Month: March 2019

You only ever get one, so live it well.

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Increasingly, we spend our lives checking, scrolling, updating, scanning, browsing. constantly looking for something that’s going to occupy our attention for a few milliseconds and distract us from our day-to-day.

But for what?

To pass the time?

Alleviate our boredom?

Give us that little dopamine hit the devices we carry around are increasingly designed to give us?

In 2018, Marks and Spencer launched a campaign entitled: ‘Life’s short, so let’s spend it well.‘

Whilst their purpose was about instilling the notion that because life is short you should indulge and enjoy nicer food, i.e. M&S food, I loved the sentiment — because it’s true.

Life is short.

I know this because, (and speaking from personal experience) people close to me have been taken too young – like my friend Charlie from school, who passed away a few years ago.

Life is precious.

I turn 40 in a few weeks.

I own a big house in the country, and I’m lucky enough to own a few nice cars. I have all the things I thought I wanted in life that would make me feel content.

But the truth is, material things don’t make you happy.

They might make you feel good in the short term, but they rarely have lasting appeal.

Unlike the things that really matter. Like friends, and family.

Like my wife; a smart, incredible, wonderful, amazing, beautiful woman.

Like my two amazing, funny, kind, loving and beautiful children; Jake, aged 3, and Millie, aged 1.

Before I had children, I used to wonder why people who did have them, never came to company parties, or stayed out late, or went out drinking at the weekend.

But now I get it.

With the big 4-0 dawning. I get that no amount of material things will ever give me the pleasure that time with my family gives me.

Time doing things that I love doing, with the people I love being with.

When Marks and Spencer launched their campaign, it connected with me in a way so few campaigns ever have done.

Not because it featured amazing looking food (another passion of mine).

It connected with me because of the message.

A message that’s relevant to everyone.

Life is short.

Life is precious.

And because it’s short, you need to do everything within your power, to live it well.

You’re never too small to make a difference

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When it comes to influence, and opinion, there’s a typical belief that most of us aren’t in a position to make ourselves heard.

Over the years, I’ve heard people say things like; “what does it matter what I think?”, and “it’s not like my opinion will make the slightest difference”, and “I’m not significant enough here to be listened to”.

I disagree.

I believe anyone can make a difference.

I believe anyone can make a difference if they truly believe in something.

I believe anyone can make a difference if they’re passionate, and determined, and relentless.

Yes, the path to being heard might be a long one, but if you believe in something to your core, you absolutely can make a difference – no matter who you are:

You can’t be what you can’t see

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When you have children, you become acutely aware of certain things that you most-likely rarely ever thought about.

Things like free time, silence, lie-ins, spontaneity, and responsibility. Things that you take for granted until you suddenly have to look after one or more little humans.

I’m not saying people without children don’t think about these things, but I certainly know that I think about them now more than ever; either because I never have them any more and miss them dearly (a lie in on a Sunday morning for instance), or they’re front of mind 24/7 – responsibility for their well-being.

Here are my two; Jake aged three and a half, and Millie, one and a half:

They’re absolutely amazing.

They’ve enriched my life in unimaginable and indescribable ways.

They constantly surprise me with their creativity, their humour and how smart they already are.

There is however one thing that I absolutely loathe about bringing up children, and that’s the mental conditioning that happens from such a young age, from things like their toys, their clothing, and the TV shows created for them – even the food that’s promoted to them.

I like to think that we’re bringing them up to know that boys and girls are equal and capable of achieving anything they put their minds to, but this is challenging when so much of what they’re exposed to from the moment they can think for themselves is geared towards making them think and behave in certain ways – purely based on gender.

The other day, Jake brought a toy car to me and went “this is for boys, Millie can’t have it”.

I know for a fact this isn’t something we would ever have taught him but at three and a half, he’s starting to think for himself a lot.

I quizzed him as to why he said this, to which he replied “only boys drive cars”. Now, he typically spends the majority of his time in a car with either his mum or his nanny driving so I knew this wasn’t his point of reference.

The more I thought about it, the more I realised that it was in fact the various shows he watches:

Paw Patrol:

Noddy:

Peppa Pig:

Postman Pat:

Blaze:

Cars:

In the majority of children’s shows and films, the cars and/or the drivers are male.

It made me feel uncomfortable. Uncomfortable that in 2019, things that are created for children are still full of ridiculous stereotypes.

It’s an outdated view of the world and absolutely not representative of real life. For instance, in the UK, 46% of drivers are women.

It needs to change.

And whilst it’s the responsibility of us adults to recognise it and make the changes, the change they need to effect starts with children.

Children’s TV shows need to stop stereotyping based on gender.

Children’s food needs to stop stereotyping based on gender.

Children’s toys need to stop stereotyping based on gender.

Children need to be shown that whether you’re a girl or a boy, you are capable of doing and achieving anything. That whilst your gender might define who you are, it certainly doesn’t define what you can do.

Some of the best loved brands – like Nike, get it. They don’t just get it, they’re doing something about it. But when it comes to children and the brands aimed at them, based on what I’m seeing and experiencing, we’ve still got long way to go.

As Marie Wilson famously said; “You can’t be what you can’t see”.

They say you should never meet your heroes

You make your own luck1 Comment

…but I did – and I’m really glad.

Ever since I started out working in planning – about thirteen years ago, I’ve been on a continual drive to learn as much as possible from whomever and wherever I can.

I’ve always said that planning is unlike most other disciplines within an agency, for a variety of reasons. Project management for instance, you’ve got agile and waterfall methodologies to work to. The frameworks are proven and effective.

Whereas, planning is different. Whilst there are a plethora of books you can read, and different frameworks you can use, and courses by the IPA and APG to aid your thinking and your output, the actual way you go about actually doing planning is massively open.

It also doesn’t help that planning isn’t one dimensional, and instead, multi-faceted. It intertwines with and overlaps so many other specialisms in the agency, from analytics and business intelligence, to creative and copy, and even into client service… (hint – if you’re a planner and you’re not presenting your thinking to your clients, do something about it).

So you have to be an expert generalist, and on any day, wear a multitude of different caps to fit the many different contexts and scenarios you’ll end up in.

Planners will often pigeonhole themselves as ‘brand’ or ‘comms’ or ‘data’ or ‘creative’ and whilst I agree there needs to be these sorts of specialisms, I’m convinced most [good] planners – specialist or not, have a bit of everything in them.

With planners who I’ve managed in the past, I’ve always advocated them finding their own individual style for their planning. From how they approach a problem, to how they craft their thinking. I tend to find this is a far more effective way to help people develop that trying to force a one-size-fits-all way of doing their planning upon them.

But like those I’m managing today, I also had to start somewhere and beyond the many business, advertising, strategy and creative books I’ve bought and read, I found the Internet to be the best source for not only developing my craft, but also giving me a level head and keeping me in check.

As with most professions and hobbies, there’s a really strong community that exists for planning. Most planners I’ve ever met are generally quite emotional, deep thinkers who have a high degree of empathy and curiosity. The sort of traits that add a richness to some brilliant discussions you see about life+advertising on blogs and social media.

Over the years I’ve built up a fairly hefty list of planners who blog and planning resources, which I promise I’ll share one I’ve had time to update it as I’m sure by now many of the links no longer work. From the brilliant Nick Emmel’s irreverent guide to writing creative briefs, to Julian Cole’s Planning Dirty newsletter, Martin Weigel’s blog to Mark Pollard’s no-nonsense approach. As a planner today, you’re spoiled for choice.

But there’s one stand-out resource that for me, has been both instrumental in helping me develop my craft and which, has kept me sane. This resource has helped show me the importance of qualities such as integrity and honesty in my work. That it’s OK to say ‘I don’t know’ and ‘I don’t think it’s the right thing to do’. That the obvious route is probably not the right, nor best way to go about something. That there’s always a better answer to a problem. That lateral thinking trumps literal thinking when creativity is concerned. That it’s OK to call bullshit on lazy planning and crappy advertising.

What is this resource I hear you ask?

Rob Campbell’s blog.

In December, I had the pleasure of finally meeting Rob – after a decade of reading his blog. I simply wanted a bit of advice on a number of different planning related things and despite not really knowing me, he offered to meet for a coffee and lend an ear. His advice and kindness was beyond words.

My only disappointment was he wasn’t wearing his trademark Birkenstocks. But it was December so I can probably just about forgive him.

So my advice to you is this; if you’re not learning from the people you work with, move teams. If you can’t move teams, move jobs. If you can’t move jobs, then find someone who can be your source of inspiration and guidance. It’ll do more for both your career and your mental state than any book or course ever will.

Keep hunting. They’ll definitely be out there.