Since leaving a…

Since leaving a 40-person company at which I worked for 12 years and moving to the big multi-national corporation 13-month ago, here’s what has happened:

• I’ve been through 13 rounds of massive budget cuts. But don’t worry, I was only asked to cut what we didn’t absolutely need. Every time. 
• I’ve been through 13 rounds of massive budget additions. Each which needed to be spent in the next 10 days. Do you know how hard it is to spend $250,000 in 10 days or less? Surprisingly hard.
• I’ve grown. Wider. And my back hurts from sitting in a chair so much.

But seriously, looking back I feel surprised that it took a full year to get into the swing of things. I think the real reason it took so long is that by that time came around, I had the opportunity to create and execute my own plans, having been immersed into business challenges myself instead of 2nd hand. And, I’ve been reflecting and realized I have had some accomplishments:

1. I demonstrated a better way to communicate with our shared services group and in the process built the rapport, respect and trust of the individuals which truly resulted in a broad but strong team working for the best interest of the brand. 
2. I lead the way in building honest and effective communication with our agencies – building meaningful partnerships
3. For the first time, the division witnessed strategic thinking in the process of building holistic communication programs
4. I infused energy into a mature and tired product line – opening up new lines of revenue
5. I lead a traditional team down a new media road and captured 100,000 Facebook fans in less than 8 hours, kept them engaged with a consistently high “talking about” score, and thereby demonstrated the power of moving loyalists up the sociotechnographic ladder
6. I raised the bar on reviewing the work we did execute by aligning communication tactics with business objectives – demonstrating true integration.

tbd

I’m sad. 

I should be happy because my daughter has just landed a super fun and exciting job working on a small cruise ship for the next 12 weeks. It meets all her needs: adventure, meeting new people and seeing new places. It meets my needs too since it’s a job. I’m not sad because I won’t see her for 12 weeks. I’m sad because I don’t have faith in her to not screw up the job.

And that is why I’m a bad mom. Or at least why I feel like one today. 

Is “No Such Thing As A Dumb Question” Accurate?

Everyone’s probably heard the statement “There’s no such thing as a dumb question”. I’m sure it was first stated by a young, inexperienced manager or teacher trying to coax her employees or students into contributing to a conversation. The fact of the matter is that I firmly believe that there is such a thing as a dumb question. Or maybe it would be less harsh to say there are irrelevant questions asked every day.

If you know me, you know that I tend to ask a lot of questions. The probing kind too. I want to know more. I want to understand the core driver. I don’t accept answers like “because I said so” (even though I’ve been known to say it at the peak of frustration with a child.) I probably was my mother’s worst nightmare as the child who always said “why?” or “how come?” (Sorry, Mom!)

But that’s not really the point of my story. The point of my story is a lot of people ask irrelevant questions. This has been frustrating, but mostly it’s confusing. It makes me wonder who the heck I’ve surrounded myself with (and naturally, at times, it makes me second-guess myself.)

Consider this exchange recently:

ME: We’re going to make the merchandising green.

OTHER PERSON: Why wouldn’t you make the packaging green?

ME: Because our packaging equity is not based on green. We’ll use the merchandising to communicate the green promotional message.

OTHER PERSON: But our other product with a different brand is green?

ME: OK… Not sure what that has to do with this product under this brand…

That’s just one example. The point being asking questions is good. But they have to be relevant.

Here’s another example. This time it wasn’t so much a dumb or irrelevant question asked by the other person, instead, it was me leaving the really tough question unasked:

ME: We need to update the catalog.

OTHER PERSON: Did you talk to the sales reps who use the catalog to see how they use it?

ME: Yes, in fact I have a good-size summary of their needs in the creative brief.

OTHER PERSON: Well, how about I talk to the sales reps next week and see what they say.

ME: OK… <what value am I playing here?> <— That’s a question I should have asked, no doubt.

So, bottom line is that there are good questions and there are irrelevant questions. And, apparently, sometimes there are the unasked questions.

How do you address dumb or irrelevant questions and how do you know when to ask the question that’s REALLY on your mind?

When “cross function” meets “dysfunction”

One of the things I love most about my new job is the holistic perspective I have in my Marketing Communications role. I get to sit in on business team meetings and hear all of the business goals and challenges not to mention wonderful insights from the sales team, manufacturing team, R&D teams, engineers and even legal teams. Although somewhat overwhelming, the knowledge gleaned in these meetings makes me feel like a real part of a cross-functional team.

Now, however, with three months in the role under my belt, I find my biggest challenge to be that while success does require cross functional participation, it is a rare opportunity when all functions are in the same room at the same time revealing, discussing and deciding. Instead, in my perception, it seems as if there is an actual effort to not all be in the same room at the same time. I understand that everyone’s busy and not everyone can always be in a room at one time, but that’s different than actually making efforts to avoid it. It made me wonder if this is one of the “unwritten” rules of larger corporations?

Admittedly, my experience with companies larger than 40 people is minimal (3 months, actually). But, from an outside-in perspective, I find myself frustrated with the inefficiency of it all. For 90 days I’ve found myself literally not completely sure if what I was taking action on is an agreed upon action. I figured it was just me – being new and not sure of how things are run, but what I’ve observed is that all of the people at the non-Director level are equally confused.

This is where dysfunction makes an appearance. And that’s when morale is lost, not to mention time and money. Ultimately market-place advantage is at risk. Can this dysfunction be quantified?

Clearly what I’m referring to is the basis of the incredibly humorous Dilbert cartoons, which suggests to me that I am not alone, nor is the company at which I work. But still, since in reality, quantifying the dysfunction I speak of may be the only way to impact a change, I’m reaching out: Is this an innate corporate methodology to justify the existence of middle-management, as my husband suggests? Should I duck my head and move on, or is there hope?

Send signs of intelligence this way, please.

Where are people finding you?

Is it important to know where people are trying to find you online? Seems like a silly question, because of course you want to know where people are trying to find you. But, maybe you think you know because you’re having conversations in certain spaces? While that’s good and obviously at least one place people are trying to find you – how do you find out everywhere people are trying to find you?

The point being, where you spend YOUR time may be different than where people are looking for you.

For some who have some presence on many different sites, it may be interesting to find that people are curious about you in some spaces that you aren’t spending much of your time. This means you have an opportunity to maximize your presence and connect with a broader audience.

For me, I don’t maintain a social presence on too many sites. This is purposeful. My focus at this time is to have authentic engagements, which I feel I can do by having strong presences in fewer spaces. And of course I stick to the usual suspects.

The fact that people are searching for me nearly equally in four different spaces tells me that I’ve found relevant places and spaces to connect with those who share my passions and confirms my commitment to my eco-system.

How would you interpret my visit report?

The Jerry Maguire Strategy to Integrated Marketing Communications

Those familiar with the 1996 movie Jerry Maguire may get this reference immediately. From a very high level: less is more. In the case of Jerry Maguire, he epiphanized that, as a sport’s agent, if he had fewer athletes to manage, he’d do a better job for them and consequently, for himself.

In a modern world where each of us are asked to do more, it’s hard to live the Jerry Maguire philosophy. Seemingly, technology allows us to do more with less. But, in a recent study, it was identified that when we think we’re successfully multi-tasking, we’re actually missing some pretty important details.

The same can be said for marketing communications. Why stretch a small budget across multiple communication platforms when you can direct those dollars to one or two relevant platforms and really make a difference? What’s the worst thing that could happen? Quite bluntly, some of your consumers could try to find you in places where you aren’t, which, admittedly, would be unfortunate. But what would be even more unfortunate is for your consumers to find you in a space where you say you are, but you don’t have the time or budget to effectively manage it.

So, what do you say? If you are being asked to “show me the money”, then consider the greater impact of a focused communication strategy.

New Year’s Resolution: 33+ Posts

I wrote 33 blog posts in 2010 related to integrated marketing communications and/or social media. I loved writing every one.

That’s a bit less than 3 per month. Which, once I did math, I was happy to get that perspective. Because, with my new blog, I had planned to do 5 per week. Which, of course, is not entirely out of the question…But, since I’m starting a new job which will not have blogging as part of my regular duties, I thought it would be best to have a bit more realistic goal.

My plan is to exceed 33 industry related posts in 2011. Even if it’s only by one – that’s OK.

Now, what I really need to do is find ways to broaden my reading audience. . . Send ideas my way!