, My Fatherhood, Otis
I think my Mum would be strangely happy that I almost forgot to write this post today.
And I did … only realizing last weekend today was the 11th anniversary of my Mum dying.
It’s not even the first time this has happened …
So how come I nearly forgot today – one of the worst days of my entire life – and why do I think Mum be happy about it?
Well, let’s do the practical reasons first …
I write this blog weeks in advance and so sometimes I don’t even think about the date they will appear, I just load them up to be automatically put out. That said, I’ve never nearly forgotten when it is Dad’s anniversary … however that’s a bit different to Mum’s in so much as he died in mid-January and so that tends to be one of the first posts I write every year, coming out the festive holiday season.
But that’s more of an assumptive rationale …
The fact is both my parents blessed me with an amazing childhood and upbringing. I’ve written so much about them over the years – from their endless encouragement to their demonstration of what love really means – and the loss of them was, without doubt, the hardest and biggest challenges I’ve ever had to face and deal with in my life.
But Dad died first – 16 years before Mum – and while I’d experienced the death of people close to me before, that was the one that was the most direct in terms of impact, importance and shock. It meant it took me years before I could think of Dad as the Dad I grew up with … rather than the person he became after his stroke robbed him of who he was and how he was.
But Dad’s passing opened up the ability for Mum and I to talk about death … and we did. A lot.
Not in an ‘impending doom’ kind-of-way … more in terms of the reality of what we’d faced and had to accept and learn.
It meant this was very much top of mind when Mum was going in for her operation. Maybe not spoken about openly, but definitely something that was in eachother’s minds. In fact, it was only after Mum had died – when the operation to extend her life, sadly failed due to a childhood issue that had gone undiagnosed – that I discovered just how much Mum had been thinking about it.
That she had written me ‘notes’ in case the worst happened – featuring information I’d need to make organizing her estate easier – is still one of the most powerful demonstrations of unconditional love I’ve ever seen. Though it still breaks my heart how she must have felt writing them – knowing that she was having to face her own mortality, on her own, while I was on the other side of the planet.
That said – as I wrote the morning she died – we’d found a lovely rhythm in the final few years.
We’d always had a wonderful relationship but there was a period where a few niggles had entered our interactions … nothing much, just a little tension caused by me wanting to take care of her and her wanting to fiercely protect her independence and have me look after myself and my future more. But we’d got past that by realizing both us were coming from a place of love … so we made allowances for each others needs, which meant she let me put money in her bank account every month and I didn’t mind that she never spent a penny of it. Haha.
And while the days leading up to her death will be forever burned in my mind, my memory of Mum has never been stuck in that period, like it was for Dad for all those years. I don’t know why but I’m grateful for it.
Maybe it’s because I became better equipped emotionally after Dad died?
Maybe it’s because Otis was born 3 months before Mum passed and so that period was consumed with happy thoughts throughout that time?
Or maybe it’s because I’d seen Mum a lot before she died – every month for 6 months or so – and so saw the impact of her heart condition on her health – meaning it was less of a surprise to me, even though I thought the operation was going to make things better?
Who knows … but while today will always be significant in my mind, it’s not the main thing that immediately comes to mind. Instead I think of the conversations we had when I came to visit … the pasta she would lovingly make for me … the look of happy surprise on her face when I turned up unannounced from Australia … the tennis she’d play with me on the patio in the back garden in summer when I was a small kid … the joy on her face when she learned she was going to be a Grandma … the stories she would tell me of the films or comedians or concerts she’d gone to see … the quiet contentment we felt when we were in the same room together, even if nothing was being said.
I think of those things WELL before anything to do with her dying.
I think of her grace, her kindness, her love, her curiosity, and her compassion.
I think of how much I wish she could see the grandson she never met, but adored.
I think of how she will never know I lived in America and back in England and now NZ.
I think of how she would react to Bonnie. [And the news of Rosie]
I think of how she would react to ‘healthy me’.
I think of how lucky I was – and am – to be able to call her my Mum.
And that’s why, I am sure Mum would be happy that I almost forgot to write this post …
Because it means her memory is alive and present in my life and that means she achieved what she hoped for most in her life.
That she was a good Mum.
And she was. And still is.
I miss you Mum. I hope you’re with Dad, holding hands.
I love you.
Filed under: 2026, A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, Apathy, Attitude & Aptitude, Business, Colenso, Colleagues, Comment, Complicity, Conformity, Content, Context, Craft, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Curiosity, Delusion, Differentiation, Distinction, Diversity, Effectiveness, Efficiency, Emotion, Empathy, Focus Groups, Inclusion, Insight, Management, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Marketing Science, Planners, Planning, Point Of View, Process, Professionalism, Relationships, Relevance, Reputation, Research, Resonance, Respect, Standards
Recently I had to interview a relatively well known singer songerwriter.
While their major successes were in the 90’s, they’d always had a place in popular culture – albeit British culture.
I went into the call only knowing what I had read up about them and what I had thought about them when they were making hits … so while I was intrigued to chat, I wasn’t exactly sure how it was going to go.
Fortunately for me, I had a secret weapon and that was a Mum who had instilled in me to ‘always be interested in what others are interested in’.
What this means is your job is simple: listen to them and follow where they take you.
That doesn’t mean you can’t ask questions.
Nor does it mean you can’t challenge them when you feel their answers contradict each other.
However, rather than go into it looking for faults or specific answers, your focus is simply to understand how they think and see the world.
And I am so grateful for that because the conversation was amazing.
Not just in terms of what was discussed, but how much I understood and – even related – to many of the choices and decisions they made on their journey.
A reminder that whoever you are … whatever plans you have … or wherever you’re from … we’re all bumbling along trying to make sense of the stuff we experience and are exposed to, while trying to keep on some sort of path we feel we can manage or hope to navigate.
I came out of our chat with a totally different perspective of this indivudual – both as a musician and as a human.
More than that, it allowed me to look back on my perceptions and realise how much I had let prejudices, associations and media [mis]shape my point of view. Or said another way, how I had chosen to ‘tune out’ their reality and ‘tune in’ to the noise surrounding them.
Noise created by people who often didn’t know them and certainly didn’t know what they were going through.
We all have experienced a version of that in our life. Now imagine it on a national and international scale?
Which is why that chat not only helped me see their choices and career through an entirely different lens … it made me feel deeply ashamed of myself.
Of my prejudice.
Of my judgement.
Of my wasted energy.
And I told them and they were incredibly kind and gracious about it. Far more than I deserved, let alone expected … but I can honestly say, I now look at who they are and what they have done – and do – with deep respect rather than judgement or ridicule.
That doesn’t mean I suddenly love their music – I don’t – but I do now completley understand where it came from and what it represented. Especially to them. And that – ironically – has allowed me to connect to them as an artist and a human far more than I ever imagined was possible … amplified by their openness, warmth and willingness to be vulnerable about moments in their life that were most definitely not easy.
I say all this because I think where I started prior to the interview represents what our industry is doing day after day.
Relying on cherry-picked data points, shortcuts and convenient answers, rather than going out their way to truly understand the textured lives, perspectives and challenges of the audiences they want and need to connect and engage to.
What’s making this even worse is how many research companies are now outsourcing ‘data gathering’ to AI driven bots … reinforcing that business increasingly values speed, convenience and efficiency over depth of underrstanding.
And the result of all this?
False perceptions.
Self-interest driven solutions.
Increased category convention advertising.
Or, to sum it up even more devastatingly … Maxwell House idiocy thinking.
It’s why I’ve always seen strategy as an outdoor job more than a desk job.
It’s why I’ve put-out books about what society is thinking over what marketing is claiming.
It’s why I’ve always favoured working with people like On Road and Ruby Pseudo over the conglomerate research companies.
And finally, it’s why – when told by planners they don’t have time to go out and talk to people – I’ve said that even if they talk to 3 people in the streets, that’s likely 3 more than anyone else. Because as much as it is always the right thing to make time for more understanding, the point isn’t about scale of opinion, it’s about scale of the nuances you will discover … because when you’re open to that, you’ll not only learn how much you never knew, but see how much your creativity can now impact and achieve.
I like food. Actually, that’s wrong, I fucking love food.
Not the fancy stuff, just classic, everyday comfort shit.
It’s why one of the only ways I was able to get healthy was by ridding myself of all temptation and shut it out my life.
So, no ‘cheeky’ bites.
No ‘super small portions’.
No ‘just a taste’. Nothing. Nada. Zilch.
Instead, I replaced my diet with ridiculous amounts of spinach, mushrooms, chicken, fruit and chili flakes. And while that might sound horrific in comparison to what I used to consume, I’ve developed a bunch of different ways to cook it that – along with regular walking/running – has let me lose weight without feeling I am also losing the enjoyment of eating. [or the will to live]
But since losing over 57kgs and maintaining it, I’ve been slowly re-entering normal life … by which, I mean going to the odd restaurant rather than cooking everything myself. And I’ve generally been able to make good choices – without going over-the-top in terms of quantity – however it has also helped me realize that as good as I have been, there are some foods that I am incapable of offering any form of resistance.
If you’d asked me what I thought that food would be when I started this journey, I’d have answered ‘pasta, butter, cheese and salt’ without a moment’s hesitation.
But I was wrong, because if I see that on the menu, I can skip past it without any effort whatsoever.
But bread?
But sausages and mash?
But a fucking banoffee pie?
Nope. Not at all. The moment I see it, my brain shifts …
It starts by screaming ‘DON’T EVEN LOOK AT IT ROB’
Then, within seconds, it starts love bombing me with thoughts like, ‘Maybe you could have a teeny, little bite?’
And almost immediately after, it metaphorically grabs me by the cheeks, looks me right in the eye and tells me, ‘Eat it. You don’t go out often. Put it in your mouth and enjoy it. You’ve earned this. You deserve this’.
And I do.
And yes, I fucking adore it.
And while it’s true I don’t go out to restaurants very often and I am very, very good at all other times, the fact is I do this EVERYTIME I go to a restaurant.
EVERY. TIME.
And here’s the reality …
If I went to a restaurant every day, I’d do it every day. I am helpless to its power.
I love the taste.
I love the texture.
I love the feeling.
I love every single bit of it.
So, whereas I’ve found a healthy, decent alternative to pasta that satisfies my cravings … I haven’t found anything that comes close to that other stuff.
Sure, there’s plenty that claims it … but there’s nothing that comes close.
Which reveals that the biggest challenge with food is not just the taste, but the texture and context … and if the health food companies spent a bit more time on that, maybe more people would feel able to change their life.
But none of that – none of it at all – has anything to do with this post.
Not really. I wrote all that to justify this …
You see a few weeks ago, I was in the office kitchen when I found that tin of mushy peas.
I have no idea why it was there.
I have no idea how long it was there.
But I do know that if I couldn’t have them on chips and gravy – loaded with salt and vinegar – the next best thing would be to heat them up, put a big dollop of mint sauce all over them and, voila, get transported back to my youth at Nottingham’s Goose Fair where each year, we would eat them out of a stylophone cup and say – semi correctly – we were enjoying a big cup of ‘Culinary Jesus’™.
So I did.
Which means not only is there another ‘food’ I have to now add to the bread … banoffee pie … and sausage, mash and gravy kryptonite list, it’s another reason why my doctor is grateful I don’t live in England anymore … haha!
Filed under: 2026, A Bit Of Inspiration, Anniversary, Colenso, Comment, Family, Home, Jill, London, Love, New Zealand, Otis, Rosie
5 years ago today, we landed in Auckland.
FIVE BLOODY YEARS!
That’s the 3rd longest I’ve ever lived in a single place.
NZ was never on the plan, but Colenso was a place I’d always loved and so when they reached out post-R/GA redundancy [which came about by the then ‘shocking’ way I promoted my redundancy, which was covered by The Guardian Newspaper], it was suddenly a real option – made even more desirable after Jill told me [having mentioned they’d got back in touch] that “it would be nice to be closer to my Mum”.
Up until then, I thought we were going back to the US, but not only did I feel I needed to do something for the woman who I’d dragged all over the World after telling her we’d only have be away from Australia for a max of 2 years [Ahem!] both NZ and Colenso offered us things that were much more where we were and what we needed in our lives and work right then – from being cool with letting me continue doing my private projects through to giving us an escape path from Covid-ridden England … that is until it arrived in New Zealand and put us back in bloody lockdown, hahaha.
[That said, our immigration hotel – The Ibis – was in Hamilton, and as people from NZ will know, it was good prep, ha]
That said, it took a lot for us to get there.
First was getting approval to travel to NZ … then there was getting a spot in the quarantine hotel … that had to also align with the insanely limited flights to NZ … which was made harder by needing to find an airline that would also take our cat … plus the endless COVID tests we had to provide to different government departments, up to 24 hours before leaving …
And that’s before we talk about organizing the visas for me, the family and the bloody cat to enter the country … telling our bank that we were off to live on the other side of the planet on the very day we moved into the house we’d just bought in the UK … through to organizing a bloody coach to get us to Heathrow Airport, to ensure there was enough distance between us and the driver so there was no last minute COVID fuck-ups.
[The photo at the top of this post is from us getting on the plane and getting ready to take off]
And while moving across the world during a global pandemic is something I would never, ever recommend – and this is coming from someone who has moved countries into the double digits – we made it and were grateful for all NZ – and Colenso – has done [and does] for us.
That doesn’t mean NZ is perfect …
In many ways, it’s position as a ‘global utopia’ is worthy of a Grand Prix for PR given there’s a whole host of things that are fucked up that people outside of NZ rarely know about, let alone see … from deeply entrenched racism, a youth suicide rate that is proportionally – and continually – one of the highest in the world plus an overall lack of economic investment and youth opportunity to name but a few … however compared to many other places, it’s still a whole lot better in a whole lot of ways.
That said, we won’t be here forever.
Don’t know when that move will happen, but it will.
That we’ve been here 5 years is already incredible to us, given bar China, our usual tenure in a country is about 2-3.
But that’s how good the place is. And Colenso.
So why can I say we will leave at some point in the future?
Well, there’s a bunch of reasons why – of which one is the idea of living in one place till the end of my days fills me with dread – but the fact this place is already the 3rd longest place I’ve ever lived proves NZ is somewhere I regard as very special and why I’ll always see my time here as a chapter of true significance. It’s also why I hope when the day comes for us to leave, the people who matter feel I/we contributed at least as much as we were lucky and grateful to receive from them and the country as a whole.
And let me tell you, I haven’t felt that way about all the countries I’ve lived in, hahaha.
So to everyone in NZ – well, 98.46% of you – and everyone at Colenso …
Thank you.
For all you are and all you have done.
It’s been 5 pretty fucking awesome years. At least speaking for us, ha.