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What I’ve learned trying to mix oil and water

What I’ve learned trying to mix oil and water

Media Leaders

Creating an agency culture that embraces different points of view is tough but worth it. I’ve had to work harder than ever to make it happen.

‘Integration’ is such an overused and badly understood word in our industry.

We all talk about integrated solutions for our clients, integrated channel planning etc. etc – but it wasn’t until we set up Bicycle London that we truly understood that properly bringing people from properly different backgrounds is actually like trying to mix oil with water.

Even as I write this today, I witnessed a conversation with one of our teams where there were totally polarising views on how advertising actually works.

At first glance this clash of ideas could be extremely worrying for any agency. But the reality is that we all know there a number of ways to skin a cat when it comes to giving our clients the best advice on how to grow their business.

Differing views, or a little argument here or there, are actively encouraged at Bicycle and actually a sign of people properly caring and thinking about the work they do.

We set out to land the agency smack bang into the heart of the evolving legacy-based agency landscape. We purposely brought together a bespoke set of skills and experience at the heart of the agency at shareholder and investor level.

We wanted everything from the start: skills that could harness human intelligence and real world data insight, seamlessly integrate effective communication strategy and media buying, balance performance and brand, obsess on both the short term and creating the maximum cultural brand value.

Unlike nearly all new agencies, we have had these capabilities in place from the outset. But it’s not a case of “integration sorted, job done”. The job is absolutely not done.

To make this truly work, you must genuinely embrace each other’s differences and, where appropriate, move to the middle ground together.

People who have spent their careers obsessing over a 5% increase in click-through rate are never going to see eye to eye with people who believe that true advertising and brand success is comparatively unmeasurable.

People who’ve spent years continually impelled to defend their position or (even worse) defend those around them in corporate structures, are always going to find it hard to actually trust the “sod it, let’s just do it” mentality of an independent, owner-run, scale up.

We’re seeing this stuff pop at every level of the business. The reality is that, while it makes for tough going, the diversity we have and the differences we see are incredibly exciting. It’s exactly what we wanted to happen.

I’ve also personally found that I’ve had to work harder than ever to make this mixing properly happen.

The ‘modus operandi’ of taking them all down to the pub no longer works. Building new teams constantly requires new skills and constantly evolving support (myself very much included).

Towards the end of last year we scoured the industry for a new coaching partner that could bring an entirely new perspective on the challenges we face. As a result of this work, last week I went on the best one-to-one coaching course I have ever been on.

It involved three days of one on one coaching in Dartmoor, it was all about pure psychology and has lifted a weight off my shoulders. It may sound obvious, but when it comes to stuff like this we are often guilty of assuming what others are thinking.

The truth is: we don’t have a clue what others are thinking. And once you actually realise that, this stuff gets a whole lot easier.

The other element that’s crucial to making this happen is not only encouraging people to have a different point of view, but listening to them. Working as shareholders in a business needs active listening, flexibility to change decisions on the fly and a desire to find the middle ground. All of which need to be behaviours that permeate through the business.

It’s only when that stuff happens do you get true integration.

It’s also why I giggled watching those significant differences of opinion unfold during a recent client meeting. It’s much better than silence and it might have just been the signs of oil and water actually mixing.

Henry Daglish is co-founder and CEO of media agency Bicycle London

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