My Year of the Tiger | Ola Bulanda

In the previous year, I worked in really different areas. I ran the social media of brands like Dyson and Aura Herbals, designed the communication strategy for Runmageddon and Coral Travel, and participated in so many tenders that I can't even cite the brands in the first second.

In one sentence - I was really doing a lot. So it was not without fuckups and lessons learned. I will share a few of them with you today. What did I do this year and what did I learn?

Supporting the New Business/tenders department

A client brief is just a prelude to a conversation. If you read an agency brief and no question comes to mind, it means you are not reading it with understanding. In my almost two years at the agency, complete briefs that explained everything can be counted on the fingers of one hand.

Today, I view agency briefs as a prelude to conversation.

In a general way, they outline the reality in which the customer rotates and shed the first light on his needs. This is a necessary but definitely not sufficient step. By stopping at this stage, we stop at the surface. I have learned this year that if you want to answer the customer's needs 100%, you have to dive really deep. Break through the generic formulations, understand the environment, figure out the problem and make an accurate diagnosis. And for that, desk research is not enough. You need a debriefing calla. So even if everything seems clear to you, still consider a debrief.

Strategy design: when you think you have it, it means you have nothing.

If you already know at the beginning of the strategic process what the key problem is and how it should be solved, it means you know absolutely nothing. This is a sign that you need to take a few steps backward as soon as possible.

A successful strategy is based on a meticulous diagnosis that allows you to see the real problem. The one that is the actual essence of the challenge and at the same time the greatest lever for success.

Regardless of your experience, it is unrealistic to do it in a reliable way so quickly. Paradoxically, the closer you are to the industry and the customer's situation, the more your hypotheses may be wrong.

The desire to impose your map on a given customer's territory will be inevitable. Remember to watch yourself in this process and stop when you see yourself connecting the dots too quickly.

Creation: boldly throw your first ideas in the garbage can

If, when reading a creative brief, you feel that you have just come up with a brilliant idea, you can in good conscience throw it in the trash right away. All the creatives at other agencies have just come up with the same one.

Leaving aside their obviousness, first ideas, just like first relationships, seem perfect at first. We fall in love with them immediately and can't see the world beyond them. They seem to be just the thing.

On the other hand, if we give ourselves some time for reflection, especially looking at them in retrospect, it turns out that they are not so perfect after all. Many imperfections in them, gaps and spaces for improvement. And it was enough to look further, to give ourselves more time, not to be satisfied with the first idea. Always dig deeper.

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Strategy workshops: the responsibility of the leader versus the responsibility of the group.

The workshop is a shared adventure, the success of which depends on each person present. Not only on the presenter.

A workshop, like any other context of work by many people, is a group process that is co-created by each individual present.

As a leader, we intuitively step into the role of a parent, telling what we will do, what is allowed and what is not, thereby taking responsibility for everything that happens in the room. And we can do that, sure. It's just that after each workshop we will be overtired for the next two days, and more importantly, by treating the participants like children, we create conditions that definitely do not build effective cooperation.

So let's come from the position of an adult and not a parent, and let's not be afraid to lead a process for which the whole group is responsible. Let's work in a healthy way.

Social media: change your perspective

You know that moment when, after conducting communication activities for a long time, you reach a wall and feel that nothing more can be done on this project? That's the moment when you need a fresh look.

When conducting communications for a given client, you dive deeper and deeper with each post, naturally losing your broad perspective and fresh eye. After several months, you're so deep that everything seems obvious, boring and has been milled around several times in different ways. You feel you've touched the bottom of the ocean... and all you have to do is turn in the opposite direction. Ask someone to help you un-anchor yourself.

Storm with another specialist, talk to a client or representative of a target group. Look at the same thing through different eyes. Immediately your optics will change and you will come up with a ton of new ideas.

This is what I learned in the previous months. I enter the next ones definitely wiser. See you on the trails of the digital jungle!

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