So I’m not here today.
Or tomorrow.
Or Monday.
Or Tuesday.
Or even Wednesday.
I know … I’ve been at Colenso 5 minutes, and I’m already taking some time off. But you see, it’s my birthday Saturday. Then Jill’s on Tuesday and Paul’s on Wednesday and I want to put in the energy into them that Covid took away.
My birthday last year was a weird one.
The good bit was that I got to be with my beloved family – and Paul and Shelly made a surprise visit [that I know absolutely won’t be happening this year] – and my old, wonderful team at R/GA got me a goat for a present [really!] … but it still was very different to what had been planned.
We were planning on all going to Spain.
Having a party by the sea.
And while what I ended up having was lovely and special … it wasn’t in Spain or by the sea.
What also made my birthday reality even more different to the original plan was when I received an SMS from a couple of the senior management at work asking me to immediately deal with a pretty shitty situation.
Despite knowing I was on holiday and knowing it was my birthday, they still asked me to deal with something of their own making that – to make matters worse – could have been dealt with weeks earlier or days later.
But even that couldn’t ruin the day and given it’s been a year since that happened – and only good has occurred since then – I want to make sure this birthday is one where we celebrate it with all the attention, compassion and focus we wished for that original day.
Of course it won’t be exactly the same – especially as we’re now living in NZ whereas Paul is in the UK – but it is going to be one where we get to celebrate all being in a happier, healthier, more enjoyable and fulfilling place and as birthday presents go, that’s almost as good as getting a video from ‘the Hoff’.
So to me. My wonderful, brilliant, beautiful wife. And my best, best friend in the whole wide world. Happy, happy birthday.
Here’s to us and to you.
You make every moment and every birthday worthwhile.
I hope we will all be together again soon.
Love you all.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Attitude & Aptitude, Corporate Evil, Technology, WeWork
I know the world has been affected by COVID.
I know most people are working from home rather than offices.
But … but … look at these results from WeWork:
I’ve written a lot about WeWork in the past.
I even worked with one of the founders in their early days at Wieden.
And there was even an occasion where they were talking to us at R/GA.
In every one of those encounters, I never understood why they referred to themselves as a tech company. Actually let me rephrase that. I did understand why they wanted to be seen as a tech company as it would mean their valuation would probably be even more ridiculous … but the way they talked about themselves in the early days – and the thing they were doing to make it real – meant they could still be something very powerful and influential if they’d just stuck with their path.
But they didn’t, which is why with Q1 results like that, it would appear their version of being a tech company was to be like Microsoft Vista.
Big hype.
But a terrible, terrible, terrible experience.
Which all goes to show that many in the investment community don’t make decisions on identifying new opportunities, but on being scared of being left behind.
Like most brand planning.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Attitude & Aptitude, Comment, Context, Culture, Emotion, Empathy, Experience, Management
A few weeks ago, in a supermarket in New Zealand, there was a terrible incident where a man entered a store in Dunedin and stabbed people.
While no one fortunately died and the assailant was apprehended, the reality is there were a number of people’s lives that were changed forever – specifically a number of the staff who were working at the Countdown store at the time.
Obviously this would be news anywhere in the world, but in New Zealand – a place where there is an overall feeling of safety and humanity – it’s a major story.
When the manager of the store – Kiri Hannifin – appeared on the nightly news … rather than present herself in the emotionless, beige voice of the corporate mission statement, she did something different …
She cried.
Not the fake tears of Matt Hancock … but real, raw emotion.
She was devastated her colleagues had been hurt.
She was distraught she felt she had let them down because as their manager, she believed her job was to protect them.
She was tormented that the pain of the tragic events would be felt by families throughout the community.
At a time where so many companies look at employees who express their emotions and feelings as weak or a pain-in-the-arse … the honesty of Kiri Hannifin was a welcome change, despite it being born from such a horrible reason.
In addition, the comments that accompanied her interview were almost entirely positive – which compared to the tsunami of hate that tends to follow good news stories in the UK and US – brought some hope from a tragic situation.
While I don’t know her, Kiri Hannifin appears to be a brilliant human and a brilliant manager. And Countdown – which is, let’s not forget, a supermarket – seems to value and employ people who value people.
So to all those companies who want to ‘connect’ to the public, maybe you need to hire more people like Kiri rather than faceless execs who are media-trained to within an inch of their life.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Agency Culture, Attitude & Aptitude, Authenticity, Comment, Creativity, Culture, Honesty, Management, Marketing, Metallica, Nike, Resonance
A few weeks ago – thanks to Metallica’s managers – I was asked to give a presentation to another of the bands in their roster.
They’re not as big or as successful as their management mates, but they are definitely a name and had a lot of ideas about the future.
I was asked to give my perspective on what they were thinking so wrote a presentation called, ‘How to stop you becoming twats’.
To be honest, it wasn’t going to be called that, it was just an internal working title – designed to scare their management team more than anything – so you can imagine my surprise when they just laughed and said I should keep it.
I must admit, I was very, very suspicious about why they were OK with it but decided to go with it because at the very least, I could blame them, haha.
Anyway, despite the very curious faces on zoom as I presented to them at 4am New Zealand time, it seemed to have gone down well … which is why I was somewhat surprised when the day after I received this email from one of the team.
Putting aside the worry they may have actually told me to present that title because they thought I would get murdered for it, it’s quite nice to have delivered a presentation of blunt truth [albeit, well intentioned] and been thanked for it.
It’s not as good as the insult I got from Lars – which was part of this preso – but it’s still good.
Now you may wonder how I got away with it?
Well I don’t really know …
However I do have a long career of being able to be very blunt with clients in a way where they continually invite me back.
I don’t think it’s because they’re masochists.
And I certainly don’t do it because I am a prick.
It’s purely because my sole focus is to help them win better.
It’s amazing what you can get away with when the person knows your ambition is for them, not for you.
Or as one of my best ever clients said to me – the NIKE CMO, Simon Pestridge – “middle management want to be right, senior management want to know how to be better”.
I may not suggest doing it in the way I do it, but truth should never be hidden or sugarcoated to the point where no one can actually taste anything you’re saying.
And if anyone pushes back on you for wanting to do this, just point them to this post … because if senior figures in global brands and members of global rockbands can take it, anyone can.
_________________________________________________________________________________
It’s a long weekend here for the Queen’s birthday, so enjoy the weekend and the exert day off free from my rubbish next week.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Attitude & Aptitude, Chaos, Comment, Content, Context, EvilGenius, Experience
Of all the types of revenge you can get, petty revenge is one of my favourites.
The beauty of it is that it’s petty. Meaning it’s for something the aggressor doesn’t even realise they have done. At least not until they experience the act of revenge.
The other wonderful thing is that the pettiness often extends to the act of revenge.
In most cases it’s about forcing some sort of ‘inconvenience’ upon the victim … even if organising it took longer than the actual inconvenience lasted.
It’s why the question asked of many revenge makers is, “was it worth all that time just to do that?”
And almost universally, the answer is “yes … it most definitely was”.
Over the years I’ve embarked on a reign of petty revenge terror. Seeking to even the score against people who have either inadvertently- or consciously – tried to fuck me or a mate over.
This has resulted in all manner of acts.
From stealing a single wheel from their desk chair so it was annoyingly lopsided … to having stickers printed so I could put the word “last” over all their out-of-date ‘agency of the year’ posters … to placing a ‘honk if you hate the police’ bumper sticker to the back of their car to having badges made that said “I’m a sexist twat” that we sent to every male boss who had harassed my female friends to – in the very old days – changing the keys around on their laptops in the knowledge they couldn’t touch type so every time they wrote words like ‘they’, it would type a very different word.
I would like to point out 3 things:
1. They all deserved it.
2. This was all a very, very long time ago.
3. I’m much more sensible these days.
Well, I say that, but when we lived in London, a neighbour denied they had taken delivery of my Amazon order – despite me being sent photographic evidence of them accepting it – so I spent 2 days signing them up to every catalogue I could find and I hope they’re still getting them. I added a nice touch by addressing it to, ‘Ima Lyer-Antheef’.
But compared to my friends, I’m still an amateur. The stuff they’ve done is incredible in it’s pettiness and time consumption.
There’s one involving a famous cereal manufacturer – that I can only say when on my death bed – that still raises a smile even though it occurred 16 years ago.
But all that pales into insignificance compared to this …
They say heroes wear capes.
Well sometimes they wear their pettiness on their sleeve.
All bow down to a true master at work. Bravo. Bravo. Bravo.