The Musings Of An Opinionated Sod [Help Me Grow!]

Doesn’t matter if it’s dating, business, or even getting someone to take out the bins … we are all capable of turning on our manipulation skills when it suits.

Nothing embodies this more than the agency pitch …

Where they bring out the most senior of senior leadership to the meetings …
Where they promise access to ‘the best of the best across the whole network’ …
Where they talk about developing specialised processes, systems and tools …
Where they discuss building a dedicated agency arm just for their service …
Where they say they’re open to new financial remuneration models and approaches …

And while I am in no way suggesting they’re lying about this, it rarely turns out like this.

There’s many reasons for that, of which one of them is prospective clients are also playing the same game …

Talking about the groundbreaking work they want …
Promising to provide good budgets, access and timelines …
Reinforcing how much they want a long-term partnership …
Championing the importance of debate and discussion …
Suggesting openness to new ways of working …

Again, not lying … but also not being entirely honest either.

If I’m being generous, a lot of this is because life and business is constantly changing and evolving so promised need to keep changing … however at the end of the day, the real problem isn’t that things change, it’s that we’re frightened of being transparent.

The irony of which is the greatest demonstration of respect – and arguably, the greatest way to build real trust – is being transparent.

By that I mean telling those around you, what is happening, when it’s happening.

Sure, I get there can be implications in doing that, but there’s far more if you delay speaking up …

It’s why I love Angela – Colenso’s CEO – attitude that ‘honesty trumps harmony’.

She’s right …

And while I appreciate it may not always be a comfortable conversation at the beginning … if you do it in a timely and transparent way, it always ends up being better than the alternative. That being people discovering the reality of the situation because of the disaster of the situation.

And yet so many still think that is a better way to deal with things … believing they can either overcome the situation or can hide the situation.

So why am I saying all this?

To be honest, I just wanted a way to justify posting these 2 photos because while the sum up the point of this post, the reality is they just made me piss myself laughing …

Because they’re true.

Oh so true.

The pitch …

The reality …