As we enter week whatever it is of lockdown, even with a roadmap in sight and yet with the winter wind still chilling us to the bone and the sunny spells alternating with rain drizzling outside our windows, it is more crucial than ever to look after each other.  We are personally being tested in…

The inability to fill stadia with fans has had a terrible economic impact on clubs of all sizes.  However the lack of fans may have had another effect too.  This season there is less of a divide between how the top teams are doing at, well, the top, and how the rest of the pack…

Extreme ownership by everyone is essential for success in terms of both Digital Transformation and a true culture of Belonging. There are two items to prioritise for most businesses in 2021.  The pandemic has given added importance to both. Digital transformation, in light of the fact that excellent delivery of goods and services via digital…

For years the marketing industry has been busy segmenting.  For a couple of decades it has been common best practice to segment customers into types of people to target everyone else who falls into the same segmentation. These are often expensive exercises and can take months to complete.  They may be of huge use to…

One in three people at work have personally experienced bias, harassment or inappropriate behaviour at work. Do you think that this always happened when they were on their own with someone?  I think that we know that this isn’t the case. Our unique research, by Dynata, for our new book Belonging, states that 39% of…

Given the focus on diversity and inclusion and the £6 billion spent on it why is it that there is no concrete evidence of change? What is holding back something that is so evidently fair, has proven results on both profitability and revenue and which has been talked about for years? Over the last 18…

The best marketing comes from businesses that commit. I learnt a lot as 2020 Convenor of the IPA Effectiveness Awards. The intense (most intense in advertising worldwide?) judging process begins with reading thousands of words.  Over 60 papers of 4000 words plus appendices.  Then as convenor I attended three rounds (6 afternoons) of judging on…

To craft a strong effective media plan you have to challenge everything, including yourself. We are all subject to confirmation bias.  This means that when we hear something that we have heard before, or that we would like to believe, we are more likely to have faith in it.  We are not as rational or…

What happens to company culture without everyone in the office most of the time? For months now we have been working remotely in most parts of advertising and media.  Many offices have been closed.  Around the world many have opened up again, although in the UK this is recent and then just for a proportion…

Last month the future of account management was questioned by an IPA study.  The report, by Hall and Partners, suggests that the problem is multi-faceted.  Not enough focus for the role, not enough diversity, clients want more for less, a lack of understanding of what account managers actually do: “The study quoted one procurement lead…

When I was a kid the FA cup final was a huge occasion.  The one match in a normal season (ie outside World Cup and Euros) when time stopped, when everyone, even people who had no fondness for football, paid attention and watched the big game. This is far from true now in a normal…

“Working without an underwire bra! You have no idea how liberating that is.” Vicki Maguire What we wear has significance.  Mood follows fashion, trends follow moods.  Current swings in women’s dress are considerable. How we dress is one of the gender differences at work.  When Kathryn Jacob and I wrote our book The Glass Wall,…