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: Advertising, Agency Culture, Attitude & Aptitude, Colenso, Linkedin, Planners, Planning, Standards, Strategy
I know I said there would be no more blog posts this week, but even though I’m away, I thought this might be an opportune time to post this.
[Or at least if I’ve not fucked up the WordPress auto-post feature]
Why?
Because this post will be the first thing anyone who stupidly comes to this blog will see for 4 days so I can see if my blog is more successful than Linkedin – where no one responded when I posted this on there a few weeks earlier. [except a strategist from the Netherlands and two from China, all of whom I massively appreciated took the time to show any interest whatsoever, even – if truth be told – they were more curious than up-for-it]
That said, I appreciate the real reason for all the silence in this corner of the World could be because the idea of working with me is the worst idea in the World [which is possible, I guess], or there are no strategists/senior strategists in NZ who want to move job … which would be kinda-awesome given how many in the global industry have lost their role following company ‘re-orgs’ … or all the 1-3 year strategists out there have left the industry because they didn’t get the training and support they wanted and were instead ‘outsourced’ to a for-profit outside org who told them to follow their system – regardless of category, client or situation – rather than help them find and express their own planning voice [maybe] … though I really, really it’s because Linkedin isn’t quite the professional platform it likes to think it is or pretend it is.
Guess we’ll find out.
So anyone who is into it – preferably in Australia or NZ – can either email me here or find out more about us here.
For what its worth, you’d be working with a brilliant and talented strategist in a team of brilliant and talented strategists … which is my way of saying you wouldn’t have to interact with me too much if that makes you feel any better. Haha.
So with that in mind, I’m going to go back into the shadows and wish you a good weekend …
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Attitude & Aptitude, Dad, Family, Jill, Mum, Mum & Dad, My Childhood, My Fatherhood, Otis
I appreciate that in some ways, I’m a total fucking hypocrite writing this.
I work too much.
I travel too much.
I – if I’m being honest – love what I do too much.
That doesn’t mean I don’t love my family with all my heart … however as I wrote recently, I also realize I’d not shown how much of a priority they were to me as much as I want them to feel.
Given my wife has enabled me to have the career – and life – I/we enjoy … and the fact my son is 10 years old … it’s pretty fucking appalling it took me so long to fully grasp this concept to be honest.
That doesn’t mean I’m no longer ambitious, nor does it mean my family have stopped generously encouraging me to go after the things that interest and excite me – it’s just that I’ve chosen to stop being a Labrador Puppy who chases everything that captures my attention and, in terms of my time, my family now always wins … which is something I’m ashamed to admit was probably not always the case, all of the time.
Now I am not trying in any way to suggest I have got it all sorted out. I’m 55, so to have only recently worked this out shows that’s definitely not the case. Nor am I judging anyone who lives or thinks differently. Plus I am still hardwired to fuck myself over – literally today I realized that throughout my entire career, wherever I’ve worked, I’ve been the first person to be in the office day after day after day. All the time. Everytime. Everyday.
Idiot. [Though in my defense, it is often the only time I get to do my work before the mania begins of colleagues, ha]
But the point of this post is one thing I hear from lots of people is their desire to have a better work/life balance.
What ‘better’ is, is up to them … but the likelihood is they want more time with the people that matter most to them than the people who employ them. Yes, that’s an assumption, but I don’t think it is entirely unjustified.
And recently I heard something that not only helped reinforce why this matters, but could ensure you do all you can to make sure it does.
It was this.
If you’re a parent … your role as father or mother will outlive you.
That’s it.
That simple.
And while we all know that, I doubt we think about it in those terms.
I know for a fact that even though my Dad has been gone 26 years and my Mum 10 … their presence and impact in my life continues. And the older I get, the more I realise, respect and am grateful for all they did to ensure they were active and present in my life. Whatever the challenges they faced – and they faced a lot.
Now compare this to work life.
However popular you are, if you’re lucky … you’ll be remembered for maybe a few weeks after you’ve left.
That’s it.
Hell – as I wrote recently – that even applies to those people who started the company, let alone just work for it.
So while I am not saying work or ambition isn’t important – for all manner of reasons – it’s a good reminder of what deserves our focus and who will actually value it the most, for all the right reasons.
Of course, being able to even think this is a privilege, given there’s a shitload of people who want to spend much more time with their family but can’t … or aren’t able to.
But for those who do have that opportunity, I hope you realise it sooner than I did … because regardless how much we love what we do – or how important we think we are – the only place we’re not replaceable is with our kids.
Hopefully.
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In typical fashion, I am away again – I know, less than a week after I was away for over a week – so there’s no more posts till Monday. So enjoy the additional time away from me and hopefully you can spend it with someone you love, not someone who wastes your time. Like me and this blog.
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: Apathy, Attitude & Aptitude, Content, Context, Culture, Social Media
I’m back.
Best not ask. Not because it’s bad news – but it’s definitely not good.
Unfortunately.
I must admit it’s getting to me, but there’s many more worse off than me, so I just need to keep the faith and follow the DR’s orders.
So given I don’t want to bring myself down – I’ve had enough of that over the last week – let’s launch into a rant shall we?
In the time off, I made the mistake of spending some time on Twitter/X.
While I still post on there, I don’t do much of it … and do even less reading of it.
To be honest, I had stopped prior to Elon buying it. I was over the endless humble bragging and hot takes from people who desperately wanted ‘twitter fame’ without ever really doing anything worthy of getting it.
Not just from adland – though there was a ton of that – but from people in general.
But when I revisited it, I was shocked.
On the positive, a lot of the ‘ego shouting’ had gone – moved to Linkedin, the home of ‘thought leadership’, hahaha – but what had replaced it was a torrent of blame throwing.
People blaming people for the bad choices of people.
You name it, they were shouting about it.
Government policy.
Kids behavior.
Employees.
Health.
It was not just depressing, it was exhausting …
Everyone picking fights with everyone around them.
Shouting, never listening.
Throwing stones regardless of the subject matter or situation.
Blinkered and blind opinions, subjectivity and contexts.
And it just reminded me of the image at the top of this post …
I got sent that ages ago, but it never became as powerful as when I took a brief swim back in the cesspool of what was once a relatively cool place to hang out in.
But it’s not just X/Twitter where this attitude prevails. It’s creeping into all avenues of life.
Where people are blaming everyone else for what is happening – or not happening – to them.
Of course there are many who are well within their rights to be angry at decisions forced upon them, but there are more who aren’t … they chose it directly or indirectly but just don’t want to accept or acknowledge it.
And while I appreciate no one likes to admit they made a mistake or did something wrong, it’s funny they all want the people they have decided to blame to do exactly that.
Making a mistake isn’t bad – we all do it – but never taking responsibility for it is another thing altogether. Yet we see this all the time. Professional gaslighting and blame-storming at every level of society.
From companies making thousands redundant and then claiming ‘they’ve never been in better shape’ to people on social media shouting abuse at people and positioning themselves as role models to governments blaming youth for crime while being conveniently ignorant to the fact they have robbed entire generations of opportunity or hope. We live in a world where it seems everyone wants the authority to dictate and judge but no one wants to take the responsibility for what they’ve enabled to happen.
God, it’s all so depressing which, on the bright side, is kinda perfect for a Monday.
Have a great week … hahaha.