Filed under: 11.11 @ 11.11, Anniversary, Attitude & Aptitude, China, Chinese Culture, Comment, Creativity, Culture, Effectiveness, Entertainment, Marketing, Perspective, Planners, Planning, Point Of View, Relevance, Resonance, Shanghai
As I’ve said many times, I miss China.
I miss everything about it. Except the pollution.
It was – and remains – an incredible important and special place in my life, personally and professionally, and I’m so grateful I get to still do work there.
That said, there’s days where I miss it more than most and today is one of those.
Singles day – because of the date 11.11 – has become the single biggest shopping day on the planet. Bigger than the global Black Friday and New Years Day sales put together.
I have had individual clients sell US$100 million+ of product on that single day … and as huge as that is, it’s nothing compared to some other brands. You see, for all the talk of Singles Day being the luxury brand bonanza, the reality is it’s the more mundane things that sell in far bigger quantities.
There’s lots of reasons for that, of which money is only a small part.
That aside, the whole thing has become an extravaganza … even featuring international celebs [before they were in disrepute] in the lead-up … and yet, while it has finally been ‘discovered’ by many in the West, it still blows my mind at how little they really know, or care, about what started it, what drives it and what it represents to millions in the Middle Kingdom.
Of course I shouldn’t be surprised, because where China is concerned, the West still prefers to be deliberately ignorant to the goings on there … preferring instead to either ignore anything until is comes to the West, or just repeating what they’ve read somewhere without delving more into the culture or the history.
And that’s what I saw a lot there.
In fact, it’s a lot of what I saw wherever I lived, especially in Asia.
The preference for headlines rather than the details.
Easy wins instead of earning your rights.
Acceptance only when it was localised.
What scares me is this attitude seems to be extending beyond just knowing other cultures … but approaches to planning.
Answers rather than listening.
Comments rather than thinking.
Responses rather than considering.
Generalisations rather than nuance.
Complicity rather than a point of view.
I appreciate we live in a world where there is commercial benefit in speed. And while that doesn’t automatically mean it is wrong, it only works if you have people with the real experience and knowledge to be able to answer the problems properly.
There’s a massive difference between someone looking things up on Google and someone who appreciates the nuance and layers that goes behind opinion, beliefs and behaviour.
And yet too often these people don’t get valued by their companies.
Viewed as too costly … when the experience and knowledge they have is the difference between resonating with culture or shouting at people.
Or said another way, doing work that is for people rather than about them.
It blew my mind how little Western markets, and companies, valued my – and everyone else I know who spent considerable time in Asia – experience. I constantly felt a sense of distain from those who had never been there … as if the work and culture didn’t count for anything … despite the history, the economy, the culture and the technology.
Fuck, I had someone recently ask me if I knew TikTok was a Chinese company. A person who claims to be ‘an expert’ in digital. You should have seen their face when I told them that not only did I know that, but it had been around in China for years before it had come to the West.
This does not mean you have to live in another country to care about it. But generally, you do have to if you want to have any way of understanding it beyond the headlines and the superficial clickbait.
Which is why in the next few weeks if someone tries to present you a deck entitled, ‘Singles Day: all you need to know’ … just ask them what the premise is.
If they only talk about big numbers – and, god forbid – something to do with Confucius, run the other way. And if you think I’m joking, I can tell you about the time I was in Beijing and sat in a meeting full of CEO’s and the guest speaker started talking about his proprietary strategy for using Twitter, until it was pointed out that the government ban it there.
This guest was the head of strategy of a major ‘global’ digital agency.
Whether you like it or not, China is vital to your business.
Might be directly or indirectly, but it can’t be ignored, even if your ego has to take the hit.
The fact I have to write this in 2021 is mind-blowing, but here it goes:
Hire Chinese talent.
Value Chinese talent.
Learn from Chinese talent.
I promise you they’ll be able to help you and tell you stuff that is far more insightful and valuable that someone writing a presentation on Singles Day from information sourced via Twitter or the Daily Mail.
Love you China. Miss you.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Attitude & Aptitude, China, Chinese Culture, Comment, Context, Creativity, Culture, Dad, Health, Management, Pollution, Relevance, Resonance
Once upon a time, a creative friend of mine rang me up.
He had been offered a job in China and wanted to hear my perspective on being there.
During the conversation, he asked if the pollution was bad.
When I asked why he was asking, he said he was pretty susceptible to asthma and while on his visit to the agency there, he had felt a bit ill, despite the weather being good.
He had asked some of his prospective workmates if they felt the weather was ever bad for breathing and they all said no and he wanted to know my take on it.
I laughed.
Not just because it’s pretty well documented the air there is not great, especially for an asthmatic – despite the government being the biggest investor in green technology in the World – but because it reminded me of something my Dad had told me while watching the Tom Cruise movie, A Few Good Men.
I know this is going off on a tangent, but hang in there.
You see, at the scene where Jack Nicholson spouts his immortal “You Can’t Handle The Truth” line, my Dad burst out laughing.
When I asked why, he said this:
“There are occasions where people will openly deny truth. Not because they hold a different opinion, but because to accept it means they would have to accept their complicity in a situation truth has revealed. Sometimes, the simple act of acknowledgement means people are forced to face and question the motives and values they conveniently chose to hide away”
His point was literally what my friend had experienced.
The prospective colleagues he asked about weather conditions knew full-well there is pollution in the air. However, their mind had almost forced them to forget it. Not because they were liars or bad people, but because if they admitted the truth, then they would be forced to ask themselves why they were there when they knew it was likely to be doing them harm.
We experience this every day.
Deliberate ignorance.
From people hired to purchases made.
Not because people are bad, but because we don’t want face the questionable decisions we’ve chosen to make to benefit our personal circumstances over health, values or friendship.
Which is why my mate decided not to go to China.
The moral of the story.
Remember people sometimes don’t tell you what they think, they tell you what protects them from you knowing what they think.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, America, Attitude & Aptitude, Authenticity, Brand, Cars, China, Chinese Culture, Creativity, Culture, Wieden+Kennedy
Years ago, at Wieden, we pitched for Porsche.
Actually we pitched twice and lost both.
Then we pitched for them at R/GA and lost that.
Which means I am the Porsche problem.
Makes sense …
Anyway, the first time we pitched, Sam – one of the creatives, along with Ryan – wrote the best positioning line I’ve ever read.
I can’t say was it was because I don’t want someone to steal his work, but it was one of those moments where you go, “Fuck me, that’s amazing”.
It was so good it conflicted Porsche.
They didn’t like our work at all but wanted to give us the business because of the power of the line. Then ‘international politics’ got in the way and we got told to take a hike.
Or a drive.
Though I acknowledge that I probably didn’t help matters by asking them why they sponsored golf when that was the antithesis of what Porsche were about. Hahahaha.
Anyway, as part of the campaign, Sam wrote a line in the TV script that I also thought was wonderful.
One I am OK with sharing because it isn’t sooooo specific to Porsche. It was …
“Ribbons of road draped over highlands”
God I love it.
I love it so much.
It’s so bloody evocative and – for me – captures the perfect balance between the quiet determination of nature surrounding a thin line of tarmac that has been gently placed over it and the loud performance of a car that’s hurtling along it at breakneck speed.
Torturing and teasing each other.
Both trying to dominate.
A game of cat and mouse.
The fine line between respect and ridicule.
I say all this because I recently came across a picture of a road that I feel this was written for,
Where we were writing for China, this road is in America – California to be more precise – but it is perfect all the same.
Which is why if someone at Porsche reads this and wants to get their brand back to the stature it once had – rather than this ‘fast luxury’ superficialness that it currently seems happy to communicate … let me know, because have Sam, Ryan and I got a brand idea for you.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, Attitude & Aptitude, Authenticity, Brand, Brand Suicide, China, Chinese Culture, Comment, Communication Strategy, Confidence, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Emotion, Empathy, Insight, Marketing, Nike, olympics, Resonance, Shanghai, Sport, Wieden+Kennedy
I have now had time to get over the Euro finals.
While my Italian/English heritage meant I was going to ‘win’ regardless of the result – and while the result, at least to me, was probably fair – I was gutted for the England team.
Ironically, the disgusting behaviour of the fans after the match – fired up by the equally disgusting behaviour of the British government – kind-of made me happy they lost.
It’s at these moments teams – or brands – can fall away and so what happens next becomes unbelievably important.
It reminded me of 2008 when Chinese hurdler – and gold medal contender – Liu Xiang, broke China’s hearts by injuring himself during the race.
Remember, this was the year the Olympics was held in Beijing and in many ways, it was the governments ‘coming out’ party to the rest of the World. A chance to showcase the nations abilities, talent, skills and sophistication. A declaration a new superpower was here.
While that might have been news to the rest of the World, for the people of China, they had known this for a long time which is why when Liu Xiang faltered through injury, people – like in the UK – started to turn on him.
While he did not face the disgusting and disgraceful racist abuse certain members of the England team have encountered, he did face claims that by pulling out mid-race, he had not tried hard enough, had embarrassed China and sold the people false hope.
Because Liu Xiang was a NIKE athlete, overnight W+K Shanghai created an ad that aimed to reframe the loss for the people across China.
To shift emotions from anger to pride, love, support.
The next morning, this ad ran in most of the papers …
It is still widely acknowledged as one of the pivotal pieces of communication.
Not just by the industry.
Not just by NIKE.
Not even by Liu Xiang.
But by people across China who woke up to that ad the next morning.
Turning anger to sympathy.
Turning abuse to respect.
Turning sport into culture.
I say all this because on the day England finished runners-up in the Euro’s, the English FA released – what I consider – the modern version of our Liu Xiang ad.
I hope it works for England and their players.
But mainly the players.
Because they did bring something home …
Every one of them.
Pride. Unity. Hope.
Until those racist fucks robbed it off them … off the rest of us.
And while the media may like to suggest those responsible are a small minority of hooligans, the reality is it’s not a small minority and hooligans are not some cartoon villain.
In fact the problem is these pricks live amongst all of us. They are invisible because they look, live and work like so many of us. They’re fathers. Sons. Brothers. Uncles.
They’re also racist scum.
Exemplified by their hate towards the 3 England players who missed their penalties.
These 3 brilliant and inspiring men are young.
Hell, Bukayo Saka is 19.
NINETEEN.
At that age I couldn’t even ask out a woman who worked on the till at Asda, West Bridgford … so anyone who gives him shit when he’s playing for the England national football team, in the final of the Euro’s, at the most intense and pressured moment of the entire tournament, with billions watching can just fuck off.
Winning FIFA 2014 on Playstation doesn’t make you a winner, it makes you a fantasist.
And to them I am glad football didn’t come home.
I just wish football could take them far away from it.
Filed under: Advertising, Attitude & Aptitude, Birkenstocks, China, Chinese Culture, Comment, Creativity, Culture, Nike, Relationships, Relevance, Resonance, Respect, Sport, Wieden+Kennedy
One of the great pleasures of my career has been working with NIKE.
What made it even more memorable is that I got to work with them in China … where the challenge and opportunity to develop sport culture was arguably their number one priority.
What it meant was their best people were there and their most senior global management were constantly there so I got to meet them, work with them, present to them and argue with them on a regular basis.
They were good.
As in proper good.
I still remember the first time I met the most senior of senior management and when back to Wieden and said, “Oh, I totally get why they are who they are”.
And I did.
They were incredible.
Sharp. Focused. Ambitious. Progressive and obsessed with culture, sport and creativity.
Then there was the time I met Rosemary.
She had just come to China from the US and I remember being in a meeting where I saw all the global guys go up to her, when normally you saw people go up to them.
I mentioned this to her when we were having a coffee later that week and she eventually admitted the reason they all knew her was because she had been Phil Kinght’s kids babysitter when he was starting the company and she had actually painted the swoosh on the first shoes they produced.
Amazing.
As was her knowledge of the brand.
The nuance, not the headlines.
Underpinning all of these people was a backbone of belief. A pride of who they are matched with a responsibility for where they were going. They were challenging, demanding and questioning … but you always knew it was to get to great rather than to tear you down.
Frankly I’d not seen anything like that, at that level, before – and being old – I had been exposed to some amazing people within organisations.
I will be eternally grateful to Simon and Steve who both invited me in to meetings and discussions I should never have been in … as well as them not killing me when I turned up in my Birkies.
Now it is fair to say, the brand – for all the success it continues to have – has faced some headwinds. Some are shifts in culture, some are shifts in internal culture.
And while there are many opinions and viewpoints flying about, there are many who say the company they are today is not the same company they once were.
Some of that is good, some … well, probably less so.
Too many amazing people have departed.
Too much focus on sales rather than sport.
Too great an emphasis on optimisation rather than progression.
But the great thing about Nike is they always come back.
Sure, some of the things – and people – that allow that to happen are no longer there, but it will be back because this is not the first time they’ve gone through something like this.
Whatever ‘this’ is.
And recently I saw a clue it was starting, bizarrely from someone at McKinsey of all places.
This:
Cool, isn’t it?
But not because of Adam’s interpretation of why it exists, but because it exists.
Someone did this.
Someone chose to do this.
And while there are a whole host of possible reasons why it happened, to me it’s a sign of a brand that still has people in there – beyond the few left I know/work with – who do what they believe is right rather than what their process now dictates they do.
At its best, Nike was always an infectious culture machine.
Making it. Championing it. Enabling it. Fighting for it.
I’ve not seen that as much as I once did.
Maybe, a txt.file is a sign I will.
I hope so.