First impressions are lasting impressions...The Company Meeting - Week 6

In the above blog introduction I promised to discuss the highs and lows of my advertising experience. In previous blog posts I have shared many highs so now I think, its about time that I share the lows, cause I don't want to short-change you. 

The Company Meeting

It was late afternoon, and time for the company meeting. An occasion where the entire agency downs tools for an hour and gathers in Bobbs Place - the company bar. To witness a showcase of all the great creative work happening within agency walls; Senior Mangement inform us of any new business, company initiatives or awards the agency has achieved.  And, its also used as an opportunity to present 'Heroes' with awards for hard-work and welcome 'new starters' to the agency. 

New Starter Embarrassment 
When I arrived at the company meeting, Bobb's Place was packed! So, I took a seat on the floor close to the front of the stage. Our Managing Director kicked-off the meeting by briefly running through the agenda on a PowerPoint presentation. As she did so, my eyes homed-in on the last item of the agenda. Which said 'WELCOME NEW STARTERS' still feeling like a' fish out of water'. 

I felt an acute sense of dread wash over me, because I really wanted to keep a low-profile and I had no idea what welcoming new-starters involved? or what I was expected to do and not do? So, I began to feel the nerves of potentially making a mistake set in. The fear of making a mistake played on mind, to the point I found it very difficult to concentrate on everything that was happening during the course of the meeting. I was trying to think of a sensible strategy I could use to avoid needlessly embarrassing myself. I decided the best thing to do, would be to copy what the other new-starters did - "when in Rome" and all that Jazz! Except when new starter introduction time came around. Guess whose name was first on the list? Mine of course!   When, the Managing Director called out my name. My heart stopped. Than started again, but this time it began pounding 10x faster! 

The Announcement

I was seated on the floor so, I quickly stumbled to my feet. However, instead of staying in one place like a normal person... I preceded to make my way to the front of the stage to introduce myself to the company.  (I was so nervous, really didn't want to be doing it - but,  I assumed that's what I was expected to do.) 

So, yep! I stood up in front of the entire company and said something along the lines of "Hi my name is Jessica, I am the new graduate, I come from West London University and last week I found out I was awarded a First Class Honors Degree!" The entire company gave me an  energetic round of applause and I went back to my seat on the floor, ready to watch the next unlucky candidate make an arse of themselves, like me. Except... this didn't happen. Because, usual protocol was just to raise your hand and say hello! From whereever you were standing . Not, marching up to the front of the stage and telling your life story! The moment, I realised this I could have died - I wanted the ground to swallow me up... I was beyond embarrassed. 

The Aftermath 

When I returned to my desk, the whole team was rolling over in laughter, basically saying "Jessica - your nuts". The Account Director said "what you did was a fantastic PR stunt because now everybody knows who you are, which can only be a good thing!" And, I would diffinately employ someone like you; because your obviously very brave! But, the main thing the team more surprised at - which I honestly never thought they would be. Was the fact I had achieved a 'First' and neglected to tell them. I can't really say why, except that I don't think arrogance is an attractive trait, and I silently felt it was deserved. Because, like many students I had worked hard and paid a lot of money for my degree. Plus, the novelty of achieving a First quickly paled in significance to joining the agency.

The Lesson 

Even though I really embarrassed myself at the company meeting - in more ways than one.  It actually turned out quite well...  As that day, I left the office feeling really silly and embarrassed. However, when I returned the following morning. As soon as I entered the office lots of people were introducing themselves to me and congratulating me on my degree, and in the days that followed I began to make friends and be invited to drinks and events. So I can only figure that my Account Director was right when he said "now everyone knows you". I think, because I put myself out there. Many people have felt OK to put themselves out there with me..

So, I'm less embarrassed because I think that episode has quickly helped me to settle in within the team and the agency.  Therefore maybe the lesson here is "in some situations it pays not to follow the crowd... March to your own beat and see what happens!"

Whats the Worst that Can Happen? 

Getting under the Skin of the Brand - Week 2

The first part of my second week was spent continuing to get "under the skin" of the brand by surfing the net looking at news articles, marketing inteligence and websites. That would shed some light on the current PESTEL issues affecting clients business, and also identifiying and discovering ‘Golden Nuggets’ - important insights which are regularly emailed to the client to show the team understands the issues affecting Barclays business and their brand positioning.

After a while getting "under the skin of the brand", did get a bit tedious. But I knew it was important to continue marching on and putting 110% effort into the task, because once things sped up I knew I wouldn’t get the chance again. A thing, I realised at this stage was my marketing degree had not really prepared me as much as I thought it would for working in advertising, in relation to readily understanding the creative and production aspects of brand management.

This was an interesting revelation as for a long time whilst being a student I ofthen questioned why our degree was titled Marketing and Business? And why If I wished, I couldn't do a straight Marketing degree? However, the first two weeks working in advertising demonstrated that to be a good Account Handler (Brand Manager) you need to have an equally good understanding of both 'Marketing' and 'Business'. Because essentially an Account Handler is the middle-man between the client and creatives; and as a result the job invariable involves having one foot in the world of business (Barclays) and the other in the creative world (advertising agency), basically you are the ‘eyes and ears’ of the client within the agency, therefore, you need to understand their mission and objectives in order to deliver a good marketing campaign.

Midway, through the week, things started picking up, and I began learning more about the advertising agency’s processes and procedures. What was really interesting - was that week; it so happened the agency was changing its creative and financial processes – by placing a stronger focus on being more internally integrated as an agency (i.e. all departments working together). In order to reflect it’s commitment to being a fully integrated digital advertising agency to all stakeholders both internal and external. This was communicated by the new agency wide flexible project delivery process of: Imagine, Discover, Craft, Create and Learn in a presentation.

I attended the presentation of the new process to clients and wrote the contact report afterwards which I circulated to all meeting attendees. In terms of procedures, I started to learn about how to financially manage the creative elements of a campaign in relation to developing and updating cost estimates, forecasts and timing plans. These tasks drew heavily on my Excel skills. I also discovered that many of the procedures in place are there to effectively manage and monitor each stage of the production process e.g. studio time, artwork development and copy writing.

I was also given the responsibility of updating the weekly status report which is presented to the client at the Weekly Status meeting; which the team regularly attends at the client's Headquarters in Canary Wharf to update the client face-to-face on the campaign’s progress.

Date: 7th February 2011