“Revitalising the pitching process“, an opinion article by Daniele Fiandaca, intrigued me so bad that I couldn’t decide if it’s safe to share it publicly or not. After sleeping on the idea, I made up my mind and chose to put it here, where I can both express my feelings and reach a small but friendly audience.

Here’s a fragment of the text, describing one of the steps of an “UnPitch experiment” conducted by Converse in the UK:

The Briefing – rather than get all the agencies to rewrite the brief and kill the life out of it (from my experience, agency briefs tend to be so dull), the client wrote a clear brief (which did not need rewriting by five different agencies). Converse hosted a half day session with all the agencies together with the sole intention of inspiring and interacting with the creatives who were going to deliver the ideas – suits and planners were banned from the process.

Full article here

The story ends with a very optimistic call to action from the author, encouraging everyone to “send it to every brand manager/marketing director they know, then maybe we can get them to think differently next time they think about running a pitch. Hopefully this might lead to the industry looking a little less broken, with more time for inspiration and spending time with our peers.”

And that’s the point where I got very scared.

I feel that promoting such an experiment would be just like distributing a horrible weapon to the wrong hands. I think you first have to learn the rules so you know how you can break them properly. And I hope, just like a child in front of an unopened chocolate bar, to live the day when we’ll get there. But until then, until we’ll reach that ideal context for that ideal process to foster the ideal ideas, I’ll just have to settle for working our *sses off, for personal fights, for personal wins, for team playing, for team mistakes, for stubborn clients, for “almost there” feedbacks, for quick pitches, for long developments, for failed meetings and more.

I don’t believe in the existence of “cushy communications excellence” and in reality, the outcome of those perfectly imperfect methods is exactly my motivation for working in this industry.

Enjoy the reading and please don’t hesitate to comment ;)

PS: What a coincidence that they’re out just while I’m packing for Amsterdam, huh?

Heather LeFevre is the head of planning for StrawberryFrog Amsterdam and also the one and only initiator of a global research about planners and planning. Please contribute if you find yourself in the recommendations below:

Who should take the survey this year?

• Anyone working as an account/brand/strategic planner in any company or role
• Freelancers
• Unemployed
• Planning interns (New!)
• Students studying to become planners (New!)

New this year:

• There’s a progress bar.
• Students and Interns are welcome to take part in the survey.
• There are four open-ended questions (for most of you) all on one page. This part will take the longest, but your thoughtful answers are appreciated.

As always, the survey is anonymous. Please encourage your friends and colleagues to participate. Heather gets emails all year long from all over the world asking for more details on countries with low participation. She can only share when enough people take the survey to be able to protect your secrets with the power of averaging.

Here’s the link to the survey: http://sgiz.mobi/s3/The-Planner-Survey-2011

Thank you!

• What’s the biggest myth in our industry?

That there are some things that advertising, by itself, can’t do.

• Define an insight.

A feeling when you feel you are going to feel a feeling you have never felt before.

• Define an idea.

Something that alcoholics refer to as a moment of clarity.

• What is Planning?

Something invisible if done right and something really obvious if done wrong.

• How will W+K be making money in ten years?

By sharing their mind-reading skills

• Tell us something interesting.

One in 10 Europeans is allegedly conceived in an Ikea bed.

• Which piece of work do you wish you’d made, and why?

“The best job in the world” – 1. Earned media coverage valued at over AUD$400 million; 2. First ever campaign to win 3 Grand Prixs (Cyber, PR and Direct); 3. Love at first sight.

• What’s your favourite piece of Nike work from anywhere in the world, and why?

Nike Basketball – made me think I could fly.

• What’s the biggest issue facing football?

The game and the passion are about to become extinct because of ignorant investors.

• What does Just Do It mean to a kid today?

“You’re way smarter than your mom & dad”.

Who else wants to play along?

The APG Awards – Call For Entries from APG Australia on Vimeo.

Although I don’t necessarily agree with everything stated above, I am looking forward to see The New Creative in this landscape too..

My favourites:

Via MisEntropy

Cognitive biases are psychological tendencies that cause the human brain to draw incorrect conclusions.

Example: Post-purchase rationalization = the tendency to persuade oneself through rational argument that a purchase was a good value.

This is a great resource, just check it out!

Cognitive Biases – A Visual Study Guide by the Royal Society of Account Planning

Via Living Brands