Filed under: 2026, A Bit Of Inspiration, Aspiration, Attitude & Aptitude, Comment, Corporate Evil, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Effectiveness, Efficiency, Emotion, Empathy, Experience, Leadership, Loyalty, Management, Passion, Stress
Over the years I’ve written a lot about companies viewing ‘emotional people’ as problems.
Viewing them as too passionate.
Too dramatic.
Too impatient.
But the reality is, emotion means you give a fuck and I’d rather have that than work with robots who efficiently execute what’s needed without ever wishing to add, elevate or challenge the status quo.
Of course, the irony is the companies who criticise employees for caring deeply about what they do, tend to also expect their people to be disproportionately passionate and loyal about the company – but guess what fuckers, you can’t have one without the other.
Now I appreciate there are different ways to express emotion …
And when it becomes about what YOU want versus what you want the work to be – they’re very different things.
But having people who care … who deeply want to do the right thing, the better thing and the new thing … is creatively and commercialy far more valuable – let alone interesting – than having an entire department of drones. And yet in these optimisation obsessed times, companies have decided the opposite is true.
Which leads to the point of this post.
Recently I saw this clip of Robert Glasper playing Radiohead’s ‘Everything In It’s Right Place’.
In it, you witness Robert crying as he plays the piece.
The emotional impact he feels because of the piece.
It’s not ego.
It’s not performative.
It’s pure, unfiltered emotion. For a piece of music he didn’t write but feels deeply connected to.
So connected, he gives his all in performing it. To honour what it means to him and what he hopes the audience will get from it.
In many ways, it’s one of the most selfless, geneous acts you could ever witness.
Something I am sure Radiohead would feel honoured by, rather than say:
“Robert … Robert … stop being so emotional about the music. It makes us feel uncomfortable and we don’t know how to deal with it”.
Because that’s the thing … the issue of emotion is not about the person feeling it, but the people who never can.
Who are so disconnected to what they do, the only thing they value is the checklist of what has been done.
Because for them, quality isn’t the goal, it’s productivity.
People who care about what they do and what the company does, is a gift.
It’s why we have to put an end to this false narrative of them being a problem … because they provide life to what so many senior leaders destroy.
Enjoy.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, Attitude & Aptitude, Business, Clients, Communication Strategy, Complicity, Confidence, Conformity, Consultants, Craft, Creative Brief, Creative Development, Creativity, Experience, Fulfillment, Management, Marketing, Marketing Fail
I’ve been around.
I’ve been doing this strategy thing for longer than many who read this blog have been alive.
And of all the things I’ve learned, one of the most valuable has been to never doubt the importance of having a good client.
To be clear, a ‘good client’ doesn’t mean they never challenge you. Or place high expectations on you. Or resist the urge to add pressure to what needs to be done and by when.
The reality is good clients do all those things. The difference is how they do it and why.
Because a good client acts as a proper partner.
They take responsibility for what they need to make happen.
They calm and control the internal noise, voices and opinions.
They share your ambition for the work, not just for the desired impact of the work.
They welcome, encourage and invite truth and transparency.
They remove the barriers and fears that stand in the way of making something great.
The don’t blame, shame or complain – they stay the course and know when to get involved and, just as importantly, stay out the way.
They never dictate … because they’re always clear with what needs to be done and why.
And if things change, they tell you early and transparently.
Plus you know they will have done what they can before that situation occurred.
They always listen at least as much as they talk.
They brief with an actual document not just a casual conversation.
They give feedback that is objective rather than just subjective
They don’t let internal processes stand in the way of opportunities that come their way.
They trust you and your expertise and look for the best rather than seek out the worst.
And they never, never treat you like you’re a servant, commodity or low-level employee.
They do all those things.
All of them. All the time.
Which is why you can have all the processes in the world …
You can have all the systems, data, structures and efficiency tools …
But not one of those comes close to what a great client can deliver and do.
For the work.
For the business.
For the customers and employees.
And for making sure you do everything you can to given them the work of their lives.
We don’t talk about this enough.
And we certainly don’t teach it or train it.
Instead, we keep hearing how we must adhere to a singular process or format, regardless of category or context, even though it has often been created by people who have never made anything of note and if they have, in one area and one area only.
You can tell who they are because they love to sound like they are business liberators when – as I’ve said many times – they’re far more like insurance salesmen.
And that’s find if you want that sort of thing – but often that is never how it is sold. Now of course I understand there’s huge costs and risks associated with creativity and marketing … but there’s a major difference between playing to win and playing not to lose … which is why there’s a huge difference between a client who uses process and deliverables as a stick and those who operate via transparency, taste and trust.
And for those of you who don’t think one person can negatively – or positively – influence the output of a corporation, even if they have built an approach and format that has been tested over years, I refer you to the quote by the Dalai Lama.
“If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping with a mosquito”
We need more training from the people who have made great things happen and over again …
Actual things, not just theories, self promotion or
Filed under: 2026, Advertising, Airports, Attitude & Aptitude, Birthday, Brand, Brand Suicide, Creativity, Culture, Customer Service, Effectiveness, Experience, Loyalty, Management, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Privilege, Professionalism, Reputation, Travel, Trust, Uncommon, World Cup
The next few weeks are big for me.
My birthday.
Jill’s birthday.
Paul’s birthday.
The World Cup starting.
Trips to LA, Milan, Berlin, London and Amsterdam.
Meetings and dinners with legends of film, fashion and music.
And a bunch of lovely planners in Germany, hahaha.
I’d love to pretend I’m nonchalant about it all, but that would be a massive fucking lie as I’m exited to fuck about it all – bar my birthday.
But this post isn’t about my impending weeks of mega-madness, it’s about the madness of dealing with British Airways.
I am in the incredibly lucky situation of having someone pay for all my flights.
Better yet, they are paying for them to all be Business Class.
I booked on Air New Zealand, who – because of the flight itinerary – also scheduled some of the flights on BA.
So far. So good.
Having chosen my seats on Air NZ, I went to BA to do the same with them … except my booking reference didn’t work.
I then tried logging into my British Airways Frequent Flyer account, but got the same response.
No problems, maybe they use a different booking reference, so I contacted Air NZ to ask – and they told me, they use the same number and so it should work.
So I tried again. Nothing.
So I tried calling. No answer.
So I tried their chatbot. No reply.
It was getting frustrating so I went on the website to see if there was another way to contact them and there was.
A customer service contact button. So I clicked on it and what did I find when I did that …
A postal address.
A fucking postal address!
They want me to write – from New Zealand – to work out why my booking reference number doesn’t work. Mind blowing.
But it gets worse …
You see, I went back to Air NZ and told them the situation and they said they would talk to BA on my behalf. And they did.
So after 3 attempts for the website to accept my login details, I go on there to choose my business class seats and what do I find?
Yep, they want to CHARGE ME for choosing a seat.
This on top of the fact it has already cost a fuck-ton of cash.
Now I appreciate this is a first world problem.
I totally get I’m incredibly fortunate to be able to experience this.
But it blows-my-fucking mind that BA wants to charge me even more money to choose which seat I fly in – especially when airlines like Air NZ, let you do it when you fly economy.
Now I should point out BA have said once check-in is open – ie: 24 hours before the flight leaves – I can choose my seat for free, but apart from that still being bollocks, I am pretty sure when I try to do it, they’ll tell me I have to mail in my request by post.
Uncommon have done some amazing work for British Airways.
They have elevated their standing and prestige with some beautiful work.
And the line they created – A British Original – sounds great, until you remember that the British Leyland Mini Metro and also one of those and was a fucking shit experience as well.
Filed under: 2026, A Bit Of Inspiration, Agency Culture, Apathy, Aspiration, Attitude & Aptitude, Comment, Confidence, Content, Context, Corporate Evil, Corporate Gaslighting, Curiosity, Effectiveness, Efficiency, Egovertising, EvilGenius, Experience, Facebook, Influencers, Leadership, Management, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Marketing Science, Perspective, Planning, Point Of View, Popularity, Relationships, Relevance, Reputation, Research, Resonance, Respect, Ridiculous, Strategy, Stubborness, Technology, Toxic Positivity, Trust, Truth
When I was growing up there was a newspaper cartoon called ‘Andy Capp’.
Andy was a cliche of the working-class – albeit he never actually works – and lives in Hartlepool in the North East of England.
Andy is married to his long suffering wife, Flo – and despite her working – they are almost on the verge of poverty because apart from Andy being unemployed, he lacks any motivation and thinks he can ‘beat the system’ because of his smarts.
By that, think early stage manosphere but replacing the sexualization of women with more pure sexism.
Anyway, the reason I say this is because I remember one cartoon where Flo told Andy that they were in debt to the tune of £1000.
To which Andy replied something like:
“I told you Flo, if you owe £100 you’re a failure. If you owe £1000 you’re an entrepreneur. If you owe a £10,000 you’re a businessman and if you owe £1,000,000 you’re a government. So what this means Flo, is we’re on the way up!”
I don’t know why I remember that cartoon among the millions of things I’ve seen over the years – but it has always left a lasting impression on me, which may explain why I’ve tended to only seek – or listen to – the advice I’ve got from people who either failed trying or succeeded by doing. Sounds obvious doesn’t it? Yet everyday I read/hear/watch people spouting unsolicited advice about subjects they have almost zero right or credibility to do – mistaking opinion as fact, interest as knowledge, knowledge as expertise or ego as cleverness.No wonder a famous football manager once told me to always learn from winners, not players.
Look, I get we all do this to some degree, but there’s a big difference between spouting an opinion or perspective and acting like you’re the indisputable, all-knowing, God-of-all.
The point is, regardless what Andy Capp says, we would not take his proclamations as fact.
We might accept it’s what he thinks is fact, but not what is true for all.
And yet, more and more, I’m witnessing business blindly follow the statements and proclamations of people who are the real-life, modern version of Andy Capp.
Kinda.
Because while they DO have jobs … and while they have even been successful in them … they are now telling people how to succeed in areas they have absolutely no right to talk about.
Not just because many have never worked in those areas, but they have a track record of making terrible choices when developing ideas outside of their core area of knowledge.
Enter Mark Zuckerberg.
I’m not doubting he’s smart.
I’m not doubting he loves technology.
I’m not even doubting his successes.
However, why are so many people listening [and investing] in his version of the future when not only is it designed around his ego and need for power and control – not to mention his desperation to be talked about in the same breath as Steve Jobs – this is a person who spent/blew/lost US$80 BILLION on the Metaverse??
EIGHTY. FUCKING. BILLION. DOLLARS.
I get innovation is expensive.
I appreciate all technology needs time to evolve.
I acknowledge that I have two of their Quest headsets.
But 80 billion?
To put it in context, the iPhone is said to have cost anywhere between $150 million and $3.2 billion. The creation of Google Maps is said to have cost around $1 billion to initially develop. Even the A380 aircraft – the biggest passenger aircraft in the history of aviation – ‘only’ cost around $25-35 billion to build.
And to add even more context …
80 billion dollars is the equivalent of being the 90th placed country in the World by GDP.
OK, so Zuck’s 80 billion was spent over a long period of time compared to how GFP figures are calculated, but still …
In fact, this suggests Zuck is someone who stubbornly believes he is always right.
Or at the very least, refuses to acknowledge where things aren’t working or where things need improving.
Sadly, we see this same sort of arrogance in our industry …
Where someone is successful in a particular disciple or with a particular agency or with a particular piece of work or with a particular promotion… and then suddenly, they believe they are more knowledgable, more successful and more authoritative than every other person in every other industry regardless of their actual level of experience and expertise.
And what is worse is they get away with it …
Because like Zuck, too many people hang onto their words like gospel, even though in many ways they’re speaking the same delusional clap-trap as Andy Capp, which suggests 2 uncomfortable truths.
1. The real problem with ego is not the person spouting the nonsense, but the people who choose to believe loud confidence over real experience.
2. Andy Capp may have been right because it does seem in business. ‘the more you lose, the more people believe you’re a success’.
Filed under: 2026, A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, Aspiration, Attitude & Aptitude, Comment, Communication Strategy, Complicity, Conformity, Craft, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Effectiveness, Efficiency, Egovertising, Experience
If you are going to read this post, please start by watching this clip …
I cannot tell you how much I love it.
Not because the speaker answers the question in a way that forces the entire audience to reconsider or re-evaluate their own perspective or judgement … but because I feel it shines a light on something we – as an industry – are increasingly failing to care about.
And that is, ‘do we like what we are creating?’
Don’t get me wrong, I know our job is to find a way to make audiences think or care about our clients in a way that offers them a commercial advantage … but too often it feels we’re ignoring the importance of whether ‘we like it’ in favour of whether ‘the focus groups’ and/or ‘research methodology’ does instead.
And while I fully expect many people will say, ‘who cares, the only people who matter are the customers’, you’d be wrong.
Not simply because it can feel you’re making work to please/appease the C-Suite more than the audience. Not simply because despite billions spent on market research [$150 billion in 2025], we still see high levels of underperformance when work is put out into ‘the real world’. But because if the people creating the work don’t find any joy in the work, then why the fuck do you expect anyone else to like it?
Actually, let’s go one step further …
If you don’t find any joy in what you’re creating, why would anyone else like it to the point they will actively choose to pay large sums of money for it?
Of course, ‘like’ is subjective. On top of that, it is incredibly dependent on having been exposed to a level of breadth, depth and craft of creativity that enables them to make objective and considered choices in how they judge and answer challenges. Which all leads to 3 points:
1. Companies need to stop thinking outsourcing their annual ‘one-size-fits-all’ training is acceptable behaviour. Especially when it’s outsourced to the same individuals and companies as everyone else is using, even though – ironically – they have never actually made any work that has made a sustainable and meaningful impact on society or categories.
2. Employees need to stop thinking that just because they receive a salary for doing a job – and/or have social media followers – they are equipped with all the skills, standards and qualifications to consider themselves ‘an expert’.
3. Marketing needs to respect and elevate the value of ‘experience’ again.
Not popularity.
Not price-point.
Not the ability to write ‘thought leadership’ articles.
Actual experience.
People who have consistently created, crafted and delivered work – not simply been associated with it – that has achieved, challenged pushed standards, brands and categories over and over again.
Because while they may be more expensive than other hires.
While they may be harder to work with because they call out the bullshit.
The value they offer is they’ll create work for you that passes the first level of the harshest critics … themselves.
And in a world of slop, parity and lowest common-denominator landfill, experience means you’ve just increased the odds of your business being able to take giant leaps rather than – at best – a few teeny-tiny, barely noticeable [unless pointed out with a big arrow] shuffles.