Northern Planner

Here's to account handlers (not client service)

I’m a failed account handler. Too shy, too disorganised and too easily bored to be successful suit, only surviving thanks to doing planning (yes planning, I still struggle to call it strategy) on the job without realising.

I could write good briefs and coax great work out of creative people, even if I couldn’t get the invoices right. I was even told to get out the industry at one point, however one kind soul told me I was in the wrong department, otherwise I’d be a teacher, an academic or maybe a lawyer right now.

My current colleagues probably wish I was a headmaster or human rights lawyer instead, sorry about that, but at least it means I respect great account handlers, in fact I’m in awe of them.

But I mean account handlers, not client service. The ones who not only make things happen on time and make it look easy, they work in partnership with planners, they have an opinion on creative work, they make ideas people feel safe, make horrible people play nice. They won’t let creatives act like children, yet allow for them being wired differently. They won’t allow intellectual planner wank, but make space for brains to play.

Even better, they ‘handle clients’ they don’t ‘serve’ them. This is no disrespect to clients, I couldn’t do their job either. By handling I mean not just saying yes externally and ‘the client won’t like it’ internally. They build a relationship, not a culture of subservience.

The ones who nurture ideas through their building and then through the client building, not the ones who shut things down.

The ones who partner clients, who look to deliver good advice and help them succeed, rather than the ones who simply say yes and make everything seem transactional.

The ones with more than charm and charisma, they build trust.

Increasingly, agencies have become a lot more about client service than client handling. There are many reasons for this of course, a big one being the increasingly competitive nature of our industry and growing cost pressures.

Yet the agencies we tend to talk about and the work we tend to celebrate, don’t just serve clients they handle them. They make money from delivering ideas clients couldn’t do themselves, even in-house. Not just because of talent and craft, because of positive friction – working on anything for too long makes you snowblind, but outsiders you trust provide the spark you rarely get in house.

Yes, there are great in-house teams, but the internal culture required for work that isn’t a box ticking exercise is the exception not the rule.

And more client service has led to less proper account planning too.

At their best, planners do a lot more than the ‘set-up’ for the creative work. They have a direct relationship with the client, a genuine partner with client services in the relationship.

But that link is increasingly severed, which also severs the most important link of all, the link to the ‘consumer’.

Planners are having less scope to go beyond primary research, to uncover the real truth and show clients possibility not of predictability. There is less of of planning as the first idea, more of planning as the first few slides.

A couple of days to do the set-up for creative work, then not even able to nurture the work itself.

As the relationship with client disappears (partly down to client services jealously guarding it as it becomes their only reason for being, but also because a transactional relationship makes the discipline nothing more than a powerpoint factory) there is more of just putting client research through a process, colouring in the client brief, or even just post rationalising creative work. Now let’s be honest, in many cases, post rationalising great ideas can be a good thing – but you need great ideas first and client service often doesn’t like them so they get filtered out. Or they allow mediocre creative to go unchallenged (but that’s another story).

Strategy was invented to be bridge between research and ideas, it was valued part of the client relationship. If it isn’t this anymore what the hell is it for?

So yes, here’s to account handlers, who do the most amazing job.

I’m obviously grateful because they allow me to do actual account planning.

I couldn’t do their job, but then again, neither could most client service.

What a painful ritual the week before the Christmas holiday taught me about planning and life

When I was a teenager I used to both dread and relish the week we're in now. I used to race at swimming and, the week before we had time off for Christmas, there was an evil tradition called 'Hell Week". 

It was exactly that, seven days of the hardest training our coaches thought we could endure, except even tougher. 

The reasoning behind it was sound. Firstly, it only takes two weeks for the bodies of trained athletes to lose a significant amount of the conditioning they may have built up, so it made some sense to put some pain in the bank before the Christmas break. 

More than that though, most of high level sport is won in the mind, your brain tells you the body is incapable of carrying on before you really have reached your limit. A week of going beyond what you thought you could do, while not sustainable for long, trained the mind to deal with more.

We all used to fear this week. Before, or since, I have never been that tired, never willingly gone through that much physical pain. A killer session before school, another one after. The ache in my arms and shoulders, always a constant companion, genuine hurt that would only go away with more training.

I also used to love it though. I liked to win of course, but I was much more interested in finding out what I was capable of. 'Hell Week' was the week of truth, nowhere to hide. You learned what how far you could go without giving in.

Those weeks didn't just put short term fitness in the bank, they taught me some things that help today.

If you're like me, not the most talented planner, the capacity for hard work doesn't half help. I've seen those for whom great thinking comes easily ultimately fail because when things gets tough, they're not used to having to fight. When you're used to having to battle for everything, you end up doing better work, because you leave no stone unturned. 

That annual ritual also taught valuable lessons for dealing with crisis. Let's be honest, there is lots of pressure in agency life, lots of setbacks and lots moments when you're really up against it. Those weeks taught me that as long as you endure, things will get better eventually, nothing is forever.

Yet, the real learning is that self-reliance can only get you so far. I would never have got through those weeks without the team around me. 

My swim team was incredibly close, yet these shared weeks of real hardship knit us together even more. We encouraged each other, never judged anyone who caved in, we just helped them pick themselves up and go again next time. 

None of us could have done it without each other.

So today, I'm not afraid to ask for help, not afraid to show weakness and only too willing to help others when they day job has some challenges. I also use a crisis to bond teams closer together, so they get through the moment, yet also emerge stronger for it. 

Bollocks to the stupid British stiff upper lip, real strength is admitting you're vulnerable. 

These lessons have helped in life too.

It's been an interesting year.

It would be easy to say that those weeks of learning resilience has made me capable of dealing with anything.

That would be untrue.

There is more than one kind of strength and the macho bollocks, or the British Reserve are probably the weakest.

I've learned that even the toughest times end eventually if you can just find a way to hold on.

More importantly, I know there is no shame in asking for help, that failing isn't failure, giving up is failure. 

Eventually, not now, but at some point, I"ll know the feeling of pride and self-worth from having survived. Able to smile fondly, standing on the edge of the whole you crawled out of, smiling fondly at the bloody claw prints that marked the journey up the walls. Yet profoundly grateful for the footprints next to you, of the people who reached out to pull you up, and the fact you could swallow your stupid pride to let them. 

 

 

Are you feeling it?

You can measure your life in many ways.

How much you money you made.

What your legacy might be.

How many friends you made.

But what about how much fun you had? How much you did things that made you feel alive rather than simply existing. 

What about the things that scared you to death, but you did them anyway?

As you get older, you get out the red pen and start to cross out the things that just don't cut it.

What if you only tried to focus on the things that excite you or even scare you a bit?

Things don't get easier when you're older, you just get a little better at hiding how confused you are.

What if you re-embraced the chaos in your work and life again? 

Because if you do only things that make you feel alive, you'll put more into them. 

The chances are, that means you'll do more things you're genuinely proud of.

Which may well mean you get noticed more in work.

In life you'll meet more people who love what you love. 

In work you'll be sought after for more of the things that mean more than a salary, which probably will get you paid more anyway. 

In life, you'll be the same person, but you'll have the thrill of moving forward and feeling less numb in a jaded world. 

In work, because it feels less like work and more like being genuinely alive, you'll always find ways to do it better.

Enthusiasm and passion show in your work, and your life, when you show up with enthusiasm and passion first. 

And I don't care how shy or anxious you say you might be, take it from a shy person, enthusiasm is infectious and breeds confidence. 

We remember how we feel about people things much longer than anything practical about them.

So you should want people to feel something about you and what you do.

Which means doing what makes you feel something in the first place. 

In other words, don't be lukewarm. 

 

Choices, ends, beginnings and finding yourself single at 46

Imagine being on your deathbed and being shown two films. One is the life you had and the other is the life you could have had. How would you feel? Much of what holds us back from the second one is nothing more than the choices we make in a few moments.

The moments we remember the most are the end and the beginnings of things, the choice is sometimes deciding which one it is.

When I was a teenager, there came a time I realised it was time to stop swimming to win and begin just enjoying it. Yet for months I carried on. I was too afraid of what would come after, of the end.

I don't know how secondary school was for you but it was okay for me. There were the usual bullies and anxieties, however it wasn't normal because I was living some sort of double life. Pupil by day and swimmer by night (and very, very early mornings).

When you go through a crisis with people, it brings you closer together and swimming competitively is sustained crisis. The shared pain and suffering, the traveling without your parents, the pressure to win. It bonds you. 

I connected much more with other swimmers than other pupils. My best friends were swimmers, my teenage girlfriends were swimmers. I wasn't good at football but killed it in the pool.

School was the bit I drifted through, waiting to put on the wet costume again, to become someone who wasn't quite like everyone else.

I was afraid of that ending, of my life as I knew it. I couldn't  see how I could begin a life without it. I wanted it to end, I didn't want it to end because I didn't have the courage to start again. 

Sometimes hating your current situation feels safer than the fear of letting go.

That end of course, was nothing of the sort.

I found a deep love for tennis and deeper connections with the friends I already had, many of whom are still my best friends. I've know my very best friend since I was four, I love him, you can't replace that tapestry of shared experience.

(Incidentally, I carried on swimming in a smaller way and raced at university  but it took a long time to get used to my body not being able to do what it once could. Golfers and tennis players can still wow the crowds with their skills for years, but in sports based purely in conditioning, the speed you lose it is light speed fast).

This is why so many people stay in bad jobs longer than they should, or bad relationships. It's easier than the fear of the unknown.

So I'm now 46, at a turning point bigger than the swimming thing. It feels like it's half-time. No matter how I look at it, half my life is done.

But half of it is yet to come and very unknown, because this year I became single again. 

It was up to me to view this as the final chapter or a brand new book.

Naturally there were remnants if that boy clinging on to what no longer worked, rather than embracing the new. Not now.

Of course, some things don't change. My love and devotion to my amazing children (which itself shows nothing is fixed as, even in my early 30s I fully believed I didn't want kids). Then again, you ask yourself what example you set for them, because that's how they learn. Not from what you tell them, they become the things you show them. 

There are things inside me I knew were there, never given a proper, full-throated voice (natural in a way as I've been told I'm far too quietly spoken).

As someone told me recently, cycling is something I enjoy but swimming is something I need (Sometimes I need someone to tell me what I think). Re-discovering the embrace of the water feels like coming home, it puts me in touch with a me that isn't a Dad, an ex-husband, strategist, clumsy fool or middling writer. It's me.

Still, I never thought I'd develop a minor obsession about swimming in lakes, which is what appears to be happening, yet it makes sense as, given the choice, I'd prefer to be outside. 

I knew I wanted to write again. but never made the time. I'm still not sure what I really want to write about, but the only way to find out is, well, start writing. 

There are emerging themes I've mentioned elsewhere. 

Yet other parts of me I never realised existed.

The part of me that wants to tell the unvarnished truth, in the hope others who can't express what they are feeling may be encouraged to do so too. Much of what is happening to me is new, I'll plunge straight in, I'll get much of it wrong, I might be confused sometimes, but aren't we all really?

The part of me dabbling in online dating and finding many of the things I thought I wanted from others were nothing of the sort. Perhaps more surprising, yet maybe it shouldn't be, are the things others bring out of you. 

The me that realised I have a lot more to offer than I ever thought and the more I find what that is, the more I'll have to show those children of mine. Hopefully, one day, there will only be one video we watch together when the second half is over too. 

 

66 days of blogging, being open and working things out publicly

So after this about building a habit over 66 days, it's only right and proper to publicly prove my point (or fail in the trying), by seeing if I can get into the groove of properly blogging again. 

That's right, a post a day for 66 days. No one is asking for it, I'm very aware, but why the hell not?

Don't expect lots of planning and strategy stuff, I'm not sure the world really needs much more of that.

Don't expect a stream of typo free, double checked prose. My brain works faster than my typing, it's how I roll. 

Do expect more rubbish about tea, swimming (and maybe open water swimming, we'll see) and what it's like being 45 and not having a clue what you're doing. No one tells you this, but older people flail just as much as anyone else, they just get better at hiding it. 

One thing about the day job though, I have to write and play around with a lot of stuff to work out what I think. Reductionism is a must in our job, but I've always found I need to go very broad, before I go very narrow. I find blogging like this.

It's a little like making small talk with someone before you hit on a rich vein of conversation. You could say these posts are like making small talk with myself before I hit on something I like talking to myself about.

It's why I like to talk things through with people I work with, suddenly someone says something, the eyes widen and you go, yes, this, lets crack on now, thank God for that. 

Come to think about it, on the subject of talking to oneself, you know that phrase, 'getting cross with myself'? Who exactly is getting cross with who?

Anyway. 

It doesn't get nearly as much traction as it should in culture, but the most miserable demographic isn't young men working out who they are meant to be and asking Google if it's OK to cry (they do by the way). It's middle aged men who have no idea either. Problem is, they have less people to talk to and find it really hard to express their feelings. 

I'm sure this is made worse by the British social disease where no one is really supposed to say exactly what they mean, and certainly not talk about how they feel. I'm lucky that my friends are very un-British and have more to talk about that football and cars. We certainly are there for each other. 

So I'm also going to write in a very un-British way about what's really going on. I know it will be a revolution of just one, but if just a couple of people feel they can be more open and not pretend to be something they're not as a result, that would be a result.

I remember when I did write a bit more about the job and the odd email would come through from someone starting out, thanking me for something or other then found helpful. That made my day.

Maybe now I can be a do something else and help people see, we're just as confused as you, and this is actually a good thing. 

Can't hurt trying can it?

We are what we repeatedly do

Long time readers of this corner of the internet may be aware I have a passion for tea. Not just any tea mind, it must be made in a warmed pot, with Yorkshire Tea Gold. Also, please put the milk in first. George Orwell was wrong on this, trust me. 

I could not, in all honesty, prove to you if this makes any actual difference to the quality of the beverage (with the exception of Yorkshire Tea obviously) but this is beside the point.

Because I believe it will taste infinitely better, it does. When I was little, this is how my Grandmother taught me to make it. My mother always made it this way, waiting for me when I got home from school. Since then, years and years of repeating the ritual have made it part of who I am. 

We all have these little habits and quirks burned into our brains. They've become instinctive and so hard to change hard to change it takes, on average, sixty six days to change them. It doesn't matter if it's a habit you wish to lose, or something you feel you need to begin, you're looking at over two months of doing it every single day before it really becomes something you'll stick with.

People fail at New Year's Resolutions, diets or so called 'fresh starts', not because they're short on willpower, but because willpower is a bit crap. It's a useful short-term resource, it can get you through a rubbish day, or having to listen to a Stereophonics song, it's just that it runs out of steam fairly quickly. Then you're back to square one, only this time scarred by failure, feeling you've wasted your time.

Real, lasting change happens because we have no choice,  or we've found a way to hack our own operating system.

Why am I telling you this? Because lockdown will have achieved the 'change without choice' thing. After one hundred and twenty days of lockdown, give or take, we've had double the time to break or pick up new habits.

So when we go back to normal, don't expect anything of the sort. 

Because we are what we repeatedly do, the new habits formed in lockdown will be hard to break. So I'd forget much of the rhetoric around seismic changes in attitudes, although, of course, there are bound to be some. What's maybe more interesting, but less talked about, is the sheer weight of all these new daily habits, so hard now to undo. 

We've got used to no rush hour, spending more time with the kids, not having to make the effort to dress for work. I was talking to someone else the other day who was surprised to have relished not having to socialise with people too much and has loved the time alone.  

Me? On the plus side, I don't think about daily meditation, I wanted to stay sane when all this hit and just did it, now it's just something I do. On the debit side, I'd been going to bed later and getting up later, not so good.  I'd got too attached to WhatsApp rather than calling people and really need to do something about getting distracted by phones. Also, I may have kept up with cycling, but I neglected pilates. 

Thankfully there are ways to hack my system. You can too. Forget willpower, use your own nature in your favour.

First, start with loss aversion, we naturally hate to part with things we have got used to. So build a streak. Just make a 66 day planner and tick every day you did, or didn't do, what you set out to. It will be hard at first, but soon you'll decide you haven't come this far to only come this far. You won't want to lose what you've already achieved. Those ticks will feel good and get you through.

Second, make it as easy to do it as you can. Whatever routine you now have, try and go with that flow as much as possible.

For example, every time I make a hot drink, I do a few core pilates exercises. My body doesn't care when I do them, just that I do them. I sleep with the blinds open and the natural light in the morning has woken me up - all I needed to remember for a while was to not shut the blinds before bed. I may have been groggy on a few mornings, but I've built up the habit of having a cold shower, which jolts me into feeling alive. 

So if you're a planner type and want to get to grips with how people might be behaving differently around whatever you're selling, you might want to look at their habits before their attitudes. You could be on to something.

If you want to change a few habits of your own, think about little changes that add up over time rather than relying on willpower. If you improve my 1% every day for a year, that's 365% by the time your done.

Change a little, change a lot. 

Hello again

Hello again, it's been a while. You may be thinking I've no work on, I've been furloughed our even laid off, to bother fill my time with blogging. Trust me, I'm not assuming for a second you're bored enough to bother reading this.

Actually, I'm one of the lucky ones. For the time being, I'm dead busy. It's a privilege when much of the news, not just in our industry but the wider world is about people's livelihoods disappearing before their very eyes. It could change for me of course, but while I'm still employed, I'm going to be grateful. 

Its fair to say though, that everyone is finding it tough to be trapped within their four walls. No one wants to hear this from a white middle class male with a garden and a spare room, I know, but we all need distractions so I'm going to try re-discover a rhythm for blogging.

Don't expect too much work stuff, I suspect the few people that bother with this blog liked the stuff about tea and swimming more, but let's see. 

 

 

What my son's broken arm tells us about working with other people in agencies - and why the best strategists are forgotten

So my son broke his arm in October. Badly, really badly. It's mostly okay now, but took a fair amount of rehab. We were at the hospital the other day for a check up and, like always, he didn't complain at the endless waiting, the pain of getting his (still tender) arm bent all over the place, or anything. 

This is nothing though, next to what he went through during the initial break. Pins put in, genuine pain. Then pins pulled directly out of his arm without anaesthetic. I've never been prouder.

And yet. 

And yet.

Like all parents, it's easy to get frustrated in the hurly burly of the day to day. When he argues over time on the Xbox. Forgetting what you told him two minutes ago.

Normal human stuff. 

Just as it's easy to not appreciate the brilliance of everyday. Playing football in the street together. Arguing over who's better at FIFA. Seeing the latest Star Wars movie (which we both loved). Swimming lessons. Gently winding up his mother. 

Whenever I lose patience, thinking about how brave he was (and is) with his arm always pulls me back.

Just as I always try (and sometimes fail) to stop, to just take in the moments we're having fun just messung around. 

Being a parent isn't the same with people you work with of course.

However, I bet they wind you up frequently and I'm sure there is an everyday flow of great stuff you're so used to you don't even notice. 

I'm also confident there have been moments when you've been incredibly grateful for them. Maybe they've got you out of a tight corner, maybe they've blown you away with something amazing. Maybe they've gone out of their way to help you when they didn't need to.

Just as with my boy, it's easy to focus on the little frustrations and not the daily flow of perfectly ordinary brilliance. Sometimes the here and now can also cloud those big moments you were so thankful they were there.

People are doomed to only notice either the very good or the very bad. The perfectly brilliant of the everyday passes us by. 

And past greatness is soon forgotten, the last experience is always the most vivid (which is why film studies focus group the ending more than any other part of a film. It's always why a really good campaign should end on a high note, not simply stop when the spend does). 

We just don't appreciate a kettle until it breaks. Just as we don't miss people until they're gone. Just as you don't need insurance until something goes wrong. 

Why am I telling you this?

Because it matters more to a strategist than most people.

Your work quickly gets forgotten when the creative work gets done and everybody loves it the executions. 

Unless the creative work is bad. Then the strategy, or the brief, is of course wrong. Then everyone remembers it. 

Yet the moment you try and wow folks, let your ego take over, you're buggered. When you try and do a strategic set up in a pitch like Ted Talk and forget people are waiting for the creative work. When you try and write a wow brief that is a really a thinly disguised creative idea. 

In other words, when you get in the way, rather than liberate others. 

It's not fair, but if you want to wow a crowd, join a band or do stand-up. 

 

 

Diversity in agencies and the value of listening properly

Saw an old friend last night, always good to catch up, he's like the more sensible and wise big brother.

Miss working with him too, as I'm one the those strategy types who has so many thoughts tumbling around I need to talk it through at length with someone to understand what I really think.

Then write it down quick. 

We all have different ways of working, we all have people who can help in different ways. Increasingly, I'm beginning to think that diversity is, of course important in agencies - not just colour and gender stuff, but the fact I'm convinced agency folks are more likely to hire physically attractive people than other industries.

Even worse, the generalisation is hiring people who 'fit the brand' -be that quirky, cool or in some cases, down right arrogant.

But I've found that I get far more out of working with people vastly different to me, especially in terms of world view (unless you like Queen, we all have line not to cross), but also how you work. 

Who accept my deep flaws and many flaws in order to help focus on my very few strengths. 

Building on that, isn't it dumb how many agencies like to hire 'characters' and then do as much as they can to make them all work the same way?

Now this will probably put you off ever working with me (I make amazing tea and coffee, even thorn has it's rose so it's not all bad) but thanks to people like my friend, I've learned that the most generous gift you can give to people you work with (and live with) is to actually listen. Really listen. So I give as well as take. 

Because really good work tends to be spark between very different people kicking things around, not a process and certainly not working alone waiting for a flash of insight that never comes. 

Anyway.

Rob

So I finally met Rob the other week. 

(Rob's picture)

After knowing each other only in digital form since 2006. That was when planning blogs were a thing, no one was really on Facebook and Twitter worked worked through SMS. 

It was also a time when it felt that planners has a real community, some sort of support network. You might not need one if you work in London or New York, but in can be a bit lonely if you're in planning department of two or three in a more regional outpost and the only frame of reference is your boss.

Now of course, your boss might be great, but there is always the chance you have the kind of leader who wants you to have their opinions rather than your own. Or even worse, the kind who lets you walk before you can crawl, offer little guidance and then criticise you when you fail.

I digress. Rob has done the kind of work most of us dream of, in every continent. He's deeply respected around the world and is still moving things forward. 

And yet if you read his blog, he quickly discover he wears his intelligence lightly, as those with real talent and experience tend to. You'll also find that he's kind and generous.

He's done stuff for me that would amaze you, without meeting once. On a couple of occasions when a couple of things were difficult for me, he was always there. 

So I was really happy to find he was moving to London a few months back, because I was sure we would finally get to meet. Eventually it happened and though I was super excited to meet him, I was a little nervous. It was ROB after all and I'm even less interesting in person than I am online.

Naturally in person he was funny, and wise.  But more than that he was kind and thoughtful. 

What a legend.

Football, cycling my son and talking to children

I rarely post about my children.

Let's be honest, I rarely post these days at all.

Anyway, since the last World Cup, my nine year old has developed an obsession with football.

This is a good thing, despite the fact football has never been one of my favourite sports.

Suddenly, when I get home from work at a reasonable hour, we're getting the nets out into the street and having a kick about.

We're watching Match of the Day and discussing teams and players.

And while this is going on, we're chatting about other things, I'm finding more about what's going at school (they rarely tell anything, let alone everything).

Our relationship isn't built on football, but football is enriching our relationship, because of what we talk about thanks to football. 

It's the same with cycling. In the warmer months, we go out on a ride and it's amazing what we start talking about. 

Men in general seem to be much better having relationships side by side rather than face on. I'm sure you know this.

But that's also true of parents and kids and they get older. It's so important to keep the communications channels open, despite the fact they begin to clam up and become more independent, very very quickly.

I don't see much of this communicated through sports brands. Maybe they're missing a trick.

Anyway.

Culture and stuff. Two ways to think about it

So I'm working in a new place with a heritage in PR. I know what you're thinking, probably this:

 

That's mostly my experience too. But not all PR folk are like that, and they're not here. 

It's funny really, you can't move for all sorts of integrated agencies banging on about influencing culture, mind you, it is fair to say that some of them are pretty good at it. 

But the good PR spend their entire career understanding what people are really talking about and what people will give a monkeys about. They instinctively get what's going in the lives of normal people. 

That's a great starting point for any client who gets that the biggest challenge for any client is that people don't care that much about brands and understands the best way to overcome that is by looking popular and tapping into something actually do care about.

Not parroting stuff people are talking about, adding to it. 

So I'm quite liking this. 

By the way, if you want to do the influencing culture thing thing, there are two ways:

1. Tap into something that's in popular culture to make the execution better. Which is fine, it build cut through if you've done your core competence and not done anything dumb.

This for example taps this Australian beer brand taps into a deep memory we all have of movie police chases

 

This shamelessly mashes up provenance credentials with the X Factor

 

1. Something more potent, but harder. Getting into issues, tensions, passions and challenges in actual life. 

While this from Axe taps into the very current confusion young men have on what they're supposed to be in modern society. It's not made up, and you could have got this from messing around in Google trends, where men are asking the internet if it's OK to cry. You just need the instincts to look for the right things

 

 

Things I wish I could change I no longer can

If there's one good thing about modern culture, it's that it's a lot more open. Age isn't the barrier to stuff like it once was (it's a good thing since I'm 44 and I'm passed being useful in the eyes of 1990 ad agencies), diversity if becoming more a reality and less of an idea. It's not great that job, or even career security is a thing of the past, but it does mean you can try new things more often. 

In many cases, it's never too late.

That's not all true. There are some decisions you can never undo, and there are simply things possible for a 20 year old single person that are not to a 44 year, married man with two children and a mortgage. 

1. Travelled more. I saw lots of the world when I was a competitive swimmer, but that really meant lots of hotels and swimming pools. Travel opens your world in a way few other things do. At least this is something I can always come back to, but never with the freedom or the vigour of a 20 something. More importantly, I should have worked abroad. I would have always come home, but experiencing another culture make you look afresh at your own and understand it more, just as home never feels so great as when you get back from holiday.
2. Not given up on swimming. I was good, it was hard work and I had a few blips in form, but if I'd had the maturity at 15 to not pack in in favour of, well, all the things 15 year olds want to do, realising how much swimming and the people I did it with meant to me, I would have carried on a little longer. That's the thing about sport that few brands ever bother with, the people you train and suffer with have a deep, unique bond with you. I've had better friends, than swimmers, but that feeling of not being like other people together was still special.
3. Carried on after my degree. Most planning types are really clever. I'm afraid I'm really thick. I get by with a weird emotional intelligence and sixth sense to cut through the crap of different arguments and points of view to what matters. This meant I floated through my social sciences degree and I would have liked to have gone a little further. 
4. Not done swimming but cycling. I love swimming, it's that joy at feeling you're doing something well, flow, in the zone and all that. But I don't have time to swim, so I cycle instead (straight out the door v getting to the pool and weaving it into the commute). It gives me the same feeling and bike fitters looking of my flexibility and natural VO2 max etc ask me if I ever thought of racing. An entire alternate universe could have been mine. Of course, I love tennis even more, but I'm not good enough. On the other hand, cycling at this age means I appreciate more, I would have packed it in like I did swimming I guess. And I go out on the bike with my kids. Good that. 
5. Stuck it out in London ad agencies. I didn't like living in London, so have never worked at a London agency. They're over rated, but the good ones did, and still do great work. Just once, I'd like to work on something where everything goes right, not in the case study, but in the real world. I'm proud of my track record, but I'll never know what it would have been like. A good thing, as I would have found out how useless my skills really are. 
6. Not being shy. I hated being an introvert. I get exhausted by big groups. I can't quite believe anyone thinks I'm interesting. It gets in the way of lots of things. It makes starting a new job traumatic, it makes all agency meetings truly knackering. But on the other hand, serious lack of confidence makes me listen more, it makes me work harder at presentations, it means I've learned to be pretty good at saying just a few things in meetings people remember. It's also taught me to not pretend to be something I'm not and to find ways to care about what I do and what others are talking about, people respond to enthusiasm and warmth far more than charisma. So it's not all bad and I'm determined to help make this industry a place for quiet thoughtful people, not loudmouths. If there is one thing our current state of world affairs shows, with the Trumps, the Boris Johnsons and the Nigel Farages, it's that the people with the most charm and loudest mouths are usually the last people you should take notice of. 
7. But the truth is, none of the above. Brilliant wife, great job with great people, wonderful healthy kids, time to ride my bike, the few close friends only someone as shy as me can appreciate. All of this has happened because of the things I can't change. I happen to think there's too much of people not being present enough in their own lives. The problem with everyone pretending their lives are perfect online, they miss how brilliant life really is. 

Anyway

Man about town

So decided to actually take a lunch break and stroll around town for an hour.

I find it funny that certain London strategy departments believe this is actually 'a thing'. Going out and mixing with people rather than sitting at your desk.

It's not that you notice anything ground-breakingly new, it's just that when you loiter around people going through their day more, you develop a sixth sense for how they feel about stuff. 

I totally believe in reading and experiencing as much diverse stimulus as you can, when you connect two unrelated things together, amazing ideas can happen. It's true.

But I great skill of planner types is to admire their audience, get to grips with what matters in their lives. 

Today I saw that most of the people coming out of Harvey Nichols has massive logos on their t-shirts, I bet most of their buyers are not half as well to do as they would like them to believe. Just as most luxury brands make most of their money from lots of people that save up (or run up credit) for one or two of their products, rather than the people who can actually afford it whenever they want.

I saw a bunch of cyclists outside a cafe drinking espresso and wondered why, with cycling generally on the rise, with coffee so ingrained in that sub-culture why coffee brands don't make more of it. 

I saw children going shopping with parents (it's the summer holidays) and missed my own kids. I also wondered if retailers and food retailers make enough of the magic of going on a trip with your parents getting to touch and choose for yourself, rather than the lack of emotion you get from a few clicks. I remembered going shopping with my Mum in the same streets over 30 years ago and meeting my Dad on his lunch break, how special it was to have both of them to myself. Not to mention the pride and wonder of him letting me go into his office and sitting at his desk. 

I saw a 20 something daughter out in town with her Mum and wondered what my kids will be like in 15 years or so, will they want to go shopping with us?

And I bought a pasty from Greggs. 

People who have studied such things have discovered that cities make us more creative and drive innovation and ideas. 

Fair enough.

For agency types, I wonder if really exploring a city, rather than floating around Clerkenwell, The Meat Packing District or The Northern Quarter keeps us human. 

Man about town

So decided to actually take a lunch break and stroll around town for an hour.

I find it funny that certain London strategy departments believe this is actually 'a thing'. Going out and mixing with people rather than sitting at your desk.

It's not that you notice anything ground-breakingly new, it's just that when you loiter around people going through their day more, you develop a sixth sense for how they feel about stuff. 

I totally believe in reading and experiencing as much diverse stimulus as you can, when you connect two unrelated things together, amazing ideas can happen. It's true.

But I great skill of planner types is to admire their audience, get to grips with what matters in their lives. 

Today I saw that most of the people coming out of Harvey Nichols has massive logos on their t-shirts, I bet most of their buyers are not half as well to do as they would like them to believe. Just as most luxury brands make most of their money from lots of people that save up (or run up credit) for one or two of their products, rather than the people who can actually afford it whenever they want.

I saw a bunch of cyclists outside a cafe drinking espresso and wondered why, with cycling generally on the rise, with coffee so ingrained in that sub-culture why coffee brands don't make more of it. 

I saw children going shopping with parents (it's the summer holidays) and missed my own kids. I also wondered if retailers and food retailers make enough of the magic of going on a trip with your parents getting to touch and choose for yourself, rather than the lack of emotion you get from a few clicks. I remembered going shopping with my Mum in the same streets over 30 years ago and meeting my Dad on his lunch break, how special it was to have both of them to myself. Not to mention the pride and wonder of him letting me go into his office and sitting at his desk. 

I saw a 20 something daughter out in town with her Mum and wondered what my kids will be like in 15 years or so, will they want to go shopping with us?

And I bought a pasty from Greggs. 

People who have studied such things have discovered that cities make us more creative and drive innovation and ideas. 

Fair enough.

For agency types, I wonder if really exploring a city, rather than floating around Clerkenwell, The Meat Packing District or The Northern Quarter keeps us human. 

The kids

So I haven't bored folks with stuff about my children for  a while, I'be just bored people with blatherings about the day job.

My girl is 6 and my boy is 8 years old now, they are growing up in front of my eyes.

I can honestly say I loved them as babies and also as chaotic toddlers, but now they're little people with questions and opinions which are things I certainly want to encourage.

This is the best time for me so far, because we have shared interests. I'm in charge of their swimming lessons (used to race as a teenager), their favourite thing is riding their bikes and the eldest already likes tapping out a rhythm on a steep climb. 

We go see films we all enjoy, we have in depth discussions on Star Wars, it's good. 

Sometimes I worry that, despite the fact we've never pushed them into anything, only encouraged them to try as many things as they can and stick with the the things they love, my influence is there like it or not.

But that's daft, because Evie also does gymnastics, karate (green belt) while William is learning Scuba diving and is obsessed with animals and marine life.

And we all discovered Ninja Turtles together.

So I'm getting interested in what they discover too. I might have time soon to take up karate and will probably end up scuba diving too. 

And then there's school topics. Egypt, The Tudors and Space are just a small bit of what they're learning now. It's great to rediscover some of this with them, I' m looking forward to doing ancient Greece with Will next year.

There's nothing more exciting than seeing the world through young eyes, or more rewarding.

What Nike and Agassi can teach strategists -and why I'm leaving my current job

This is my favourite ad, or content if you will.

 

I was 13 or 14 when it came out, playing team tennis. I loved playing, I viscerally hated the culture in British tennis.Wear white, follow the rules, juniors always make way for seniors on the court and, worst of all, in lessons and team coaching, play like they did 40 years ago.

This ad represented everything I felt, and to be honest, everything I felt as a teenager. It was just the right time. 

It helped sell a hell of a lot of overpriced tennis gear for Nike, but also made loads of young tennis players feel like they could take on the establishment. It didn't matter how you played, how you showed up, as long as performed and had a bloody good time doing it.

I think strategy folks could do with a hefty dose of ignoring 'the rules' in service of actually getting results too.

The dull arguments over brand models, including the latest fashion over 'purpose'.

TV is dead, TV is brilliant.

Outspend your market share, build fame.

And the new, equally constricting rules over big data.

It's really easy to hide behind the models and received wisdom and a lot harder to put your neck on the line, tear up the rules and try and do stuff that works .

But not only is that more stimulating and more satisfying, it will also create disproportionate success for you and your clients.

It's also more fun.

I'm leaving my job to have more fun. 

The real rules still apply of course. 

By the way, the fact that Agassi is now bald and so am I is nothing to do with it. (and yes I bought those pink shorts)

 

Keep Moving

It's good being in a job that's about people. What is more interesting than the wonderful, scary, frustrating, contradictory human race? The ones in real life, not the pen portraits I mean. 

It's also a constant challenge because while basic human  behaviour, tech and stuff means that the culture ad folks are really competing with (not the market) is shifting faster than ever. Certainly the media, paid and otherwise we exploit to try and reach them is evolving right in front of our eyes. 

And the pace is only getting faster. 

Knowing when an how to adapt is the trick, and when and how not to change, but adapt we must. 

The industry, your organisation and most most importantly,  you.

You'll find if you don't keep your eyes and ear open that sometimes your employer has become obsolete and you go down with them. 

Sometimes you wake up and see you have become obsolete in your organisation. Like the moment someone switches off a fridge and you only then notice the buzz, all of a sudden, something has been happening under your nose, your place has moved on, you haven't just like that, you don't matter any more. 

This shouldn't frighten you, it should excite you. If you're a planner, wisdom rather than information (data!!!) will always matter, as will the ability to look at things in the way others don't. But how you apply that, the tools you use and who you work with is, and will continue to constantly shift. You won't get bored and if you're one those who can embrace change and also keep core competence, you'll have a fine future. 

In other words, keep soaking up stuff from the world around you like always.

But keep a sharp eye on yourself, your specialism and your employer. Sometimes they need to change, sometimes you need to change, sometimes other places have magically evolved into the perfect place for you, where you're at and where you want to go. 

Keep moving, like a great white shark, you'll be fine, its only when you decide to stop moving forward that the problems start. 

Being a former swimmer

I was a competitive swimmer for 7 hard years. I started at 8 and foolishly decided as a teenager I'd had enough, only to regret it many years later. I never stopped training and there was a wonderful period at University when I raced again, and then it was fun to rediscover what my body was built to do when I dived  back into competitive level training in my early 30s. But the re-entry was also bitter sweet. There's a truth to top tier sport that the athlete's may learn to love their sport after their prime has gone, but it's ultimately frustrating when your body won't do what you believe it should.

Your mediocre may be war speed next to others, but it' still mediocre to you.

But some of my best memories from childhood came from the poolside though, permeated with the indelible whiff of chlorine. It's amazing how those times affect my life today. It takes years for the chlorine to finally leave your skin, but I don't think it ever released its grip on the DNA.

There are lots of signs one is a former swimmer:

You're the most flexible person in a yoga class, your upward dog is the most streamlined, even if you now weigh 17 stone

You instantly recognise the bleached hair of someone who still trains every day

Hard word and dealing with difficult moments are second nature, nothing will make you suffer like 10 x 200 meters butterfly at full gas

You crave the feeling of flow, losing yourself in a task - you didn't realise how great it was when you got it everyday

You have to stop yourself buying swimming costumes a size too small (it reduces the drag against the water)

You're amazing at shaving the body even if you're male. When I started cycling properly and shaving my legs, not only did it not feel weird, I was about to start on the chest until I realised what I was doing

You refuse to buy baggy swim wear, you can't stand how it flaps in the water (your family is always ashamed of you on beach holidays)

You hate wearing shoes

You don't care about going barefoot in a locker room, or indeed anywhere

You have a lingering shoulder injury, or you we're a breastroker, it's probably the knee

You stretch your shoulder in the morning even though they're not stiff anymore

You find it hard every day not to do some sport that makes you properly suffer

You're kids are not allowed anymore swimwear that isn't acceptably branded

You're the best person you know at getting up at silly o clock

You know the exact degree of seperation between you and any Olympic swimmer

You hate all cultural entertainment with competitive swimmers in in, only Muriel's Wedding escapes this, they get the swimming wrong here too though

At least half of your friends from childhood do mental physical sports, ultra marathons, iron man etc

You don't remember most of your training sessions, but you remember every second of the sessions that made you cry, and the other where you reached some sort if state of grace and everything just worked

You secretly, simultaneously  hope and dread your children will become racing swimmers. You know the intense joy and pain it will bring (and the fact you'll have to get up at 5am to take them morning training)

If you haven't quit yet, here is some advice:

Regular people think excessive nudity in the changing rooms is a bit weird

Some day, you 'll have to take the amount of food you're used to eating and eat and at least half it, this will not be easy. 4,000 calories a day is not remotely normal

One day you'll find your shoulders don't hurt - it will be like when you switch off a fridge and you realise it was buzzing. You didn't notice the pain until it stopped

You will never ever have the chance to see this group of your best friends every day, even twice a day, or go on so many trips away with this many friends. Appreciate it

You don't realise the deep joy in doing something sublimely well until you don't do it anymore. Enjoy every stroke while you can

Nothing will be as hard as those sessions that make you want to throw up. Life gets tough when you get older, but you'll be ready

One holiday, two old parents and two young (for now) children

So we went to stay with Mum and Dad in Cornwall last week. I always treasure these times.

Mum and Dad are getting on, when you begin to realise they won't be around forever, you make the most of the time that little bit more.

It's one thing to become a parent, or have a moderately serious job. You think you may be all grown up, but until you emotionally reach the moment YOU will be the only backup in the family, I'm not sure you're totally mature. This is a very personal perspective of course, coming from a loving, supportive family unit etc. Some people have to grow up a lot quicker I guess.

Of course, these weeks are for me to spend proper time with my children. They are four and six now, Evie, our youngest is at that point when she's about to become a girl, rather than a little girl and you want to get as much of it as you can, before it's gone forever.

We always find when we go away with them, that they seem to change right in front of your eyes. Evie seems to have come home with even less of the 'little' in her and Will, our six year old is suddenly having much more intricate conversations and we can see in his developing features, more of the young man he will sadly become all too soon.

I'm not sure if it's because we have the chance to stop and watch them, without having to go off and do the usual stuff working parents running a house do, or the fact they respond to so much more time with us.

Either way, it serves as a reminder that no child will grow up remembering how clean the bathroom was, or how great Daddy's powerpoint was, or how well Mummy ran her team.

They'll remember how much fun they had, what we all talked about and how loved they felt.

One hopes.

Anyway

A weekend with clients and some, now legendary, pink footwear

A useful way of looking a your relationship with clients is asking yourself, "Would they want to spend two hours on a train with you".

As a client once said to me. "You can have the best planning, the best creative and the best pricing, but you won't get anywhere if we don't like you".

So I was pleased to be invited to spend a whole weekend with some of them, riding 150 miles.

You know you must be doing something right when they're happy for you to see them in lycra.

Not to mention share a jacuzzi in the hotel after day one.

That said, they were a little incredulous at the pink overshoes.

To quote the commercial director, "What the fuck are they".

There was the cafe stops.

The ice cream stops.

The amazing landscape in the Scottish borders.

The sea on the run up to Edinburgh.

What wonderful people.

My Dad

It's a little before 5am. My Dad is gently shaking me awake.

In 5 minutes flat, I roll out of bed, put on my clothes, picked up my swimming bag and get into his his Ford Sierra while he scrapes the last of the ice from the windscreen.

It is minus four, which is really cold for the UK. The radio comes on and, as usual, Dad has put on Radio 2 and it's a slightly mad bloke doing the 'Bog Eyed Jog'.

I am thirteen.

Half an hour later, were at the swimming pool in Leeds city centre. Dad makes his way up the balcony with his flask of coffee and the paper.

I get changed as quickly as possible, the heating hasn't come on yet. Diving into the pool doesn't offer any solace though, it isn't heated either.

The only thing recourse is to train as hard as possible.

It's a delicious feeling when ice in your veins begins to melt and you go from a little warmer to wonderfully toasty.

Two hours later, I will be totally spent and feel like a mini furnace.

As a do the various reps within the session I look up to Dad.

His attention constantly darts between the paper and his son slogging his guts out in the pool.

Only years later will he tell me how proud he is of me.

Not the winning, which happens a decent amount.

The trying.

The determination to train everyday, twice a day.

Getting up in the freezing dark.

Bolting down a hurried evening meal after school, crashing through homework and training again.

He knows there isn't a day when my body doesn't hurt.

And I will tell him how it felt to know that when I looked up from the pool, he was always there.

Just like before every race, he was always there.

Just like when I didn't have any money, he was there for me, not judging, just helping.

How he never told me what to do at the big moments.

Jobs that mattered.

Getting married.

Having your heart broken.

The twin joys and terrors of becoming a parent.

He just talked about what it was like for him and what he did.

The rest was up to me.

When I got beaten up by a mental chef working in a hotel one summer, I only found out months later that he had to physically restrained from driving up to that kitchen and trying to knock his lights out.

We weren't speaking all that much at the time.

The usual headstrong boy/man and the puzzled Dad wondering where his little boy had gone.

But he was still there for me, even when I didn't know it.

I don't think you see the person your parent is until you go through some of the same stuff.

I only understood what it took for him to take me morning training and then do a demanding job.

As a child you love your parent of course, it's biological.

It's another thing to become friends with your Dad and admire him, to want to be him.

And I want to be like my father.

There are things happening in mine and Juliette's live to do with her Dad right now.

I'm very close to him too, but it reminds me to make the most of my, quite old, Dad and make sure he knows how I feel.

He tells me these days he's just as proud of me doing something with cycling now as he was when I was a swimmer.

He was the first on the phone my I broke my wrist crashing into a car.

He was there when our first son was born with an infection that nearly led to meningitis.

He's always there, he always was.

 

A meaningless ride that meant everything (and what it means for the job)

As I may have mentioned, we're having a not okay time at home.

To the point where I'm not that interested in extraneous stuff that much.

But you need an outlet.

Hence I'm posting the odd thing that isn't much to do with work  -but if you want planning stuff scroll down to the end.

Swimming used to be my outlet, still is a little, but it's mostly pain and suffering on my road bike.

Because as a busy, working Dad, it's just easier to use where getting to where you need to be as training.

I seem to love agony. I couldn't tell you if this was nurture - 6 daily hours in a swimming pool as a boy.

Or maybe I'm naturally someone who needs to suffer.

And I think it's great training for the job, and character in general.

Like I said, we're having a difficult time, but I'm the one that keeps it going.

That tends to happen when the job get's tough.

Just like being able to take one length, or mile at a time, it helps to take one day at a time.

And nothing focuses the mind like a goal.

And right now, doing something else that isn't 'reality' really helps.

So, with that in mind, I'll take you back to last June.

I was planning to do a 70 mile ride very fast.

70 miles isn't that far, but it was the speed I was looking for.

I had trained hard for it. Weeks of pain.

Then the night before I fell off my bike and badly hurt my arm.

So I was forced to watch mates at the finish line the next day, quietly seething.

The anti-climax, the disappointment.

Not good.

So this was going to be the year.

I got a new bike in January, a terrifyingly fast race bike.

With gears much too hard for my puny legs.

But I would grow into it, train into it.

I used to find when I was swimming, the best way to get better was to train with older kids.

First is was pure agony just to not get dropped completely.

No rest between intervals. Pain and suffering.

Then slowly I would get within touching distance.

Then I would start to find I wasn't last, then halfway up the chain.

And when I raced with kids my age, it paid off.

Just as I got better at tennis by playing with kids much better than me.

First you want to duck their cannon ball serves.

Then you get a couple.

Then you start smashing them back.

So that was the plan in January.

I (humbly) told anyone that cared I would grow into the bike.

And try do the ride in under four hours.

That doesn't sound like much, but an average of 17.5 miles per hour with a couple of really big hills felt like it was pushing it at the time to me.

And then I broke my arm.

Knocked off the bike by a driver that wasn't looking where he was going.

And lost two months training.

I also lost a lot of confidence.

I've had the usual crashes, but after breaking my ribs in November, this one really hurt.

Not to mention the frustration at losing what I love for so long.

When I got back on the bike I discovered two things.

First, my legs has lost a mass of power, a tough bike had become a torturous.

Moreover, I was afraid.

I was pulling back when I got up to a decent speed.

So I embarked on a mental training regime courtesy of Strava.

Every day I got challenges on email based on where I needed to be.

Lots of intervals, lots of long sprints, lots of hills.

All designed to break me into little pieces.

All at 7am, the only time a really have.

Nothing has hurt like it since I was a competitive swimmer.

In fact this hurt more.

There wasn't a day my limbs didn't really, really hurt.

I resorted to doing sports massages on my tired legs -which meant more pain.

I drank a lot more coffee and little less tea.

And gradually, the bike got easier.

I got stronger and the fear went away.

Put the pain never stopped. Because you just push harder.

Then two weeks before the ride, Juliette's father fell ill.

Very ill.

He loves cycling.

He was looking forward to being at the finishing line

He's also as close as you can get to having a second father.

It hit me nearly as hard as it did Juliette - but I was the one to carry on with everything.

But we agreed we would do the riding day anyway.

It finished at the beach and we had promised the children the day out.

Juliette knew I had worked so hard and what it meant after the hurt arms.

But the reason we went ahead was we knew he would be furious if we didn't.

So I got to the start line with a couple of mates.

On the understanding I would drop them pretty much straight away.

Because I was going to do the fucking time no matter what.

After all the hurt.

But now, because I felt he was riding with me.

And the first half felt good, really good.

I didn't understand why, but I was way ahead of pace I needed.

I was zipping past everyone and didn't bother with big drinks stop after 35 miles.

But one of the stewards did.

Which mean I went the wrong way.

And after another few miles, I realised this wasn't right and went back a little, to find others who told me they were sure this was right.

So I turned at sped back.

But it didn't feel right and I phone the helpline, who told me I was way off course.

After last year.

After the broken arm.

After the agony of training.

After wondering if we would even be doing this.

There are moments when you decide to give in.

Seriously, fuck it. Whatever.

Or you carry on.

A meaningless bike ride that seemed to mean everything.

I sprinted the 12 miles back to the route.

In time for a vicious hill.

Waved at my mates as I climbed past them (they had no idea what the fuck was going on).

And then sprinted the last 25 miles.

Anger is energy. There is much to be gained from being totally pissed off.

It certainly pushed me along.

Until everything changed.

I felt like I was flying.

Yes, this was what mattered.

The bit when you're mind and body work together.

When you're lost in the moment, both inside and oblivious to the situation.

Flow, wonderful, glorious flow.

Yes, this is what it' all about, this.

10 miles to go. I was actually smiling.

My hamstrings began to scream.

I went faster.

The flat turned into one more hill.

Faster.

I could smell the sea.

Even faster.

Snot coming from the nose.

Soaked in sweat.

Faster.

And then 1 mile to go.

Sprint, let it all go.

Go the wrong fucking way with 200 metres to go, end up down at the beach.

Sprint up the cobbles.

And then I see wife and children at the finish line.

It's over. I need it to be over.

It hurts.

I don't want it to be over.

Come off the bike.

Can't walk.

Drink a litre of water.

Get handed a cup of tea.

Hug proud family.

Think of father in law.

Look at the time.

79.2 miles per hour.

And average of just under 20 miles an hour for four hours.

I didn't think that was possible for me.

The fucking pratfall detour has actually turned into a sweeter result.

Did the time, went even further.

Pride, relief.

And, for a little while, being away from everything that was going on.

Just me, my bike and him riding with me.

A meaningless ride that meant everything.

Later, when father in law found our what happened.

He grinned from ear to ear at the result.

And laughed at the 'detour' so hard  the nurses got worried.

It was worth it just to make him happy.

 

You will care little about any of this.

And I don't really care about planning stuff right now.

But I still think there are a couple of things to apply to the day job.

 

You have to put the work in.

If you take yourself way to a place way out your comfort zone, eventually it becomes your comfort zone.

Hang around people better than you, until they are not better than you.

Then hang around new people who are better than you.

Welcome pain, suffering and setbacks - they pay you back in the end.

You're much better than you think you are, you only need to do the work.

It's only a fucking job, if there's one thing I've learned recently it's that it really doesn't matter.

Find something you love that isn't work. 

Anyway. 

 

Burning children and why no parent has a child because they want another job

The internet is ablaze (sorry for the pun) at fate of a young, sweet innocent girl was burned alive by her parents, in service of fanatical religion - on a fantasy drama series you'll be familiar with. You'll know what I'm talking about it you've seen it, if not, you've been saved the spoiler.

Some are understandably up in arms at the torture of a character many took to their hearts. Others talk, in sophisticated terms on the value of getting people to question their belief systems and showing the unvarnished truth about religion, medieval times and so so.

I must say it affected me, but for very simple reasons.

I used to get annoyed at parents in research who could only talk about their kids.

They framed every experience through their experience with their children.

I didn't understand this but I do now.

Nothing changed my life like having my two of my own.

The unconditional love is so fundamental. I can't think I wouldn't do for them if required.

They know, and will know for the rest of their lives that, when it comes down to it, if they needed me I'd drop anything and be there to do what is required.

Which is why the made scene of a girl being burned at the stake by her parents is so shocking, I'd rather burn MYSELF alive. Not my little girl.

But it's not just that.

My eldest is five and is still holding on to his innocence, but you see the cracks.

But Evie, my Evie.

She's three and such a sweet little innocent little thing. You fight a doomed battle to preserve it, knowing it's only a matter of time, but utter trust in you always being there never goes away.

Breaking that trust is unthinkable. And the faith doesn't go away when you grow up.

Juliette's Dad isn't very well and, while intellectually you know they won't always be there, the emotional reality really knocks you.

With both my kids, especially my eldest actually, I see so much of myself.

They're both so INTERESTED. They're quick learners, they love books, they have this total love for whatever they're into. Right now it's sharks, and we read endless books about them, and Will draws these amazing pictures of every species he can. If he loves something, he has to draw it.

It makes me feel responsible, as this came from me.

Juliette says she sees Will's eyes glaze over when they're chatting and she knows he's away daydreaming.

Like his Daddy.

We know that he, and to a lesser extend her will end up quite sensitive, kind and little bookworms.

We know we need to protect this is and help them with introversion, while absolutely letting them know how proud we are of them as they are, and their interests and passions should be respected and developed.

This in a world where they're going to have to compete like never before.

I see an army of ferociously well educated children already readying themselves for the dwindling jobs and prosperity. I see a world that sees the cost of everything and the value if nothing.

It's my job to help them through this, but keep who they are intact. No, to flourish.

That's why burning your child in a fantasy show affected me. Because that innocent trust is the most fundamental thing in the world. It becomes your world.

There's conflict of course. In my case the obsession with swimming and cycling, wanting to read and watch stuff and the realities of being a planner that is better for their upbringing than it is for being a planner.

There needs to be some balance, but the scales will always tip in favour who I really am.

Their father. 

We're really close. I'm a very tactile parent. We hug a lot, we tickle more. I dread the coming years when they start to pull away.

Right now a single kiss can be magic. It can make everything go away. I can make them believe that when I snap my fingers, my nose will beep when they touch it, and their will honk.

I quail at the time when they're teenagers when we laugh together less and they laugh at me more. When they do the whole rejection thing. I can't imagine yet the pain of reaching to take a hand and only grasping empty air.

It will come.

Which is also why I get annoyed with so much advertising around parenting.

Much of the themes are the hard work, the 'job aspect'. The joy in sacrifice. It's true, it's bloody hard work.

But it seems to miss what most parents (this isn't just a view, decent research seems to corroborate this) want to feel.

No parent has a child because they want another job.

It's about love, it's about a relationship, it's about playing, it's about the watching someone grow and helping shape how that turns out.

There's some insight for you if you like, I suppose.

So yes, all that from a burning child on a fantasy show.

I'm off to call my Mum now, I suggest you do them same.

 

Work is good, children are better

So our family hasn't had a great time recently. You don't need to know.

But not having a great time has reminded of the comfort and solace of work.

I'm lucky to have a job I like.

It has its frustrations, but they are piffling next to doing something interesting with nice people.

Nice to be reminded of that.

Not to take it for granted.

But even that is tiny next to the comfort of your own children.

My two are three and five.

They are such fun.

There really are no problems that don't look smaller being knocked around on a trampoline by two pint sized gangsters.

5 songs in 5 days. Queen - Flash AAAARR

More of the 5 songs in 5 days thingy

 
I am ashamed to admit the first record I ever bought was Queen single.
To be fair, it's still a classic and was more about liking the film than Queen.
Princess Aura, I certainly would. In the real world, Flash would have dropped Dale Arden without a second thought.

 

 

What swimming taught me about being a planner

I might ride the bike more these days, but swimming was my first love and will always have the most enduring place in my heart. If I had the time as a working  parent, I would still in the pool everyday.

I used to compete as a youngster. The kind of competition that required six hours training a day. You don't come out of stuff like that unscathed.

Below is the Leeds swim team on tour in Chicago in 1988. Bet you can't spot where I am in the line up.

1. Accept the simple truth, you are alone in this

You will tailgate others in training to pull you along. You can banter with your team mates. You can lean on the coach for advice and a kick up the arse. You can turn to family and friends for support. But eventually, there will always come a time when you are utterly alone. It will happen in the training pool when your body cries for mercy and you have to go on. You have to try and lock away the negative thoughts in your brain and pretend the agony in your muscles is not there.

This is doubly so in a race of any notable distance.

But the real loneliness is when you're on the starting blocks.

It's just you, your nerves, your courage and the clock. Waiting for the starting gun. The other other people on the blocks hardly matter. You'll hardly see them in the race. You won't hear the crowds cheering. It's just you.

It's ultimately the same as a planner. You work in a team, a team where most, at best, tolerate you getting in the way.

Nevertheless, while you rely on the creatives to execute something in a way that can't be missed, you have suits and production folks to make sure stuff gets made, if your in media there's a whole host of specialists and buyers to flesh out the plan and get a decent rate (and media owners to add loads of value) there are suits to get things through Clearcast and make sure there is a vet for a mouse on the shoot (legal requirement in the UK) - you can't get away from having having to do a clear strategy you can express in a sentence.

You. No one else. A sentence others will question, pull apart and try and ignore. It's lonely.

There will be moments, with a first stage internal meeting,  a pitch date getting closer and closer when you feel you have nothing.

All you can do is grit your teeth, keep working, keep looking at as much stimulus as you can and keep writing things down.

Flashes on strategic insight rarely come on their own in the shower. Nice when it happens but you can't plan for it. They come from hard work. The pressure to get there can be immense and no one is going to do it for you.

Assess and listen to your body, always be patient

In training, you have to listen to your muscles as they flush out any stiffness or residual lactic acid. Don't go too hard at first. At the end, your body will acquiesce to your determination and begin to respond to more challenging demands. They will collaborate more willingly on some occasions than they will on others, but eventually they will play ball.

It's the same with your mind. Many don't appreciate the challenge of having to think for a living. Most days, there are big chunks that require concentration. Some days, you're tired.

The brain is a muscle too.

But deadlines and general workload, like essential training days in sport, will not go away.

You have to get on with it - and get into that prized 'flow state' when everything gets fluid and easy.

Which, like with sport, means starting gently, stirring the soup a little, but generally keep going. Eventually the brain will play ball like the other muscles do.

Find a rhythm

When you're training and doing long distances, you need to find the right cadence that suits your lung capacity and strength. Start too hard, and you crack and the rest of the distance you have to swim is murder.

You've lost a race or wasted a training session.

Leave too much until to late and you won't make up the time distance with the leaders, or you won't have put your body through enough in a training session to build your body up.

In planning, it's hard work. The days can be long, the work intense.

Find out how you work best and stick to it.

Some folks are on it in the morning and come in early. Some work late and do naff all in the morning.

If you're like me, and find it's amazing what you can achieve between 9 and 5.30 if you don't prevaricate, as long as the tea is good, you'll go full pelt from the get-go.

Of course, with practice you can change your ways, but, like making your weak legs get stronger, it won't happen overnight.

I also know that, as a shy person in meetings, it takes a while to get going. I start off quiet and build confidence as the small talk stops and the work talk begins.

Even then, I let others talk and weigh in when others have exhausted their vocal cords. I make sure what I say is short and to the point, i may not get another chance. Then, as I relax, my cadence builds and I get more chatty. Eventually, I need to make myself shut up.

But that's just me.

But change it up when you can

In our training schedule, there was always planned shocks to the system.We used to do hell weeks, where over seven days you would be close to tears, throwing up or both. The only objective was survival.

Because of the law of diminishing returns. The more the body gets used to a routine, the less it benefits. You need to introduce surprises and variation to keep in on its toes.

That's why every training session has a variety of strokes, distances, rest periods etc. And why we never did the same session in a fortnight.

It's also why interval training is so good. Not only does it raise the metabolism for hours after the session, it makes you train way beyond your threshold for limited periods - and as you do more and more, you find you can go for longer and longer.

If you only train at a 'training pace' you only get good at swimming at a training pace.

Variation is essential as a planner.

Media, creative, whatever  -if you go through each project in the same proprietary process, you'll always do similar work. Innovation comes from doing something different.

By all means, create a benign conspiracy where you sell your thinking conforming to a the stages of a process, post rationalise it I mean, but if you want new stuff, do new stuff.

But don't forget the basics. That's where processes and agree standards are good, just as with swimming, where there is a basic correlation with the amount of training kilometres you've done and how race fit you are.

That goes for reading. If you just read marketing, planning and reading books, you'll just do the same as everyone else who reads the same stuff.

Soak up as much interesting stuff from as many sources as you can.

And for God's sake. Don't just be a planner 24 seven. Don't live at the office. The more real life you live, the more you can draw on.

There's a trick of psychology too, where couples that do new things together tend to be happier. So do new things as a team, try new stuff. It just makes it more fun.

Just as there is nothing more monotonous as swimming up and down a pool if you can't find a way to make it more interesting. Like I said, you're on your own in the pool, it's boring unless you jazz it up.

I'm sure you have lots of stuff to draw on from your own interests, this is just some stuff which is of relevant to and how I have gone about stuff in a variety of species of agency.

 

 

 

5 songs in 5 days. Hello it's Me

Rob Campbell has helpfully got me to do this 5 songs in 5 days thing. Rob has decided his 5 will be songs to be played at his funeral. Despite the fact I'm getting spammed on my email by 'plan by funeral' at the moment I won't be entirely following suit.

 
However, the first one is a funeral song, partly because of the neatness of the title- it's 'Goodbye Andy' by Lou reed and John Cale.
Now, The Velvet Underground are not too everyone's taste, but along with some of Lou Reed and John Cale's respective solo efforts, some of their stuff, especially songs not on the album everyone knows (with the banana on the front) are among the stuff I've always come back to for most of my life.
Songs for Drella the album this song was from, was a joint effort Reed and Cale did, burying the hatchet after years of the usual music partnership falling out. It was a tribute to the Andy Warhol after his shooting. The whole album is moving, utterly original and communicated the regret of too, now mature men, who wished they hadn't wasted some of their best years on spite and pride.
This song perhaps captures that the best

Things I miss about creative agencies and the things I don't

I used to work in creative type agencies, now I work in media type places.

The things I tend to miss about creative places:

1. Unlimited big pads and sharpie pens for scrawling notes and thoughts etc.

2. Creatives that liked solving problems

3. Experienced planning directors who wanted you to get to some great thinking

4. Working a planning department

5. Suits who loved working in partnership

6. Creative reviews that took your breath away with inspiration

7. Working in an agency run by people with the kind of experience you'd kill for and were incredibly generous at sharing that experience

8. Jonathan Fletcher

9. People who cared and understood about the craft of making ads and content

10. Seeing the ad you worked on appear on telly (come on, we all did)

11. The endearing passion to debate how advertising works and break new ground

 

The things I don't miss:

1. Presenteeism

2. Planning directors who wanted you to write up their great thinking

3. Creatives who wanted to talk about if the work was a gold

4. Arguing about brand theory and how advertising works to justify okay work

5. Working out what the hell Media Arts was

6. Spending a week getting a proposition signed off by various stakeholders so the creatives could ignore it

7. Discussing the creative brief format

8. The minority of the people

9. Creative reviews where you're scratching your head trying to find something positive to say.

10. Pre-testing

11. Working in an agency run by people who had only ever done CRM for tiny, tiny clients who knew no better

12. Reporting to a Head of Client services who's response on most things was 'When I worked at Little Chef'

13. Obsessing about the size of the logo

 

Tired is stupid -what a sports massage tells us about the perils of overwork

I had a sports massage towards the end of last year (that's not a euphemism).

Because I do a LOT of cycling these days, I haven't the time for swimming I would like. 

It's all or nothing with me, I have to do it right, so it's daily torment.

There isn't a day when my legs don't hurt to a certain degree.

So sometimes they need help.

It was agony on my legs this time. Sports massages do hurt a bit, but this was like some mythical 8th circle of hell.

My tormentor was clear on the reasons.

The first was that I didn't massage my legs enough.

The second was that I was over-training.

I had forgotten the basic principles I was taught when I used to swim.

It's a daily grind close to the edge of your limits and beyond.

But for that training to really work, you need to give your body time to heal.

Because training is really controlled damage to your body.

If you want it to benefit, to get stronger, it needs time to heal itself, for the work to bed in and your body develop.

Rest days and even rest weeks.

It's the same with the job.

You need to work hard.

You need to do lots of reading, lots of thinking.

You also need to have lots of patience.

You can't be the one to lose your temper. You need to convince everyone about everything.

Planners are the only ones in any agency who can't say, "I think we should do this, end of discussion".

All this makes you hard, it makes you tough.

But it's exhausting.

But if you don't take time off to recharge, you'll just end up tired and stupid.

Even in the thick of things, going home on time should be a must when you can.

If you can take a day to kick back a bit in the office and potter, do it.

But it's more than that.

There is no point banging your head against a brick wall when you're on a project.

There is no point spending all your waking hours thinking about planning and brands and stuff.

There isn't any point reading all the stuff planners need to read in you spare time - culture etc.

For all that reading and work to have it's real benefit, you need to shut your mind off, to do something else.

That's when new neuron pathways get bedded in and new connections form.

Your subconscious is thinking when you're not.

That's when ideas pop out.

That's when the memory is encoded for later use.

So take lots of breaks.

I don't believe in those flashed of Damascene insight that much either.

They happen of course, but not all the time.

The only way to be consistent is to work hard.

Start with something a bit rubbish, edit, talk it around, read some more and gradually end up with good and hopefully great.

But done is better than perfect.

That level of work isn't sustainable forever.

Take a lunch break, go look at an art gallery, go to the gym or just take a walk.

Take time to make tea or coffee.

Go to another department to chat.

But also, in general, do absorbing stuff outside of work.

Have a hobby you give yourself utterly to, so when you're mind is focused on it, you're cleverer subconsciousness is sorting all all the memories and problem solving for you.

Cycling and swimming work for me.

But so does having kids and spending proper time with them.

I'm not saying don't work hard.

I'm saying work really, really hard, at your threshold as much as you can.

But no your limits.

Then take a break for that work to properly pay off.

Don't over-train.

Just like my legs, your brain is muscle.

It needs time to recover to get more intelligent.

Otherwise, you'll end up a very busy, very tired fool. 

We're all hypocrites

 

I love these new Curry's ads. There's that universal in here that everyone has dreams of another life, of what might have been, no matter how happy they might with the one they're living.

And even more fundamental, people are perfectly capable of having two opposing principles, or points of view at the same.

Just as I move heaven and earth to get home in time to see the kids during the week.

Then plot and negotiate to leave them for two hours on a weekend to indulge in mid-life crisis bike riding.

 But let's forget all the planner speak, they're just funny.

Where as this, which again shows the pain and joy of parenthood, is so charming.....

 

 

A pub

I went to see Ryan Adams (NOT, I repeat NOT Byan) the other night at the O2 Academy in Leeds.

Rather good in case you're interested. I like gigs like this, nice to be surrounded by my own people or so to speak.

But that's not the point I want to make.

You see, leaving the venue, we walked past a nondescript pub.

Except it's not for me.

Over 13 years ago, I didn't have a full time job and the money was running out.

So I was temping in a call centre, selling plumbing and drainage insurance.

Soul destroying, which is why I'm always nice to cold callers. I've been there.

We worked from 12pm until 8. Lunch was 5. But it wasn't lunch, everybody went to this pub to drink their way into a state to get through the rest of the shift.

Misery.

The spoiled, ex-student, recently ex-ad agency me met all sorts of people there.

And I learned how lucky I was, because I knew this employment arrangement was only temporary.

For others, this wasn't a stop gap. Just part of an endless cycle of undertainty.

Sometimes it's worth being reminded you could roll the dice a thousand times and never be as lucky as you are.

Anyway.

 

A not crushingly bad Queen review

So I went to see Queen last night. 

Sort of against my will. Campbell dared me to confront my prejudice and I accepted, only to find him putting his money where my mouth was.

It wasn't totally hateful. 

I took my sister and it made her happy. If anything made it worthwhile, it was that. 

But it's hard to not to appreciate 10,000 happy people singing their hearts out. It even made me smile.

The songs, and yes I do unfortunately know most of them, do work in a live setting.

Adam Lambert confounded my expectations. Once he forget to try and impersonate Freddie Mercury and just perform, he's a very good singer, he won the crowd over, not least because he could see they were enjoying themselves. 

But Brian May was the real star of the show. It's uncool to play a guitar that looks like he crafted in a school woodwork class and he always has this squinty frown. But he's a very good guitar player. 

Someone apart from Freddie Mercury was missing. They played Under Pressure, a David Bowie song Queen got involved that in that I do love - and it missed Bowie. 

Overall, I wouldn't go again. The songs just aren't that interesting. Eventually, like listening on record, it just became slightly camp power rock played with a very similar guitar style. It was a bit boring. 

Meatloaf does this kind of thing a lot better in my inconsequential view. 

The one surprise was when they forget to be 'Queen' there were some good bits. They played a very earnest and affecting Days of Our Lives for example. That was OK. 

So I maybe hate Queen a little less. They make a lot of people happy and you can't argue with that.

It's just not for me.

But at least I gave it a go. 

Thankfully I'm seeing Ryan Adams in February and Morrisey in March to cleanse myself. 

 

Some things people have really said in relation to the job

“Who will be my primary contact to interface with?”

“We’re way off the point of actual ideation”

“I like recessions, the fear means we can squeeze far more out of our people”

“I agree with you completely. However….” (every single meeting)

“Put that hardhat on. No really put it on. Now take this celery and hit yourself on the head again and again, because it’s more likely you’ll eventually knock yourself out than me paying this fucking bigger fee”

 

To a creative team:

Day one: “This is the last change the client is going to make”

Day Two: “Just a couple of final tweaks before it can be signed off”

Day Three: “Has the print run started yet?”

 

“These are not the fucking changes I briefed, what sort of a twat do you take me for? How fucking simple is it to get a fucking wine leaflet right? Oh bollocks! This is the chicken leaflet isn’t it? Fuck me, I’m sorry, mind you why the fuck didn’t you say I was talking about the wrong bastard leaflet?

“The secret to marketing? I’ll tell you the secret to marketing, it’s selling a loaf of bread to poor simpletons for 10p less than the other bastards”

“We just don’t go for this emotional stuff”

“This is a professional organization, put some bloody shoes on”

“I haven’t got my credit card, can you get the bill?” (said the Head of Client Services to the account exec when the £2,000 bill came in for the client lunch”

“I can’t make my mind up with these scripts, can we have an animatronic please”

“Fucking salience? What’s salty water got to do with my fucking brand?”

“Just letting you know you replied to my email. I’m assuming you wanted to forward it?”

Ring ring….“I know it’s two in the fucking morning, but I’ve just had a thought”

“Do they still bother with suits Up North”

“Bloody planner”

“Can you give us a worse proposition?”

“We’re going to make a cartoon panda sponsor a racehorse”

“Get out of my broom cupboard”

"No one leaves this bar until dawn. 6 more black russians on the way"

"Look, the trick of a contact report is not to report what happened and what was said. It's a second chance to get we wanted out of the meeting. No one reads them anyway"

"When you sign on the teleconference, everyone can hear you mate"

"You forgot to press mute"

An extended break

 

That's it for a while. Perhaps a long while.

Back at some point in New Year. 

Have a lovely festive break and excellent New Year. 

Plan on. 

Why a battered cycling body tells us life as planner isn't fair, but you need to deal with it

I got knocked off my bike the other day. 

It hurt.

I've never understood how clothing can remain un-ripped yet the skin can be stripped from your flesh, yet that's what happened to my leg.

Then there's my ribs that are either bruised or broken. 

Still on the bike though, a few pain killers etc and it's OK.

Get back on the horse.

 

Now it wasn't my fault, but it doesn't matter. 

It doesn't make my ribs any less damaged, it doesn't put the skin back on my leg.

If I didn't know how to fall, it wouldn't change more broken more bones or a mangled bike.  

That's the problem with getting all self righteous about blame and fairness.

It rarely changes your current predicament. 

In fact it usually makes things worse.

 

It's the same with the job. 

It's not fair that strategy types have to earn the right to have any sort of point of view -and are expected to back it up with evidence. 

While others can say what they bloody well like and it's taken as gospel.

It's not fair that brief has largely been ignored by the folks working on it.

It's not fair that your carefully crafted, well researched thinking has been torpedoed by a client, creative director, media partner or whoever without any evidence or logic whatsoever. 

It is the job. Change what you can, deal with what you can't. 

Treat rejection of your work as a chance to do something even better. Work even harder. Learn dirty rules to politely destabilise the thinking of louder mouthed people. Learn how to push emotional buttons when you share your work, no one gets excited by logic. 

And if it's a lost cause, start the long term plotting to change your job, client or even department. But do make sure the problem isn't really you that's the problem. 

 

Back to that bike incident. 

 

I got up, ready to blister the offending driver with white hot rage.

Only to see a mother and her little girl behind the dashboard, on their way to school. 

No way am I going to upset a little girl. 

I prepare for a withering look before I stuggle onto my bike and ride off. 

But she opens her door, rushes out and gives me hug.

My ribs are agony, but I let pass because she's in tears.

She's actually in shock. She says she's so sorry, she's full of concern, she offers to drive me to work, pay for a new bike and God knows what else. 

I end up calming HER down and making sure she's OK, before I eventually pedal away. 

Why am I telling you this?

Because no one has the right to be self-righteous if someone else feels bad and didn't mean it. 

But more because, getting back to the job, it's worth making sure you know how someone else feels before they wade in. They may well surprise you - and head confrontation rarely works. 

The person who blanks you because they're actually painfully shy.

The client who won't even discuss why you're work won't get any further because they're inexperienced and they make you feel stupid. 

The creatives shouting at you for work bombing in research, when they're actually terrified of a creative director. 

The TV planner who's only way of dealing with stuff is 100% aggression, because that's what he's got from everyone else. If you give it back, you've only managed to cease to amaze him like everyone else. 

 

Remember, I missed acting looking a total idiot on that road, by a matter of seconds, only because I happened to look through the windshield at the person.

I've learned the hard way about rising to unfairness and being shafted at work. It never works. Pause, look behind the windshield instead. 

 

On the other hand, she might have been using emotional blackmail on me, but that's OK, we've already covered how playing dirty can get you out of dodge. Being moral and fair and considered is all good of course, sometimes, you just need to be a little bit cunning too. 

Star Wars and the need to feel 10 again

And so we have a new Star Wars trailer.

 

No point telling you I’m looking forward to a new Star Wars film.

Since I was born in 1974 and I’m male, it’s sort of inevitable.

Sort of.

Because the Star Wars world is divided between those too scarred by the prequel trilogy and those that insist on living in hope.

Anyway, the prequels were not as bad as received wisdom likes to claim.

It’s just that die hard original fans saw the first film as little boy and nothing can ever match how it felt to watch those films for the first time.

When I listen to my five year old begging for a Darth Maul lightsabre you know those films had something good about them.

From time to time, we all need to feel like little boys and little girls again.

It’s why I just read the Hobbit again. When I was eight it was magical. It still is, not because I haven’t grown up, it’s just that the wonder of being that age comes flooding back.

The feeling that everything was amazing and special.

That Mummy and Daddy were much loved constants that knew everything and would always be there.  

Where December seemed to take forever and ever.

That nothing mattered more than if Vader really was Luke’s father, except, perhaps, the Raleigh Chopper you were hoping against hope would appear on Christmas morning.

How lucky I am to have grown in a little world where I never had to worry about real things, apart from the odd bully and relentless teasing from my elder sisters.

How fortunate (for now, you never know what’s around the corner) my children are able to grow up in a similar way. 

That's why some folks can't get over Star Wars and similar things. It's what their childhood was made of and who doesn't want to feel like that again every now and then?

 

Why Satnav and a Gorilla show us that planning tools are Trojan Horses of the obvious

One of my many failings is my useless sense of direction. SATNAV and Google Maps are a godsend for a numpty like me.

Blatant excuse to show this..........

 

I was lucky though to have grown up in a time when there were not the tools to do it for you. The AA Route planner and real maps became my friends.

And I got very used to being lost. Got used to not panicking, leaving enough time in the first place and getting there.

Which means when the tools let you down (and they frequently do) you actually want me in the car with you.

When it comes to the tools for our job, media agencies tend to be amazed how loads of creative agencies you will have heard of don’t have some of the basic planning tools.

I don’t mean the sexy stuff like TGI Worldpanel, NVision or the latest YouGov Profiles doo dah (you can get a watered down version of Profiles here).

Stuff like basic TGI, Mintel, Touchpoints or access to WARC.

Now these tools are bloody useful of course, but they have problems.

TGI is based on claimed behavior and as has been said ad nauseum, people rarely say what they do.

Touchpoints is more diarised of course, and real time reporting means you get a decent idea of what people do. But no clue about how they feel about it, or why they do what they do.

Mintel is really someone else’s opinion on market share and TGI. And don’t believe their observed trends – it usually means it has been observed twice.

WARC case studies are really helpful for all sorts of industry stuff, case studies and awards papers are great for inspiration but every single one is a representation of a perfect world, where everything works like clockwork, where there has been an ‘invented crisis’ and some earth shattering insight to overcome it. When of course, every agency process is a variation of chaos, post rationalization and gut feel.

The tools are great for the ‘sell’ – case studies and data that justifies the thinking are great.

But the problems with tools is they’re too easy.

They keep you at your desk, settling for easy answers that at best tell you ‘what’ rather than ‘why’.

They allow you to have an opinion and then justify it.

Rather than finding a fresh perspective.  

They allow you to have a point of view on your target customer without ever having met them.

They are Trojan Horses of the obvious.

Now, of course, creative folks without the tools can be VERY guilty of assertion without making any effort to prove it.

And some quotes from Trendwatching or NVision loosely linked to your ‘insight’ don’t count.

But the good organizations are great at having an informed opinion by constantly going out and meeting their customers, reading what they read and doing what they do.

I think a great example was when AMV wanted to prove that Sainsbury’s customers sleep shopped, so they filmed a Gorilla roaming about instore, being mostly ignored by customers and showed it to the client.

Deep insight you won’t get from TGI.

Aligned with the fact that most bought cookbooks are left unread you have a lovely tension between the pressure of habit and routine and the pressure to be a ‘foodie’ you get ‘Try something new today’.

 

So.

By all means use the tools, but only as a starting point and by way of the final ‘sell’.

Please do the desk research, all the crumbly stuff out there on the web.

By you can’t beat leaving your desk and actually being your audience.

Because the problem with relying on Satnav, and planning tools, is that you don’t know you’re lost. 

Leading by example - I'm trying Queen

Just following on from this post about doing as much stuff as you can, in the hope something unexpected and good will come of it..

The evil genius Rob Campbell somehow goaded me into accepting a challenge to see Queen live in January. 

For the record, I hate Queen. Really hate them. Maybe irrationally so. 

Maybe the pain will mitigated by the lack of Freddie Bloody Mercury. 

Maybe. 

Yet I will be going, posting a selfie and blogging an honest report. 

With an open mind. 

I doubt anything good will come from this new experience. 

But you never know. 

If that's not putting my money where my mouth is, I truly do not know what is. 

Different kinds of agencies are very similar and very different. Some reasons why.

I’ve worked in quite a few different agencies.

Each has been very different, starting with a creative agency getting to grips having to do more than traditional ads, right at the start of the original  ‘What do about the internet?” question, when agencies began to think being able to design and build websites.

Blogs were a long way off, let alone anything that looked like social media.

This contrasts sharply with my experience these days in media agencies.

They’re absolutely on top of their game dealing with the continuous upheaval and change their industry faces.

Communications strategy is no longer owned by the creative (or digital) agency and, to some degree, nor is core brand strategy. How can it when a huge proportion is what gets planned, across paid and earned I hasten to add, doesn’t actually need much stuff created for the client by an external agency?

(Can I just say I bloody hate the term ‘brand planning’ or ‘brand strategy’. Yes, I’ve seen the same numbers as you, that show the payback from great campaigns that build and refresh memory structures etc.

But this is merely a constant need over time to reach as many buyers as possible with stuff that is consistent with, and develops, core associations in the mind.

Rarely is the immediate PROBLEM the brand. The problem is nearly always about removing specific reasons not to buy. Defining the issue, then going about the job of solving it.

Anyway)

So many modern campaigns include content created in partnership - with the people that own the  media, or folks at an even sharper end of creativity – film makers, writers, technology outfits and whatever else – ‘strategy’ no longer means what you fill the ads with.

Now, as a strategy type in a media agency, you’d expect me to say that.

But the reason I jumped ship from the creative outfit a worked with wasn’t just down to the creative director with the ego dwarfing his skills, or head of new business that thought he was a planner, not even the general complacency of the place.

It was simply that I was getting concerned at the amount of ‘ad tweaking’ briefs I was working on.

After getting used to, in many cases, developing digital stuff around the work other creative agencies were doing, it was a little too much to find in latter years, I was mostly being given some core thinking from the media folks.  

And lots of it was pretty good too.

In fact, it seemed that much of the innovations and drive to solve business problems rather than just ‘marketing’ or even ‘creative’ problems was coming from the media folks.

So here I am. Probably quite well qualified to comment on what’s different between creative/digital/media agencies and what is the same.

5 things that are the same

 The other agencies are charlatans. They don’t work as hard, they get paid more, they’re not held to the same high standards as you are. It’s so easy on the other side, you’ve often thought of jumping ship for an easier life, to make a bigger impact and get paid more.

Clients just don’t get how hard you work, how you’re always juggling, how their briefs are never clear enough. They always brief you at the last minute and expect a response now. But when it comes to invoices, they pay as late as possible and query everything.

Suppliers to agency folk, researchers, media owners, production  companies, tech companies, printers etc think agency folk don’t get how hard they work, how they’re always juggling, how their briefs are never clear enough. They always brief you at the last minute and expect a response now.

Many agency folk jump ship and work on the client side, only to get a nasty shock at the stuff they have to deal with, things well outside their experience or skills. Like dealing with a supermarket buyer if you’re in FMCG. Like dealing with sales team. Like being actually responsible for sales. Like working in a normal office without a groovy coffee machine. Like having to spend 90% of your time having to deal with stuff that is nothing to do with ‘campaigns’ or ‘communications’/ They miss the good old days.

They wish they were paid more, they hate the new world of procurement and know for certain the other agencies get paid more than they do.

 

5 Things that are different

Creative agencies secretly wish it was 1995 again, they could just make ads and bamboozle clients. Media agencies are torn between the simplicity of the old days where you could just negotiate the right amount of TVR’s – vs the brilliance of the new world where they can be lead agency all of a sudden. Digital agencies wish it was 2003 again when no one understood what they did, including themselves, but they could charge the earth for it. PR agencies don’t care when it is, as long as no one asks them to report ROI in the detail everyone else does.

Creative and digital agencies rarely have lunch breaks. Media agencies nearly always have lunch breaks and will not answer the phone to anyone between 1 and 2 pm. PR agencies are out to lunch all day.

Creative agencies spend ages on two IPA Awards year to prove the stuff they do works. Media agencies report on everything they do, reach is actually a serious measure. Digital agencies can prove everything they do, clicks are a serious metric. PR agencies have got to grips with the new world of accountability and do far more than equivalent media value and share insightful stuff like ‘likes’.

Media agencies have ‘invention’ or ‘content’ departments to disguise the fact they’re doing more creative and want to do even more. Creative and digital agencies have ‘creative departments’ (so little imagination) and planners that innocently trot out media recommendations in the guise of ‘brand behaviour. PR agencies do PR.

Creative agencies make their money charging a lot of time for a make-believe process. Media agencies make their money on commissions and charging time for a make believe process. Digital agencies charge for what they can get the client to understand. PR agencies are lovely. 

Back swimming

I’m back in the pool again.

One of the benefits of the new job is that only two minutes’ walk from a decent pool.

The other is that it’s the kind of place where people actually take a lunch break.

So it transpires that a few days a week, I’m in the pool for a go half hour.

Now half an hour for swimmer isn’t much.

When I was training as a boy, we did about four to six hours a day. There wasn’t a day when my body didn’t hurt. I don’t mean the actual training, I mean the ache in my muscle after. The only thing that would stop it is more training.

It’s not even much next to what I was doing a few years ago to train for the Great North Swim – about a solid hour a day.

But now I’m riding around 20 miles a day, it’s not about the fitness and stuff, it’s about just doing it.

My obsession with getting on the road bike is all consuming, but my first love with always be swimming.

Because I will always be a clumsy fool on land, but when I get in the pool, suddenly my body assumes an air of grace. It knows this is something it likes to do well.  

Also, cycling is freedom but riding is solitude and for an introvert like me, being alone with your thoughts is a rare pleasure. When I used to train properly, it was far from lonely, with all my team mates, united in agony and loving what they did. But now, there isn’t a silence quite like being underwater.

So how is it going?

At first, muscles I forgot I had woke up in flaming torture.

Then they calmed down.

My feel in the water was dreadful. That’s the thing swimmers need the most, and what disappears the most quickly if you stay out of the pool.

But it’s coming back.

While all the hours on the bike mean stamina isn’t a problem, as far as the lungs are concerned anyway.

What still hurts are the arms and shoulders.

Anyway, as embracing my long lost lover has been great, especially as it coexists with my new flame, my beloved cycling.

Anyway. 

What Naked Wines can teach mass market brands

I like wine.

No I love wine.

So when Naked Wines started emailing me, and offered a ridiculously good trial, naturally I had a go. 

Now, the wine of great, the business model of supporting independent growers, so you pay more for the wine and less for the supply chain, and know the people that matter get paid is all ace.

But that's not the good bit. The clever bit is how you get put on the waiting list to be a fully fledged member -and when you can you have real influence. 

Because we live in an instant gratification culture today, where we can have it now at the click of a button  culture where more is better. 

Creating scarcity, earned membership of a hard to enter club where you're treated as a connoisseur (even if you're not like me).

That's really special these days and is commercial catnip if you can get it right. 

Even in the mass market. If you can create perceived scarcity or exclusivity, you're on to something. 

Because perversely,in today's have it all world, the thing we want the most is what we can't have. 

E

Winging it

I'm lucky to have a great relationship with my father.

It wasn't always thus, we had the familiar late teens rocky patch when we struggled with re-adjusting to 'he's not quite man, he's certainly not a boy anymore' thing. 

What really frustrates me is how I didn't respect him as much as he deserved until I was going through some of the stuff he did. 

Working for a living.

Thinking for two instead of one when you get married. 

The terrifying responsibility of looking after the wellbeing of your children and the sacrifice and joy that brings.

Every decision suddenly loaded with implications, the way work can never be about ego or personal growth in the same way, it's about buying shoes and food. 

You cannot know what you're Dad is going through until you experience it yourself. 

I only know now how much he loved me, what he did (and does) for me now I feel the same way about my own children. 

And you realise they were winging it, as uncertain and basically using The Force as much you. 

It's the same in the office. There were some people in high places when I was younger that I'll never forgive. There are others I'll never be able to thank enough.

I understand them all better now. And respect them a lot more. 

Because we're all winging it at work too. Anybody who claims to 100% know what they're doing is a charlatan, or at least self-deluded. 

The salary gets bigger, the responsibilties and stakes grow perhaps, especially when the salary pays for shoes and school books, not just rent and beer, but the general Making Things Up as You Go Along persists. 

Bugger.

My daughter, the metaphor for modern advertising

Evie, my lovely little daughter is a bit of a Daddy's girl. 

I won't pretend not to like this. 

But not even Daddy escapes the darker elements of her current stage of development. 

Namely, the power of repetition. 

When it's time to brush her teeth, Evie miraculously loses the power of hearing. 

Ask her ten times and nothing. Diddly squat. 

Until she get's bored not hearing you and just leaves the room. 

When the tables are turned, when she wants TV on, despite knowing full well it has been switched off until after tea time, she'll ask over and over until you are trembling with the need to give in. 

Or when she wants to know what's for tea, and doesn't want it to to be boring chicken, she asks for pizza over and over, even while she shovels forkfuls of the fown passed her - butter wouldn't melt - lips. 

Most of advertisers are like Evie when she wants something. Over and over, no let up in stalking you, even with hateful re-targeting these days until you can take no more. 

But so are most consumers when the roles for Evie are reversed, evolving a fantastic ability to filter out unwanted rubbish, even when it's right in your face. If it's a mobile display ad that freezes the site, like Evie leaving the room, we'll just leave. 

Impacts/impessions/reach figures are not a measure of efficiency or value. They're usually a sign of inneficiency. 

Onwards

So, I'm off to work here in a month after a year at PHD.

It's with a heavy heart in many ways, I get attached to places and people quickly, but I was covering maternity leave and my brief sojourn is coming to an end. 

I don't think I'd cover maternity leave again. The uncertainty is one thing, but leaving people you like is difficult.

That said, I'm bloody excited about where I'm going. The people I've met are ace and I'm going to be doing some interesting stuff. I'm very lucky to be honest. 

Like most times I've moved, it's going to be a challenge, but I do think careers are like sharks, you need to keep moving forward or you die.

Adjusting to working in a media led agency was one of the hardest things I've ever done. But this year has been one of the most rewarding after the initial pain of getting to know what on earth I was talking about.

I've only just found out what a TVR is (only kidding). 

This feels like another terrifying leap forward but, in many ways it was the easiest series of job interviews ever as two out of three were really chats about road biking punctured with the odd bit about the work. 

So here we go, Head down, ears open, mouth shut.

Planning scars

I have seen and done sone stupid things in my time. 

I have seen Mission Impossible 2. 

I bought a Mel and Kim single when I was very, very young. 

I tried to boil an egg in the microwave. 

More recently, I have been seriously riding a road bike for around two years, but only commuting for one. Riding in the city is tricky, but the problem with fast bikes is you don't want to slow down, you weave in and out of traffic, you jump red lights.

You are not brave. You are stupid. 

So I'm glad I got knocked off my bike in February. It wasn't my fault, but twinges I get from my poor neck even now tell me to not be an arse on the road, not when I'm surrounded by tons of very hard metal. 

Painful experience in the job is so invaluable too. You need some planning scars to remind you not to be so daft. You might well be brilliant and a veritable genius, but if you haven't failed miserably, or felt like a complete numpty any number of times, you're not ready. 

The scars from creatives who found out the clients' feedback was really your feedback. 

The data you conveniently left out that contradicted your argument. Then you got found out. 

The strategy you wanted to do because it was cool, rather than right. That got through and bombed. 

That pitch. 

That client. 

The clever digital stunt thing that no one actually saw. 

The time you tried to shaft the partner agency.

The time you trusted the partner agency.

The best work you've ever seen being eviscerated by bad research. 

The bad work that got through because of research.

The idea you wouldn't change, but were then too proud to alter when you thought about it. 

 

Get some scars. Get some wisdom. 

But don't let it stop you trying new things and moving forward. 

It's just a lot easier to move forward when you've been knocked back a few times. 

A day with Evie

So I spent the day with my little girl yesterday. Evie is nearly three and not ready for nursery, while our eldest has just started school.

It was a lovely day. We only went to look at the fish and the parrots at the garden centre, saw the farm and bounced like loons on the trampoline. QWe read books and painted, along with some hardcore chasing of course. 

And just chatting. 

The kind of stuff we do most summer weekends, but this time, no older brother just her.

So it means the world.

Because it can be difficult with two, you need to divide your attention equally. No need to divide the love of course, but we're learning both need time on their own with one or both of us. Evie came second but will never be made to feel second.

And I want to hold on to every single memory of her before she goes to nursery and loses every last trace of being a toddler. It goes so quickly, with her even quicker.

Looking at some of the old pictures of Will at her age, it's painful sometimes. He's started school and the slow decay of his innocence has begun.

He's more fun than ever, and I'm enjoying seeing his mind unfold.Will has a great imagination and is proving to be really creative, like Daddy was actually. At the same time, it's difficult to see the beginnings of introversion, which will be great for hime in some ways, but I know how difficult that will be and want t help him in every way I can.

We have a great time though. 

But it's hard to look at the pictures of that chubby little mass of chestnut hair and planet sized grin, from a couple of years ago,and not miss it sometimes. 

There's no dodgy 'what this means for brands or planning' I'm afraid, it's just on my mind. All I might say is that you'll never be able to comprehend the waves of joy and sorrow that assault people with children until you have them yourself. Another reason why the worship of youth in this industry can be a bit daft. 

Anyway. 

 

What Haruki Murukami can teach brands

I bloody love Haruki Murukami. 

To the point when I usually get his new book as soon as it is published. Forget paperbacks, I want it now. 

Over a number of years, he's built up quite a following for largely writing variations on the same them. 

A lonely man with unrealised ambitions, who cooks a lot of spaghetti, has a lost love and a past he cannot reconcile, with a new, enigmatic girl in his life, meanwhile a parallel world full of possibility begins to bleed into this one. There is a lingering sense of sadness and loss of what could have been, with a coming to terms of what is and what could be. 

It's never boring because there is so much invention in every page. Every book is a surprise and delight, yet it always feels like coming home.

I think brands have something to learn from this.

I've often found that 'brands as people' is too artificial, not to mention that a rigid 'essence and values' model is just too limiting, especially for a fast moving media landscape like we have today. 

But I've never bought 'brands as conversations' and 'relationships', which all the data tells us is, as far as generating business growth, hogwash. 

I do like the idea of brands thinking of themselves more as content creators and less as advertisers. This shouldn't be news to anyone - the best advertising has never felt like an 'ad' it has always rewarded the viewer - but it's fair to say that more and more of what we do needs to add value where it shows up and what people are looking for.

But of course, we also know that brands need to build consistent, yet distinctive. Continously interesting, yet familiar. 

I venture being more like a Murukami, with a big flexible theme, rather than a tight, never to be messed with brand triangle/onion/key. 

I reckon brands should think of themselves more like authors than advertisers. 

You know what you'll be getting from Murukami, a Phillip Roth or even a Stephen King or Hillary Mantel. 

You will be entering a familiar world in which you'll be entertained and surprised .

In fact, you enter a particular world when you're listening to Radio 4 or watching HBO. 

Maybe that's what we should start asking if we were an author, what are the constants in how we tell our story. Or what is the equivalent to 'Radio 4-ness' or 'HBO-ness'.

I'm not saying that people are sitting and waiting for our stuff (and I'm a heavy Murukami buyer, most folks will have read two of his books  bet). But when we do stuff that hopefully get's us noticed by folks that don't care, it needs to build up a picture, a world, over time. 

If you like, boil down any Lego construction, no matter how amazing, it's made of the same simple collection of bricks. 

Anyway. 

 

Blackberries

 

Apparently psychologists have found that the key to a happy marriage isn't the grand gestures and lavish gifts. It's little daily selfless acts, that's what makes up the fabric of good relationships. Which is music to the ears of a tight wad like me. 

Obviously, my relationship with my kids is different. You don't have to work at it (but it is work!). It just is. But then again, my little boy is old enough to remember little things and he's a caring little soul. 

Hence his insistence that he got to pick blackberries at Grandma's because he knows Daddy loves blackberries on his porridge. He was so pleased with himself when he gave me these, and I just melted. 

Happiness isn't free of course, but some things that make you happy certainly are. 

What swimming and cycling tell you about me and culture

So I got the news about Ian Thorpe coming out with zero interest.

Really? Does it really matter (apart of course from the fact he had to keep it quiet, now that certainly does matter)?

But some of the footage made me extremely whistful for the pool. Because I don't go swimming that much any more.

I just don't have the time. Because of these two beautiful monsters. 

Which means my once a week thrash on a Sunday morning, while the kids have their lessons is that much more precious.

And after watching Thorpe's freestyle stroke, in the recent 'revelation', and realising my arm was coming in the water too low, the last time felt sublime. Even once a week, the simple joy of doing something well, for no reason apart from that, is so precious.

But that's not the end of it. Roughly 33 years of addiction to pain, suffering and the sheer endorphin rush of doing sport to the point where your muscles are running with molten lava and your heart might burst demands to fed.

It's not a recommendation, it's quite the opposite, but by the time you get to forty you realise what is a part of you, like it or not and what is not.

And this obsession is as much part of who I am as Star Wars, tea or and constant fear of not being good enough at my job, or the ever deepening joy of my children.

 

Enter cycling stage right.

 

What began as an experiment in grasping at something I liked doing as a teenager, has become an obsession.

To the point where I ride around 20 miles a day as a minumum. 

To the point where I can see a justification for my bike costing more than my car.

Much of this is simply the joy finding out I'm sort of okay at it.

A lot is to do with doing something completely knew.

Mostly it's about convenience. Excruciating fitness stuff built into the commute or a Saturday 2 hour blast before family breakfast time.

But it's more than that. It being allowed into a new world.

So much history, legends, myths.

So much of brand stuff is about pretending. You wear an Omega watch and pretend to be Bond. You wear handmade selvedge jeans to feel a bit artisan and bohemian. You buy Chanel to get as scrap of what it must feel like to be Linda Evangalista.

When I get on the bike, it doesn't matter if I'm only doing 40 miles in Yorkshire. I'm in a black and white grainy shot somewhere in the Alps. . 

I'm free.

It's no accident that road biking has eclipsed mountain biking by the way.

The archetype of the 'the man of action' in response to the 'other directed man' is one of the constants of marketing to men (and let's get with the 21st century, to women, it should be the 'other directed person') and meant towards the end of the last decade the non-conformist bourgous bohemian to acres of middle class folks. On the mountain bike in slouchy gear. 

The rebel.

But with austerity etc, I'm convinced road biking with it's graft and sufferng is to do with the reaction against complacency and relative coolness of discpline and hard work. 

And road biking has a timeless 'nobility'. 

Me? Swimming gave me a hateful work ethic. I like it hurting and those feel like the clothes road biking gives me out of the pool. 

It's hilarious discovering some of the 'rules' and distasteful elitism that come with the territory. But the generosity of most people on the road to help with a spare inner tube or a breakdown, the sense that 'we might be different but we're the same' is ace. 

And how you get up a hill is a bloody great leveller. 

So swimming will always be a part of me, but now so is cycling. 

What does this mean for brands? Not much you'll be pleased to know. 

But I do think it's worth thinking about the 'other directed man' in his current incarnation. And what needs are driving big shifts in culture like cycling. Marlboro has a solitary cowboy on his horse. Now he's wearing a helmet a lycra, on a carbon steed. 

I also think it's shows how you shouldn't take any buyer for granted. Few love swimming more than me, but things change in customers lives. Culture moves forward too. You need to plan for it. 

One of the great joys if riding is that a shy awkward man like me has something to talk about with so many strangers. Men's relationship is side by side, they need an activity to talk about or do. Worth thinking about. 

I love that I could chat to so many strangers at the Tour De France. And that our socially stunted Country (or at least Yorkshire) could be happy together for one weekend withour a drop of irony or cynicism. The British are always looking for social ice breakers, especially the blokes. 

So I guess cycling and swimming tell you something about me, but also where British culture is at and certainly what glues men together. 

Or not.