Five things on Friday #362
This week: we reflect on the values of leadership.
Things of note for the week ending Friday March 1st, 2024.
INTRO
Let's start off with the big update:
February 21st 2024 was my last day as Chief Strategy Officer at Diva.
"Nearly two years after launching the strategy department at Diva, redesigning the internal approach to creative briefs, reinvigorating the pitching process, diagnosing, defining and designing a refreshed agency approach to brand strategy, and leading the team into Tough Mudder - now is the time to move on and find something different.
I will be forever grateful to the tenacity and commitment the team at Diva showed at embedding strategy into our work. Together we won new clients with YouTube, Ubisoft and the BBC - as well as working with existing clients (there’s one more project that’s finished and unannounced that I can’t wait to tell you about too). One of the great things about being a planner in this business is that whenever you leave an agency, you almost certainly leave it with work in the oven and knowing what’s arriving out of Diva later this year, I can’t wait to share it with you.
One of my favourite David Ogilvy-isms is this:
“If each of us hires people who are smaller than we are, we shall become a company of dwarfs. But if each of us hires people who are bigger than we are, we shall become a company of giants.”
The team I worked at Diva were exactly that, giants. The talent in the studio is incredible. And the client services, project, and strategy team around them to brief and deliver the work will always set the template to me for what great work looks like."
Nevertheless, it’s time for me to look to the horizon and see what’s next. Spring is around the corner and 2024 is barely getting going.
If you're a regular reader of FToF, then you might already have a good idea about where my head might be leaning.
Diving deeper into leadership, integrated strategy and planning, branded/brand & entertainment, and gaming - well, it takes you to interesting places, right? I’m going to tug on that thread and see where it takes me.
In the immediate term, I intend to take some time to reflect on the journey so far, hangout with a family that needs me, and of course, play some video games.
If you know anyone looking for my kind of brain, please feel free to hit reply to this email and let me know.
I'd welcome the intro :)
Linkedin (where people have been very nice indeed - reader, I cried) is also an option.
-- -- --
What else can I tell you?
The past few weeks of Five things on Friday have included explorations in leadership; What makes a good leader, how to spot a bad one etc. The response to last week's intro was so good that this week it has now turned into its own thing. Hurrah! Thank you for that (and we'll get to it shortly).
While we're speaking about last week's edition, I'd also like to take a minute to say thank you to all of you that have been in touch in regard to the health stuff on the home front. Some of the notes you sent genuinely moved me to tears.
Feb 21st, as well as being my official last day at Diva AND the day of my friend Martin's funeral, was also the day that my other half started her not insignificant medical treatment (these things come in threes right?) - I think once things are underway properly with that, I might ask her to write something up about it for a future edition (if you're reading this my love, does this work as a brief? 😅).
It's been a hard but fascinating journey and one worth sharing, I think.
She inspires me.
She keeps me kind.
She keeps me sane.
- - -
Final spot of admin before we crack on, thank you to FToF subscriber, Dave, who clocked a poorly linked link from #361.
The Diagrams Book mentioned in Thing 4, #361 is available here and is a must purchase for all budding planners (and probably the smarter creatives among you too, JR).
- - -
That's enough rumination for this edition (hahaha - as if), shall we crack on with the things?
LET'S.
TO THE THINGS!
1. FURTHER EXPLORATIONS IN LEADERSHIP
Following on from previous newsletters, leadership is a continuing theme of Five things on Friday - thank you for your patience.
As mentioned above, a BUNCH of you got in touch with some builds on last week's intro (I even got a free coffee out of it - thanks SP).
It's a subject matter I've been on since I was first approached for the CSO role back in 2021.
So here's some more er... open-plan thinking on that.
The values of good leadership I floated last week were like so:
To unpack them further:
TRUST & EMPOWERMENT
This is something that is important to helping people feel - to put it frankly - like adults. The opposite of command & control. The opposite of micromanagement.
Trust & empowerment is the demonstration of the vision and key values that you as a leader have laid out for everyone to work within. Trusting others to not simply get a job done but also do so with care and consideration of themselves and those around them. To me this is part of the overall job around motivation. You're saying: 'I trust you. I think you can do this. And I trust you to figure this out'.
Therefore I want you to feel motivated to at least try - because I believe in you. And if I can't lead you to a place where you feel motivated to find your own way, then what kind of leader am I?
PSYCHOLOGICAL SAFETY
HBR defines Psychological Safety as 'a shared belief held by members of a team that it’s OK to take risks, to express their ideas and concerns, to speak up with questions, and to admit mistakes — all without fear of negative consequences'.
There's no point entrusting and empowering people if they then don't feel safe to put forward opinion, test new concepts and maybe even - heaven forbid - they get things wrong. The worst example of this is when company vision and values are ignored and employees end up feeling scared, unsure, and ultimately gaslit by those leaders they initially placed their trust in.
These concepts are intrinsically linked. They don't really work without each other.
So let's talk about the next one:
VULNERABILITY
Perhaps these things are all layered (maybe i need to put it into a different diagram actually). Engendering trust, a sense of psychological safety, these things - I don't know if they're possible without showing any real sense of vulnerability.
In Brené Brown's now legendary TED talk 'the power of vulnerability', Brown states 'Our job is to look and say, “You know what? You’re imperfect, and you’re wired for struggle, but you are worthy of love and belonging.”'
Demonstrating that you as a leader are imperfect, that you get things wrong; that you are fallible - and doing so in a way that shows that it's safe to open up and be vulnerable - enables and creates the feeling of psychological safety. You're saying 'I, the person who is meant to be leading this team, can be vulnerable therefore this place, this team, that we all work in, is a place where you can feel safe to be vulnerable too'.
Good leaders know the way, show the way, and go the way right?
Maybe I'm overthinking it but it's important to lead by example on these things.
ACCOUNTABILITY
Again, these things are linked. Taking ownership is a big deal. Being a leader that is able to say: 'Yes, that was my fault. I could've done that better. I wasn't clear in how I communicated that. How can I improve? How can I support you better?' - that's accountability.
The art of not only combining these things together but also keeping them in place is how you create a just culture.
A just culture means that when things go wrong you say 'What went wrong and how can we improve?' over and above 'Who did this?' which, in turn creates a culture of blame.
Blame cultures are well known for creating toxic working environments; they erode employee mental health, instil an underlying inertia in employees' ability to make decisions (due to a fear of getting the slightest thing wrong) and end up stifling, or all out killing, productivity.
Not great!
Right. So. So far... so what?
These things just feel correct, right?
A bit airy-fairy maybe. I mean, no one sets out to do the opposite of good leadership (at least I hope not). But actioning this stuff - and putting the processes and systems in place to create a positive working environment (and sticking to them) can only be implemented by leadership.
The thinking, provocations and input I received over the past couple of weeks have built on these a bit more.
(this is turning out to be a much longer Thing than I initially thought - sorry not sorry? Sometimes you just need to tug a noodle)
Jamie Thingelstad writes:
Re: leadership models. We have something similar at our company and I like the structure. The four quadrants are: People Developer, Culture Champion, Strategist, Results Enabler (this used to be Get Things Done which I liked better). My read is that Trust & Empowerment, Psychological Safety, Vulnerability are components of People Developer and Culture Champion.
You can have leadership models for different purposes. Another organization I know had “4 Behaviors of Inclusive Leadership” that I liked a lot too: Vulnerability, Empathy, Courage, Grace.
The grace part reminds me of a system I heard about at Santander. Whereby employee objectives are set: 50% for what you achieve and 50% for how you achieve it. So if you're hitting all your objectives but you're a dick about it, you can only ever achieve 50% of your potential bonus for that year.
The four quadrants approach that Jamie mentions leads nicely into a nudge I received from JFS - aka @Wildpark - about the Hersey-Blanchard Situational Leadership approach. JFS writes:
"[This is] a model that says what your people need from you at a particular moment in time differs depending on many factors and the better a leader you are, the more you are able to shift your leadership style to match their needs."
I hadn't seen this before but to read it, it goes as follows:
Style 1 (S1) - Telling, Directing or Guiding:
The leader makes decisions and closely supervises execution. This is a short-term approach intended to create movement.
S2- Selling, Coaching or Explaining:
The leader still makes decisions but provides background and context and engages with the follower to reinforce buy-in and continued progress.
S3- Participating, Collaborating or Facilitating:
The follower makes decisions with support from the leader in an effort to instil and enhance task mastery.
S4- Delegating, Empowering or Monitoring:
The follower is trusted to not only make task-related decisions but to suggest strategies for improvement and identify best practices.
I really like this.
Leadership that changes and flexes depending on the needs of the group and, well, the situation, feels like a solid (yet fluid) approach. Going to spend more time with this one...
(we're nearly there - two more inputs and then we're moving on)
Another Jamie writes:
Leadership needs inspiration. How are you going to get people to follow your path, your vision? It's too important to be wrapped up into one of your current framework titles.
Inspiration currently isn't in there but I wonder if that is a) tied into vision and values and b) exhibiting behaviours that are true to them. Hmmmm...
Rishi writes:
A couple of things to add to the leadership framework:
- transparency (probably goes with accountability- as many decisions as possible have to be seen to be made and why)
- predictability (decisions shouldn’t be, as far as possible, surprising)
- vision setting (where are you leading people to?)
Agree on all three of these. Accountability, transparency and predictability - these all feed into the above. Especially psychological safety.
...
OK, so that was a lot.
Thank you for indulging me on this. I think we're going to hit pause there for now. A lot to reflect on, right?
More open plan thinking to follow soon (and 'open plan thinking' as a concept generally, I think I quite like as well).
Got any more builds?
Feel free to drop me a note x
2. FOR OPPENHEIMER
"You don't get to commit sin, and then ask all of us to feel sorry for you when there are consequences."
We watched the 2024 EE BAFTAs the other night and, being parents of young children, cinema-time these days (well, for non-kid films at least) is limited. So we left The BAFTAs with a long list of movies we wanted to catch up on, starting with OPPENHEIMER (Amazon Prime had it available to rent in UHD for a fiver so we went for it).
If you've not seen it yet, do please go ahead and find the time. If you have seen it, then you might enjoy this GREAT interview with Cillian Murphy and Christopher Nolan.
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3. THIS WEEK IN... GAMING
I think I hit the word count on this week's edition before we left Thing 1 so again for TWIG, I'll see if I can keep it brief.
The main news this week is the news of continuing game industry layoffs hitting, among others, PlayStation, EA, and Supermassive.
I've got friends in all three of these places and it's pretty tough knowing that they're going through. If you're reading this, I hope you're doing OK. Hit reply if you need to.
This year's total is already over 8,100 and it's pretty grim out there.
I am hopeful that this 're-sizing' (or as one dev said to me at the weekend 'it's post-covid resizing OR it'ss corporate malfeasance, we'll soon find out') is coming to an end and that games will return to 'normal' soon. Games like Helldivers 2 have set a new bar for AA games that sometimes don't need HUGE investment to get them over the line.
More of that (and maybe better management - financial or otherwise) and the industry might not get back here again for a while, maybe?
Outside of ALL that, there isn't much other news to report on, however, from a 'What is James playing' perspective:
I'm still very much all in on LEGO FORTNITE (much to the amusement of many of my gamer pals), as are the kids - which is fun. We haven't touched Minecraft in a while (I really wish Mojang would update it to VR2 - literally any kind of current gen update would be nice).
HELLDIVERS 2 is proving to be THE game of the moment. The devs, Arrowhead Studio, are overwhelmed (figuratively and literally) with the success of the game and if you haven't played it yet, just imagine STARSHIP TROOPERS but as a game. And it's a firetruck load of fun.
Friday nights are community nights for my lot (the Midlife Gamer crew) and, in spite of my efforts to the contrary (and my efforts to get us moved onto a different game), the weekly 'Gears and beers' has meant I've finally had to get good at GEARS OF WAR. Well, I say 'get good', I mean 'less terrible'. So if you work at Xbox and you're looking for some free community ideas: Gears and Beers is still a thing - so do something with that, yeah? x
Next on the list is PACIFIC DRIVE which, while yet to be actually purchased, has been on my long list ever since it was first announced. Early feedback is good so I think I'll be jumping on that at some point.
I picked up a few PS VR2 games (STAR WARS, some body combat exercise thing, and AMONG US VR) I bought in the Jan sale that I've been meaning to dive into so maybe I'll spin some of those up at some point soon too.
What are you playing?
4. ANOTHER WEEK, ANOTHER PIECE OF WRITING IN AT THING 4? OK FINE.
A decent chunk of replies to last week's edition mentioned the gorgeous 'KINDNESS', by Naomi Shihab Nye (Thing 4, #361). In response, I've had some your favourite pieces of writing sent back to me (you lot, honestly).
The one below, written when the author was going through a depressive episode, talks about finding growth through pain (similar to finding kindness through loss or sorry) and likens it to how a farmer ploughs (plows - US spelling) and churns the soil over to prepare for the coming season. I really, really like it.
Thanks to FToF reader (and fellow Buttondown newsletter writer), Jamie Thingelstad (second mention Jamie - strong work), for sending this in -
HARROWING, Peter J. Palmer, 2014
The plow has savaged this sweet field
Misshapen clods of earth kicked up
Rocks and twisted roots exposed to view
Last year’s growth demolished by the blade.
I have plowed my life this way
Turned over a whole history
Looking for the roots of what went wrong
Until my face is ravaged, furrowed, scarred.
Enough. The job is done.
Whatever’s been uprooted, let it be
Seedbed for the growing that’s to come.
I plowed to unearth last year’s reasons —
The farmer plows to plant a greening season.
--
Hits hard right?
A pain well-weathered.
An acknowledgement of the journey we make to greener tomorrows.
And on a more surface level, it chimed with a lot of the coaching and mentoring I do...
Depending on the situation, one of the exercises we often turn to is about trying to make decisions about today based upon where you want to be tomorrow (so easy to say, so difficult to practice - forever grateful to Mike @ Achieve Breakthrough for teaching me the latter). So many of us make decisions about today based upon what happened yesterday and as a result, spend their entire lives driving forward by forever looking in the rearview mirror.
This is an easy trap to fall into but only by staying true to your vision and values, and making decisions accordingly, will you ever hope to plant a greening season.
Key point: if you don't have a vision, then this is next to impossible - but hey, that's what the mentoring and coaching is for :)
5. DUNE II RED CARPETS FOR DAAAAAAAAYS
I mean. Come. On.
I definitely spotted it pretty earlier but the 'vintage' Mugler robot outfit nailed it. The synchronisation - the discussion - the chat groups that must've happened - the decision to just go THIS HARD for every premiere. Don't get me wrong, I know that this isn't the first time red carpet choices have been made (most recently, Margot Robbie doing a full tour of Barbie's entire wardrobe, springs to mind) but the full cast?
I love it. More please.
GQ noticed. As did The Hollywood Reporter. And of course, Vogue.
WELCOME TO THE BONUS SECTION. BONUS LINKS THAT YOU GET OVER AND ABOVE THE CONTRACTED FIVE THINGS BUT BARELY GET ANY COMMENTARY AS A RESULT. I'M SORRY.
Not much in the extra link bank this week. Half-term came and went which meant less time spent online finding, reading, curating and collating - but hey, it's nice to not break your browser tabs once in a while, right?
"Billions of miles away at the edge of the Solar System, Voyager 1 has gone mad and has begun to die." - Death. Lonely Death.
"I made my Star Wars Chewbacca suit from 45 bags of hair extensions"
I quite enjoyed Ryan Gosling at the top of the Warner Bros Water Tower.
YOU ARE REACHING THE END OF THE NEWSLETTER. HOLD TIGHT.
After last week's confession that I might not have time during half-term to get an edition out, FToF reader, EML of (of POPHealth fame), replied to say 'If there's one thing your readers expect, it's to not expect a newsletter.' - reader, I lol'd.
But here we are. A promise kept and an edition arriving on a Friday too. Phenomenal.
Finally, before I go. I need to talk about Martin.
This man made me laugh more than I ever knew was possible. Whether it was dancing to Dolly Parton with Disco Dave the cab driver of Northampton. Getting prank-called at work by Rolex the alien calling me to tell me he thinks he's got diabetes, or getting absolutely trolleyed with him and his dad and having [redacted] say to me 'James Whatley! You were the year above me at college!'
All of those stories and more.
My best anecdotes - Mart was there.
And now he's stupid gone. To stupid cancer.
I loved him. I'm furious with him for being gone. But Mart, if you're up there and you can read this. I forgive you pal. Because I love you.
Love love love love loved you.
Love is the answer, man.
Love is always the answer.
Until next time,
Whatley out x