Sour Grapes? No way!

I see a lot of award bashing all around. Some people are calling them retarded and some have listed down logical reasons why they don’t work well or are unfair. I love advertising awards, having won 2 recently. Here is a list of reasons that would convert the most determined of naysayers.

1. Awards provide legitimate reasons for everyone in the agency to get drunk – either to celebrate or to curse the organizers.
2. All the bosses fly away to France so the office is more chilled out.
3. Only real work is celebrated. Scam ads are just a myth. Nobody makes scam ads. I’ve never seen one.
4. Paying out bonuses to the hard working folks is such a retarded idea. Spending millions on award entries is an investment.
5. Working on this year’s award entries sharpen your skills – so that you can do a better job for next year’s award entries. Real work? What’s that? Oh! That silly stuff clients pay for…clients are silly – they don’t even know what to pay for.
6. All awards are judged fairly. The judges are genuine and any correlation with the numbers of wins going up due to someone from the group chairing the awards or a category is just coincidence. People who say otherwise are just sore losers.
7. Agencies that decide not to participate in awards are short sighted and do not care about the glory they can bring to their clients.
8. The small agencies that cannot afford to spend the money to participate and fly down dozens of folks for the awards don’t deserve to win. (There is a reason why they are small, right?)
9. Effectiveness? What’s that got to do with awards? Oh! You mean how good is your conversion. Yes, how else would you judge the planners?
10. Not convinced? Come on! Don’t be a spoilport! Well you don’t need to be – just because you did not win at one award show? There are 39 of them. Everyone wins. I don’t know of any agency that has not won awards.

Can you think of more?

• The first pipe was called marketing. One one end of marketing was the brand and on the other end was the customer. The pipe itself passed through TV channels, magazines, newspapers and other forms of traditional media. The flow was guided by advertising agencies, digital agencies, direct marketing agencies and research agencies.
• The second pipe was Public Relations. On one end was the corporate communication team and on the other end was the same customer. This pipe passed through journalists and influencers of all kinds. The flow was guided by PR agencies.
• The third pipe was Customer Service. On one end was the customer service team and on the other end was still the same customer. The flow was guided by internal teams and consultants.

These three pipes rarely crossed each others path. As a result, the guides – advertising agencies, PR agencies, digital agencies and customer service teams never spoke with each other.

These pipes are now breaking down and merging into one. This one pipe is called the Social Media pipe. On one end are the customers and on the other end are the marketing teams, PR teams and the customer service teams.

The guides who never used to speak with each other are now fighting over who will have the rights to guide the new fat pipe. On most occasions they have to work with each other.

The merger of these pipes is beginning to have far reaching effects on the structure of marketing, PR and customer service teams and of course on the roles of the guides! The fun has just begun.

Organizations are setting up ‘social media’ divisions and departments to understand what is happening and hopefully to sell more widgets. Training organizations and schools are launching courses and programs on social media. Advertising, PR and digital agencies are setting up practices, divisions and even companies specializing in providing social media solutions.

All of this is about to stop very soon. Social Media is dead. Social media is/ will become such an integrated part of everything that we do that the concept of treating ‘social media’ as a separate division / department/ company will make no sense.

What we need are better and faster ways of integrating social media into everything that we do rather than packing it off into separate silos.

The very term ‘social’ media makes sense only for those of us who grew up in an era when media was not social. The new generation growing up now has not really experienced media that is not social.

We do not need to create a social media strategy for our company, division, department, restaurant, or dog. All we need are ways to integrate social media into everything that we do.

1. You are doing everyone a favour by saying no.

Whenever you are saying NO to someone, remember that it is for their benefit! By saying no, you are

• Giving the person an opportunity to look for someone who can do the job better.

• Avoiding negative feelings about the person.

2. Visualize the alternative (to saying no) in vivid detail.

• You will feel bad and will curse yourself for accepting the task.

• You will do a bad job.

• You will hate the person for putting this on to you.

• The person will hate you for doing a bad job.

• You should not have said yes, if you were not going to do a good job, the person will tell you later.

3. Remember what happened the last time you said yes!

4. Use the situation as an opportunity to build a better relationship.

If you like the person and don’t want to burn your bridges then having to say no can actually be a great opportunity to improve your relationship with this person. This is very much possible, provided you take the extra effort to honestly explain to the person why you cannot do this and why you value the relationship and that you really believe that by doing a half-baked job you will be hurting the relationship.

5. Enjoy!

Sometimes, saying no is just pure joy! The joy gets magnified if you do not provide any reasons at all!

6. Go overboard explaining why you cannot.

The explaining might make the person feel better than if you had said yes!

7. Use the big–picture test.

Focus on the big picture. What are your ultimate goals and objectives? Is this task in sync with your goals? If not, just say no and rest assured that you have made the correct decision.

8. Use a bit of cunning if you need to (in this order).

a. Negotiate. If you can take this off my plate, then I can do that. Or if I can get resources for this, then I can do that.

b. Postpone. Let me think about it and get back to you on email.

c. Deflect. I cannot do this BUT I can help you with that.

d. Bluff. Carry around your dummy calendar (choc a bloc of course) and show it to the person!

e. Throw the ball back. Ask for help in deciding how you should fit in the new task on the list of priorities (especially if it is your boss).

f. Lower expectations. Point out that you might be able to do everything, but not to the usual high standards that are expected.

g. Googly or curve ball. Say yes, then call back or SMS in the next 10 minutes to say why you cannot do it. Why 10 minutes? Well because that is the average time required for homo sapiens to come up with a good excuse.

h. Scare them off if nothing works! It’s just that I have this crazy flu and I don’t want you to get it

9. If they get really pushy, switch gears and think of it as a game.

There is no way you can say yes NOW! Smile and tell them so.

10. And before we end, here are a few statements for you to practice!

• I have another commitment.
• I have no experience with that.
• I know you will do a wonderful job yourself.
• I am in the middle of several projects.
• I am not comfortable with that.
• I need to leave some free time for myself.
• I would rather decline than do a mediocre job.
• I am not taking on any new responsibilities.
• I would rather help out with another task.
• Let me hook you up with someone who can do it.
• I am not the most qualified person for the job.
• I do not enjoy that kind of work.
• I do not have any more room in my calendar.
• I hate to split my attention among projects.
• I need to focus more on my personal life.
• I need to focus on my career right now.
• Some things have come up that need my attention.
• This really is not my strong point.

–

Shalu Wasu is a creativity consultant and trainer based in Singapore apart from being guest faculty at select institutes. To attend his one-day open programme on creativity on 15th January, 2009 at NUS, Singapore, please visit www.lifeahoy.sg or contact shalu@lifeahoy.sg.

I must admit I am a bit tired of it all. Why should I get up early in the first place? What have I got to prove?
So here are 10 points about why you should stay up late and still not feel bad when you come across another article by the self-help gurus who preach getting up early in the morning!

Why you should stay up LATE!

1.    There is nothing ‘natural’ about getting up early in the morning. It perhaps made sense a few hundred years ago when sunlight was the only source of light and you could only get your work done when the sun was shining – so getting up early was required to maximize working time. This argument does not hold anymore – at least in places that have electricity. (If you are reading this, your house/office has electricity).
2.    It is a myth that you ‘save time’ by getting up early. Well, each day has 24 hours and if you sleep for 6 hours, you have 18 hours to do everything else, irrespective of when you sleep and when you get up.
3.    If you get up early, you’ll need to sleep early. If you sleep early, you miss out on all the exciting stuff that happens late at night! Most people start winding down around 8pm and are off to bed soon after. Most people have 1-2 hours of leisure time in the evening before they sleep. But this amount of time is not really enough to plan anything meaningful. On the other hand if you know that after finishing dinner at 9pm, you still have another 3-4 hours, it just opens up so many possibilities. You can read a book, watch a movie, work or simply talk.
4.    Toiling away late into the night while the rest of the world sleeps is such a beautiful feeling! It is so still and quiet.
5.    To just look out of your window or balcony at 3 am is such a moving sight. The whole city is bathed in a warm yellow glow, everyone is peacefully asleep, even your noisy neighbour. I would not miss the feeling for anything.
6.    Some of the meals that I have enjoyed the most have been the late night snacks that I had while I was studying at IIMA. We used to get very hungry when we studied till late and either we used to cook up something around 3 in the morning or walk down to the NR (night retreat – a late night in-campus restaurant). If you haven’t had a meal at 3 am, you’ve been missing something.
7.    There are few things as surreal as a late night jog through an otherwise crowded place (during the day). It is a wonderful feeling to go for a jog around 1 am and just notice the stillness around you. It is amazingly peaceful and you get great ideas as well!
8.    I am at my productive best when I work late. There are no distractions, no noise, no school bus to miss, no newspaper headlines to read. Knowing that there is nothing else between now and sleep time except what I am working on right now is a nice feeling.
9.    When you sleep late, you will usually get up late and that can be so effective because you will do the boring/usual/essential stuff very quickly indeed. It is so much fun to get ready in a hurry. You find out just how quickly and efficiently you can shave among other things.
10.    It is an amazing end to the day if you have been working late and have been able to do some good work. The feeling of satisfaction and contentment that you get as you lie down and close your eyes is not matched by anything else.

So, stop fretting about what time to get up in the morning. Getting up early seems to work for a lot of people, but it is not for everyone. The only way to find out the hours when you are most productive is to experiment. So try getting up early for a few days and try moving to a different pattern every few days. Stick to the one that feels most natural and productive.

Read another point of view here - Addicted to the snooze button?