Filed under: Comment
So recently I had a major falling out with a very dear friend of mine.
A major falling out.
And a very dear friend.
The problem was, I didn’t know she was angry until she wrote an email featuring some of the most vicious accusations you could ever hope not to get.
She was majorly pissed off.
So pissed off that she was happy to write off a 15 year friendship, despite us having supported each other through all sorts of trials and tribulations in all sort of situations.
And what was it that had caused all this anger?
I didn’t send a card when her new born baby was born.
OK … OK … so I should have, but it’s not like I wasn’t in contact or telling her how happy and proud I was on a regular basis.
But that sounds like I’m justifying myself and that’s not the point of this post.
The point is my friend expected me to react to her big news in a certain way and when I didn’t, she took it as a major – and personal – insult.
But I didn’t know.
I didn’t realise.
And while you may think this makes me thick – and maybe I am – it provides a valuable lesson for her, for me, for you …
DON’T ASSUME.
Don’t think people – even people you have known and worked with for years – are always going to be on the same wavelength as you.
That doesn’t mean you have to treat people like village idiots because at the end of the day, if people don’t react or respond in the way you hoped, you have to accept that you might have to shoulder some of the blame.
Did you tell them what you wanted? What you expected? What you hoped for?
Did you explain why it was important to you?
Did you give them any information at all?
This is more than two friends having a bust-up … adland is terrible at giving [and taking, but that’s a post for another day] direction.
Maybe it’s because we think it’s ‘un-creative’ … but there’s a big difference between articulating expectations and dictating how you want it done.
Explaining your expectations up front allows clarity right from the start.
It means everyone knows where they stand and gives them the chance to express their point of view or perspective before any issue has a chance to take hold.
So often we take other people’s understanding of what we want for granted … and while 90% of the time, we might get away with it, that doesn’t mean we should continue in this manner because it just means that when something does fuck up, the level of anger will be even greater because both parties will think the other person understood them and their mistake is a sign of selfishness.
I feel terrible about my friendship, however while I accept I might have done better … I also know it’s impossible to live up to someone’s expectations when they haven’t told you what they want.
Life is full of complexity and confusion without us adding to it, so make sure you’re assumptions won’t come back to deeply hurt you.
Filed under: Comment
So today is Valentines Day … that special day where men are guilt-tripped into spending copious amounts of cash on overpriced cards, flowers, chocolates, dinners as a public statement of ‘I LOVE YOU”.
Seriously, it’s almost insulting that companies think a woman could be so easily won over by some dropkick boyfriend simply because he sent her a card.
Isn’t that basically corporate sexism?
Maybe!?
I’ve written a lot about how much this day pisses me off [like this one] however I recently came across something that made me think men are starting to fight back.
See that card?
Well it’s a range of Valentine’s Day cards from Asda supermarket that cost 7 pence each.
SEVEN PENCE.
That’s even less than Billy spends on wooing his lady-friends.
But even better than that, they’ve gone and placed their name right on the front of the card.
I don’t know about you, but nothing says “I Love You” like a 7 pence Valentine’s Day card, made out of the cheapest paper possible with the name of a ‘every day low price’ supermarket plastered on the front.
But that’s the genius of it.
Because at the end of the day, a 7 pence Valentine’s Day card is still a Valentine’s Day card and for a woman, that is still ten thousand times better than having nothing at all … which is why I can’t help but feel the person behind this bit of evil genius was a man.
I should point out my hatred of Valentine’s Day is not because I think expressing your emotions is weak … far from it … I hate Valentine’s Day because it has fuck all to do with love and all to do with fear which is why I subscribe to the view that ‘real love’ is all about telling – and showing – what that special person means to you, each and every day.
Well, that’s my excuse to Jill and I’m sticking with it.
Filed under: Comment
So last week I woke up to hear the tragic news that Nigel Doughty was dead.
He was 54.
Nigel Doughty was an incredibly successful and talented business man … making millions with his investment company, Doughty Hanson, and then – showing he wasn’t always so smart – blowing almost 100 million pounds on Nottingham Forest.
Yes, 100 million pounds.
All that investment and where are we? Yep … 2nd from bottom in the Championship with relegation all but guaranteed.
That aside, his death really affected me.
Not because – like some Forest fans – I was concerned how his death might leave our rubbish football club – but because it re-inforced that you can’t escape death.
Without being morbid, I think about this a lot.
I have found myself – like my father before me – reading obituaries, however unlike him, I pretty much only focus on how old they were when they died.
I think about whether they knew they were going to die?
What they did that day?
How they died?
Were they alone?
Were all their affairs in order?
Nigel Doherty was – on face value – a fit and healthy man.
He was rich, happily married and incredibly successful.
Yet at age 54, it appears he suffered from a heart attack while exercising at his home gym.
What a tragedy.
I don’t know what I’m writing this for or what I really want to say other than you never know when it’s all going to end so to put off what you really want to do seems a terribly foolish – and risky – move.
I’ve met so many people who say stuff like …
“one day I’ll _______________” or “I’d love to be a __________________”
… but it doesn’t happen if you don’t make it happen.
Maybe they’re people that I heard Sir Ken Robinson once describe as ‘idea lovers’ …
They are in love with the THOUGHT of doing something, rather than doing it.
You know, the people who say they’d “love to play the guitar” but have never picked one up.
The people who say “they’d love to change careers” but don’t want to take a pay cut.
The people who say “they want a promotion” but don’t want added responsibility.
Trying and failing is not failing.
Not trying is failing.
Of course everyone is different, but I know when I eventually pop my clogs, I hope people can look at what I’ve done and say, “he lived a full and interesting life” because I know that’s what I’m trying to do and what my parents always encouraged me to do.
I’ve gone off tangent again haven’t I!?
Well what I want to say is thank you Nigel Doughty for everything.
Thank you for saving my club from extinction.
Thank you for being a good Dad and husband.
Thank you for showing rich doesn’t mean heartless.
Thank you for showing success shouldn’t stop experimentation.
Thank you for getting me to do my bloody annual health check.
Life’s short. Live full.
Filed under: Comment
I’ve written a lot about the loss of long copy ads – and how the industry has mixed up people’s reluctance to read words that don’t interest them with volume of words.
Long copy ads are fast becoming part of a by-gone era, but I recently came across an ad that just might change all that …
[See it clearer, here – but please read it]
___________________________________________________________________________
Have you checked it out?
Have you?
Honestly, you have to see it before you read any further.
All done?
OK, so let’s continue.
Seriously, how amazing is that.
I absolutely and utterly love it.
I adore the pace … the eloquent phrasing … the way it constantly tries to coax a reaction by gently probing, tempting, flattering, challenging and misdirecting your trains of thought … the requirement to stay completely focused … the need to read between the lines … the incredibly slow reveal and – at the very end – the slight touch of menace they’ve intertwined with an air of concern as they warn you, in the most gentlemanly way possible, to keep this all strictly confidential.
This is copywriting at its best.
Storytelling at its most supreme.
And best of all, you are the star.
Of course given it’s an ad to attract potential ‘spies’ means it was always going to be interesting and intriguing, but that’s why the writing is so wonderful, because they’ve resisted the urge to scream it out from the rooftops, and instead, chosen to let the ad speak in a way that I imagine a real British spy would act and sound:
Calm. Eloquent. Controlled. Educated. Informed. Intelligent. Ambiguous … and ever-so-slightly intimidating.
I also love how the ad has been made to look.
No logo. No headline. Just – on first glance – an innocuous page, standing slightly behind all the other pages screaming for your attention.
It blends itself in the background, wanting you to come to it, not the other way around.
Treating the reader with the intelligence they can work it out.
Filtering out candidates by every line that they read.
Based on the ‘rules’ that much of today’s advertising seems to adhere to, this is almost the perfect anti-ad … and yet it’s one of the best ads I’ve seen in a long time.
I don’t mean best long-copy ads, I mean ads full-stop.
Apart from it being by M&C Saatchi London, I don’t know who specifically wrote this ad for the British Government … I don’t know if we’re ever going to be allowed to know who specifically wrote this ad for the British Government … but I want them to know it’s an exercise in communication magnificence and it restores my faith in what this industry can achieve when it wants to, and when a client allows it to.