a strategist’s convictions

the way we sell ideas in the first place. Concepts are much harder to make fun than executions. They also are most open to interpretation, turning future rounds of review into wrestling matches between difference in expectation.

We spend so much time thinking about the big idea, the joy of the output suffers.

the process. The project based structure of much agency work has resulted in the systemic destruction of enthusiasm. Agencies want so mad to be taken seriously, they stop themselves from having the fun that good work requires.

Is it clear to you when a trend forecast is coming from amateurs versus the professionals?

ES: I mean, no. I think an amateur and a professional have kind of an equal chance at hitting the nail on the head. True flashes of cultural insight happen where you’re lucky enough to just put the right words against the cultural phenomenon at the right momen... See more

Humans are simpler than the instructions would have us believe. We’re all looking for the same things. To be seen. To be accepted. To connect. To matter. This is true for readers and writers and kids and strangers and the cast of Love Is Blind.

You see, all strategy is defined by movement. Regardless of whether you are a planning fundamentalist or, like me, a proponent of more adaptive methods, the point of the strategic exercise is to move the organization. The difference between the two schools of thought is that while adaptive strategy is concerned with direction, strategic planning ob... See more

strategy is the very human act of imagination. ‘Seeing’ what does not yet exist. Seeing things as they could be. As we would want them to be.

The role of planning/strategy is point imagination and resources (time, people etc) in the right tasks that matter (so that they can have maximum effect). Identifying and articulating the task with imagination and rigour is at the heart of a planner’s role. It’s the art of choice and point of greatest leverage.

— W+K's Martin Weigel on our industry’

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