Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Attitude & Aptitude, Cannes, Creative Development, Creativity, Technology
I kinda love this drone usage at an open-air concert.
A simple ‘exit sign’ that allows the thousands inside to see how to leave the venue.
Nothing fancy.
Nothing overblown.
Just some practical magic.
It reminds me in many ways of the brilliance of the old SONOS logo – when it wasn’t old.
A static image that was carefully designed to look like moving sound waves. Amazing.
I say this because in our quest to create the shiny new thing, sometimes we forget the most useful thing. The stuff that surprises – and delights – in its practicality.
Small acts that feel big and – even more importantly – are memorable.
Don’t get me wrong, I love the bonkers and utterly imaginative stuff.
It’s important … it breaks new grounds and possibilities.
But that doesn’t mean we should discount doing the simple stuff in smart ways.
Because while I know it’s not sexy … and I appreciate a lot of it can be easily replicated … the fact is with so many ideas recently being exposed as ‘questionable’ at the Cannes Festival of Creativity – they’re not just useful, they’re real.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, Aspiration, Attitude & Aptitude, Career, Collaboration, Communication Strategy, Creative Development, Creativity, Culture, Empathy, Grifting, Metallica, Perspective, Resonance, Respect
This is a photo of Metallica’s road crew for their current 72 Seasons tour. I say that, but it doesn’t include the entire team who makes it happen … which totals around 500 people.
Five Hundred!
To allow 4 guys to play their songs to people around the World.
From stage riggers to wardrobe people to caterers to production crew to personal roadies to management to the 92 truck drivers.
Then there’s the people who are part of the tour but not on the tour …
From logistics people to fanclub project managers to lawyers to each and every one of the bands families.
It’s a lot.
Now the reality is the band are not just aware of this, but are deeply grateful and protective of everyone who is part of this … but the point of this post is not only does our industry love to place the spotlight on individuals – crediting them and them alone for whatever product, project or theory that is being celebrated – but too many of those individuals like to project the view that is entirely justified and as someone who has been in this industry longer than dinosaurs, the amount of times I’ve genuinely seen that, can be counted on one hand.
Don’t get me wrong, I have the ego of Bono.
And I appreciate everyone loves being told they’re good at what they do.
But there’s a difference between being celebrated and taking all the credit. And there’s a fuckload of people who – at least on social media – are happy to take all the credit.
Presenting themselves as some sort of comms Jesus.
Look, I’m not saying what they do isn’t good.
And I’m not saying what they do doesn’t have value.
However I am saying that in 99.9% of cases, they didn’t do it all on their own.
[Even though there’s more than a few you could possibly have that argument with, especially those who’ve never made work to back up their self-proclaimed genius or judgement]
Sure, maybe some of the help they received was people simply creating the conditions for them to be able to do whatever it is they do … but by the same token, ‘creating the conditions’ is exactly what those 200 people in the photo above do, and the band are very grateful they for that because otherwise no one would get to experience what is possible. Including James, Kirk, Lars and Robert.
My reason for writing this is because, as I said a few months back, too many people entering this industry are being subjected to a perspective that is inadvertently robbing them of what they could achieve if they didn’t fall into the ‘thought-leadership shortcut trap’.
That doesn’t mean they shouldn’t express their opinions and ideas.
That doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be ambitious in their aspirations and goals.
But it does mean they shouldn’t think working with others is a sign of failure … because not only is that a recipe for disaster, it’s also why the industry is becoming less and less of a community and more and more an ego battlefield.
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Also, today is the 1st anniversary of our dear Rosie passing.
On one hand it feels longer than that, on the other only it feels just a few weeks.
Despite being small, she’ll always have a big place in my heart and life and I’ll be thinking of her and ‘her ways’ even more today.
Miss you Rosie.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Agency Culture, Ambition, Attitude & Aptitude, Career, Creativity, Dad, Mum, Mum & Dad
What is success?
Is it the job title you have?
The salary you are paid?
The area you live in?
The company you work for. Or with?
The satisfaction you get from whatever it is you do?
The strength to leave a job that is hurting you, even though they are paying you?
The health and wellbeing of your family?
Your friendship circle?
The number of talks you’re invited to be a part of?
Of course, the reality is its different things for different people … made up of many elements, rather than just one … and yet when you look at Linkedin, it appears the only metric worthy of success is one that reaffirms your professional status.
I get it, Linkedin is ‘supposedly’ a professional network … but the myopic view of success is tiring and, arguably, unhealthy.
An obsession with being seen as a ‘thought leader’ … a person who is ‘changing the industry’ … a person who is in an endless stream of ‘leadership positions’.
Don’t get me wrong, it takes a lot of work to achieve that, but there’s 3 issues.
A lot of the ‘thought leadership’ or ‘changing the industry’ being spouted and promoted is – on closer inspection – simply reciting old rules with new terms.
A lot of what the industry calls success is about what is said, rather than what is created.
A lot of the focus is on celebrating an individual, rather than acknowledging the group.
While I fully appreciate that even with this, there’s a lot of effort and commitment people put into it, not to mention it is not their fault the industry chooses to focus on points 2 and 3, rather than them actively pushing it – though some do – my issue is it not only sets a weird definition for success, it also means anyone entering the industry is being told the secret to their progress is not about quality of work, but how popular they can become.
But arguably, it is even worse than that.
Because it also says that the only success worth caring about is professional achievement.
Forget personal fulfilment.
Forget professional development.
Forget health, happiness and family.
If you’re not getting the likes, you’re not living a successful life.
This doesn’t mean you can’t be proud of what you do.
Or who you do it for.
Or even what you get because of it.
But myopically defining success in terms of salary and status is about as toxic as you can get – especially when there are so many people doing so many amazing things across the industry but are universally ignored because they don’t court fame or don’t play the game that the industry increasingly demands you play.
Our industry is a special industry, that can do special things … but we’re in the shit right now, fighting for our relevance, value and impact … and if we’re not careful, we’re in danger of focusing so much on elevating false gods and prophets, while we sink without a trace.
Doesn’t have to be the case … but it will require us to value those who make change rather than are popular for talking about it.
Or as my old man use to say to anyone who joined his firm:
“Be aware of those who need to let others know how smart and successful they are. They’re rarely as good as they like to think they are and elevate themselves up by bringing others down. They pretend they’re saints but behave like devils.”.
There’s a lot of people out there like that these days.
Worse, they’re getting rewarded handsomely for it.
Which is why – whether you are an old hand in the industry or new – it’s worth remembering something my Mum once said to me:
“Money doesn’t define success, it just lets you buy better groceries”.
We all have aspirations and ambitions.
It’s important we don’t confuse them with doing OK in life.
Especially when you remember so much of what many in the industry define as success, is as much down to luck, as it is talent.
OK, enough sanctimonious Paula Abdul x Oprah talk from me today. Even I feel a bit queasy.
See you tomorrow.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, Attitude & Aptitude, Cannes, Context, Craft, Creativity, Culture, Distinction, Emotion, Fashion
There were a lot of stylish people at Cannes.
There were also a lot of try-hard people at Cannes.
But of all the folks I saw over the days I was there, one stood out.
Not just for how they looked, but for the statement they made:
About Cannes …
About the people at Cannes …
About the attitude and behaviour of the industry at large.
I don’t know who you are.
I don’t know what you do.
But if it were up to me, you’d be walking away with a Grand Prix Lion for owning a look I’ll never forget – which, where our industry is concerned – is what we once were brilliant at creating before we sold out the value of creativity in favor of making cash off process and being complicit to a set of rules developed by people who [1] have never actually made the stuff we’re brilliant at and [2] claim the rules for effective marketing are things like emotion, distinction and consistency as if that hasn’t been the case for 200 fucking years.
I suspect, that’s the emotional baggage she’s carrying with her.
It’s the same emotional baggage anyone who cares and creates work is dealing with as we watch certain individuals get wild applause from the broad industry despite the fact they continually demonstrate they either don’t know their history or are choosing to rebadge it so they can flog it off as a ‘proprietary systems for success’ despite the fact all their blatantly bloody obvious lessons have come off the back of the hard work the creative industry has been creating and making for decades.
Seriously, we’re in full-on, corporate Emperor’s New Clothes territory these days … and while there’s a lot of fools being taken in by it, we’re the biggest idiots for having let it happen and then standing by as they do it.
Happy fucking Monday. I’m up for a fight this week … Hahaha.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, Attitude & Aptitude, Bands, Brands, Cannes, Creativity, Delusion, Effectiveness, Grifting, Metallica, Miley, Mr Ji, Music, Paula, Planners, Point Of View, Relevance, Reputation, Research, Resonance, Respect, Rick Rubin
When I was going to move to Australia, I was severely stressed.
Part of it was because it meant moving away from my beloved parents.
Part of it was because I would be leaving a job I loved and had worked hard it.
And part of it was because I was moving for a woman who I hadn’t known too long.
While I knew in my heart I wanted to do it, the risk of it was huge – personally, even more than professionally – so I went to see my first ever therapist to ask for help.
This was a big thing for a whole host of reasons – most of which was that ‘therapy’ was an American thing and not the sort of thing done widely in England. But I needed to talk to someone so having found someone relatively close, I went to them and explained my situation.
I’ll never forget his response.
“Yes, what I was thinking was full of risk but the highest risk always offered the greatest reward and I was going into it with my eyes wide open and I should embrace that fact”.
I’m not saying that was the comment that led to me doing it – having my parents support and encouragement was the most important thing – but it did help me feel more peace with my choice … and while my relationship with the woman I went there for, didn’t work out, I can honestly say that everything in my life to this day – bar my relationship with Paul and his ex-wife, Shelly – is because I went.
I say this because I read something that Jeff Bezos said recently that I loved. It was this:
Now I appreciate he is not suggesting you let go of all common sense in your business operations – and nor should you – but at a time where so many of the industry ‘guru’s’ are selling systems that claim to ‘guarantee success’ [when in all reality, they are promoting complicity and insurance] it’s a pleasant change to hear a positive take on being ‘experiment positive’.
Just recently I saw one ‘guru’ announce their new ‘success stack’ for effective marketing.
To great acclaim, they announced this is how you ensure your marketing is successful.
Now I am in no doubt there is value in what they’re selling, but the problem I have is their approach is so myopic, systemized and one-size-fits-all that at best, they’re simply ensuring you hit guideline metrics rather than achieve actual growth.
Add to that, they’ve never made any work of note and are simply analyzing work that has achieved success based on their definitions and metrics, that people should – at best – be treating it as a guide rather than a blueprint.
But no … our industry is so messed up right now, we value the words of – excuse the analogy, because it’s not a good one – the pundits rather than the players.
By that, I mean those who are paid to find fault versus those who create change.
As I said in our speech at Cannes a few weeks ago, it’s like saying that because music has mathematical contexts behind it, we should trust a school maths teacher more than an actual musician.
We’ve gone mad. Or at least, deliberately ignorant.
Of course I appreciate risk is scary for companies.
I also get the numbers involved are huge and the implications even bigger.
But for all the talk of grawth and effectiveness we, as an industry, are far too comfortable playing within the rules, systems and codes of people whose entire ‘for profit’ business model is built on igniting fear and judgement in what you do, when the brands and businesses that experience the greatest growth always allow creativity – in whatever form it takes – some space to play, explore and experiment.
Sure, it might be a relatively small percentage compared to their core business, but they do it and do it without the boundaries and limitations that we are continually forced to adhere to, because they see it as a commercially important investment rather than an act of marketing practice defiance.
And given so many brands are currently acting, looking and communicating the same thing in the same way – because of their blind adherence to certain people’s one-size-fits-all marketing practice protocols, I’d argue there’s less risk leaving space for experimenting than there is following the same systems as everyone else.
Or to quote David Richards – from Paula and my talk at Cannes – it may explain why ‘companies have consumers but artists have fans.
[Of course, the ‘factual’ reason behind my declaration is that I work for the the most profitable luxury Retailer in the World, the most successful fashion and street culture investor in global fashion, the fastest growing eyewear brand on the planet and – of course – the 2nd most successful American band in music history, among others]
As an aside, if you’re interested in hearing the talk Paula and I gave, drop us a line here. If there’s enough interest, maybe we can do it. Not because we think it what we presented is THE ONLY way brands should think, but to ensure no one is daft enough to think there is only one way fullstop.
Happy weekend.