A Copywriter Writes

Getting Life Experience or, Watching TV Is Part Of The Job

My first (creative) partner was a girl in my ad school during my third year doing a Bachelor of Communications at AUT.

She was great, we did a lot of interesting work together.

There was one thing about her that I found odd.

She didn’t watch television.

Her family didn’t have one. She was raised like this. Instead of watching TV, she’d pursue hobbies like dancing, which is all well and good because she was an excellent dancer.

And her parents took her to different countries when she was little, so she was well travelled. Phenomenally so.

But she didn’t watch television.

And to me, this left a gap in her thinking.

Sometimes, I would suggest an angle we could explore or lines we could use based on popular culture originating from a TV show, and she would come back to me; expressionless.

I think there was one time I mentioned a TV character like Captain Planet.

“Who?”

“Captain Planet. You know, the Planeteers? Earth, Fire, Wind, Water, Heart? Go, Planet?”

“Nope. Are you sure people know who that is?”

“Are you serious?!” 

Good advertising messages stem from insights. Insights about the product, where it’s made, how to use it, the people that use it, an so on.

The best advertising messages stem from life insights. Aspects of daily living that transcend language, age and gender boundaries.

And the best way to come up with these life insights is to experience life.

If you’re disconnected somehow, you’re not going to reach those crucial truths you need.

In a way, this means to travel; see different people and cultures and view life from a unique perspective.

In a more realistic way, this means to branch out from what you already do.

Just because Ted, Marshall, Lily, Robin and Barney hang out at MacLaren’s Pub all the time, doesn’t mean it’s cool for you to do as well.

Read a book you by an author you don’t normally read; see a movie you wouldn’t see; watch TV, a lot; go to a restaurant you haven’t been to and order something you don’t normally eat.

Every new thing you do gives you a new perspective and broadens your thinking.

You could notice how people who can’t handle spicy food look like they’re taking a Lamaze class when they eat, or how the majority of commuters read books on the train, or all the weird tips and tricks for picking out perfect produce you learn from farmer’s market patrons.

They can all birth interesting ideas that come from simple life insights.

Another thing I would recommend is to watch a lot of stand up comedians. All and any you can. Local ones, international ones, male ones, female ones, transgender ones, old ones, young ones, Irish ones, American ones, Spanish ones, Chinese ones, Nigerian ones, bad ones, really bad ones, all of them.

Especially those who specialise in observational humor.

What these people do for a living is take even the tiniest life insight, like the faces men make when we shave, and turn it into something relatable, funny and entertaining.

Gee, that sounds familiar.

And you can tell they’ve hit the nail on the head with these details of daily life because of the immediate laughter from the audience.

Young creatives could learn a lot from these people. The more you watch, the more perspective you benefit from - it’s simple.

As a creative (especially one working in advertising), you’re not just living life, you’re exploring it. And the best way to do that is just do something different from time to time.

A friend of mine, Iain Nealie, a creative at TBWA\Tequila in Auckland, once did something as simple as using a different mode of transport to go to work each day for a week.

He managed it (walk, run, car, skateboard, bus).

Simple as that.

Or just at least make sure you’re getting enough TV each day.

Direction or, The Type Of Creative Director I Wish To Be: Part 2

So as I’ve previously pointed out, my happy place is my own office, with my own desk and my own door that says my own name on it and ‘Creative Director’ underneath it.

It can also just say ‘Creative Director’ without my name. I’m not picky. I have very flexible life goals.

Aside from doing great work and earning my keep in the ad industry, I’ve taken to preparing for the CD role through observation of the many I’ve met and worked with so far in my budding career.

Approachability was the first quality I figured was important to have. The next one is an obvious one and almost goes without saying.

Direction.

To state the perfectly obvious, creativity needs direction like a burger needs a bun. Especially in a commercial industry where the message needs to be bold and more obvious than what you would find at your local modern art museum.

So if you’re a young creative mucking around with a brief, judging by the job title, you’d expect a Creative Director to look at your ideas and direct your creativity in the right direction.

I’ve had my share of meetings with CDs, where they’ve looked at the work and sighed a vague response:

“It’s not ‘there’ yet. Go away and come back later.”

Or something of the like.

What the hell is this ‘there’ place? It’s funny because I’ve talked to a couple of CDs who know when you’re not ‘there’ as if they know where ‘there’ is, but they’re not about to give you a map and a compass.

You go away from those meetings being just as confused as you might have been before and with no grounding to start round two of cracking the brief. And a creative who doesn’t know what they’re doing isn’t likely to produce some awesome work.

Now, I’ve had some absolutely brilliant meetings before. I was once sitting with a CD who was giving be a speech about pushing beyond the first thought after I showed him an idea for a campaign. Not only did he tell me to explore the uncharted territory but he gave me an example, he took my idea and said,

“What if you made it about [such and such] and said something like, ‘[blah blah blah]’. You know? That way, it’s not your usual campaign about [whatever].”*

My art director and I were simply inspired. There’s nothing better than coming away from a meeting with enough open windows to air out Buckingham Palace.

Another brilliant example is a CD I was trying to get a job offer from. I met with him and showed him my portfolio and he went through it, critiqued it and then we sat there and brainstormed for another 30 minutes or so! A CD who will give 1st rate direction to even unemployed creatives is absolutely top of my charts.

He even apologised that he had to wrap up the meeting and get back to work! Brilliant.

Sure, not every CD is like that, and not all CDs can be.

As much as I’d like to sit with my future creatives and nut out the brief alongside them, there may be times where I’m too busy or whatever.

But if I can at the very least leave them with a good starting point to come up with ideas that even I as the CD wouldn’t have considered, then I would consider my day’s keep earned.

*I can’t give all the details because it’s an idea I’m currently working on to go into my portfolio.

Approachability or, The Type Of Creative Director I Wish To Be: Part 1

Basically, my long term goal is to one day (hopefully in roughly 12-15 years) be a Creative Director of a sweet agency.

If you were to talk to many creatives my age at once, that life goal gets really old quick.

But it’s my goal and even though the needle on my experience dial points just above ‘Fuck All’, I’ve taken to already preparing myself for the role.

This means I’ve carefully watched and learned from the CDs I’ve already had the privilege to work for in my short, but illustrious career to date.

There are a number of qualities that I both admire and dislike in CDs I’ve observed or just heard about that I wish to either emulate or avoid.

However, I tend to think of them as I see them and say to myself,

“I want to be just like that when I’m older.”

or perhaps,

“I must not let myself become like that when I get older.”

So I shall talk about these qualities one at a time.

Starting with one of the most important, in my book.

Approachability.

From what I’ve learned, if a creative feels comfortable with their CD, then they’ll show them any old crap they’re working on and seek an honest opinion, the way it should be.

Alas, sometimes the creative is shit-scared for their CD for a number of reasons, and so they self-judge themselves heavily and end up presenting what they think are their best two ideas, or at least what ever that they think is worthy.

Sometimes, this may be due to something that the CD simply cannot help. For instance, if the CD is incredibly successful and influential and thus as intimidating as the meathead dating the girl you’re crushing on.

I know I’ve been there, I’ve worked for a CD who I could only dream of working with in my uni days. When that time did decide to grant itself to me, all I thought about was not disappointing him. All he had to do was enter the room and I’d be sweating bullets faster than a gatling gun.

This can be good for a creative; a nice motivational kick every day. But it’s a bit too far when you panic at the thought of showing the ideas you’ve come up with to them.

Other times, the CD is just gruff and speaks their mind, no matter who gets wounded and maimed in the process. That probably works for some, for the rest it has us trembling so much we can’t hold our Moleskines properly.

Being able to simple stroll into your CD’s office and spit across some first thoughts at them without taking a second one is a crucial factor to a young creative’s development, in my humble opinion.

I had a CD once who had approachability down to an art. He would saunter into the office, ask us how we were and not even ask to see our ideas sometimes. When we offered, he would simply shrug and say,

“Yeah, sure. I mean, if you’re ready. No rush.”

And just like that, we’d be at ease.

And no anxiety meant less pressure.

It also meant a desire to impress, as opposed to a desire not to screw up.

Big difference. Especially when you’re talking about creative productivity.

All, in my eyes, dependent on how approachable you are as a CD.

Passionate People or, Temporarily Living The Dream

The DDB Group in New Zealand was always an agency I wanted to work for. It was one of the top in the country. 

How could you not want a piece of that?

It wasn’t until I was about a month out of leaving for Malaysia that my little dream was answered. I received a text message asking me to come into the Interbrand office to work on a couple of projects.

This was off the back of a very good recommendation from my past tutor. So I was elated. You couldn’t get much closer to a professional orgasm than that, short of a promotion to your dream job.

I went in there for the meeting on the Monday, and started work on the Wednesday.

I was nervous as hell, as you can imagine. Walking into the same building as some of New Zealand’s most awarded creatives.

But I cautiously wandered into the office, sat down and proceeded to work like I’ve never worked before. I wasn’t there long, as I had a flight to catch in early March, but it was the most productive few weeks I had experienced.

I have a couple of answers to why that may have been:

It might have been the fact that I was sitting at a desk in the big, tall building at 80 Grey St in the heart of Auckland’s CBD, or it could have been I was working for a Creative Director (Lorenz Perry) that I had heard so many good things about in the past.

However I’m more inclined toward the fact that the Managing Director, James Bickford had an amazing way of igniting the the wick of the team’s passion and shooting it up into the sky to explode in an array of colours and sparkles.

He was a great guy to work with, to say the least.

He was one of those people who was very involved with all the work the agency was doing and really liked to push ideas.

He was someone you really wanted to impress, too.

One meeting, we were discussing a look and feel and name for a particular band of lamb.

“Yes, I love that. Now, this is interesting. Yes, I was thinking the exact same thing! I’m not sure this works. What do you think? Yes, I agree, I was wondering if it would be better like this? For me that works best. Ah, yes, I see what you’re saying. What was that you said? Yes, that one, I like that one.”

Trying not to sound like a blubbering ad fanboy, but it was magic to watch.

I was asked to come up with names and tag lines and other little copy based bits for the projects I worked on. I was surprised at how I was churning out the words.

They wanted names for a drink brand, I gave them over 100 suggestions by lunchtime. They wanted me to push a few. I came back with about 50 in half an hour. I was feeling good.

This is exactly how you want to be in your working life; surrounded by people who awaken your love for your work and have you performing like you’re up for an award.*

Surround yourself with passionate people and naturally, your work begins to improve as your attitude does.

Obvious. You see it in the opposite scenarios too. There have been many times when we’ve had a client reject an idea or propose a really silly change and team is on its last legs and collectively goes,

“Fine. It’s no use fighting anymore. Just do whatever.”

How deflating is that?

Someone who is trying to keep fighting and try to get something at least a little cool out is going to drown with do support.

It happens. But if it happens often, you need to get out and go find a place where it rains positivity. 

Another thing to keep in mind is you can’t depend on these people to keep you positive. It’s a dyadic process. You’re surrounding yourself with these people and in turn they’re surrounding themselves with you. They’re counting on you to keep them going too.

I’m guessing that’s how James stays so passionate: because the rest of the team at Interbrand NZ are as equally as passionate and keep on delivering passionate work.

And then you become a place to work that people like me admire, blog about and wish to work for.

*I’m not saying all the other places I’ve worked were not like this. On the contrary - every single place I’ve worked at has given me something different that I couldn’t get anywhere else. I’m not sure I have a favourite place, yet.

Abolish Caution or, Why I Now Order Prawns Like A Boss

It was a special occasion and my family decided to go to the local steak house for dinner to celebrate the said special occasion.

I was eyeing up the seafood menu, at the king prawns, specifically. I had my first nibble of those juicy underwater dwellers at a barbecue the weekend prior and had developed a taste for them.

I ordered them with much excitement and anticipation. An eagerness for food that is borderline unhealthy, to be honest.

The waitress finally came over. Here we go.

She served me soup and walked off as fast as she had set it down.

Now, I’m usually very polite in restaurants, and in general public for that matter, but this was mildly urgent.

“Excuse me! HEY! Sorry, excuse me! Miss! Yeah, sorry. I didn’t order soup, I ordered the king prawns as a main. Thanks.”

I held out the dish for her to take with a look that confidently said:

Hey, it’s fine. These things happen. People get mixed up, don’t take it personally. I’m not angry.

My parents snorted and the waitress smiled.

“Actually, that’s your finger bowl. For when you eat your prawns.”

Red as a cooked crustacean, I set my bowl of lemon water back on the table.

“Oh. Then thank you.”

Everyone else at the table spluttered with laughter.

Why can’t we look this silly all the time?

Why can’t we just let go and ask the stupid question and get laughed at and feel like a dick head?

Sure it’s mildly embarrassing, but the moment is fleeting in comparison to the rest of your life.

And you learn. Boy, do you learn. You can be sure I know all about what happens when you order prawns. No more surprises, just the immediate nonchalant dipping of fingers, as if I’d been doing it right my whole life.

Having said this, people, including myself at the best of times, are simply not willing to make such a small sacrifice; a moment’s stumble for a lifetime of strides.

There’s too much of a pressure to be right all the time or to appear in control.

I’m reminded of a creative team I studied with at university. They were given the chance to go and get work experience at Saatchi & Saatchi Auckland. That was big; a very good agency with a very prestigious name and some highly skilled creatives within.

They came back to uni from a brainstorm session with the agency. They had to come up with ideas for the campaign they were doing that went across a range of media, including something called ‘eyelites’, something which they knew nothing about.

“What’s an ‘eyelite’?”

“We don’t know!”

“Haha, didn’t you ask them?”

“No, of course not.”

“Uh, why not?”

“Dan, you don’t ask them those sort of silly questions. They’ll think you’re stupid. I mean, how bad would that look; not knowing what ‘eyelites’ are?”

“I highly doubt they’d care, you simply ask and they tell you.”

“No, it doesn’t work like that.”*

I left the conversation totally baffled. Later, they found out that eyelites are what the guys at Saatchis called bus shelter ads, or what we had always referred as ‘adshels’. So that creative team knew what they were all along, they just called them a different name. Had they asked straight up, they’d have found out earlier and avoided unnecessary stress.

As I’ve pointed out in a previous blog post, as a young person, the time to ask the stupid questions or make the silly assumptions is now, when you have little to lose in terms of your dignity and everything to gain.

Besides, they make for great stories to bring the next generation of timid juniors at ease when you become a ridiculously successful watchamacallit.

“Oh, I was just like you once, except worst! I screwed up everything! I couldn’t order prawns without looking like a dipshit.”

Just think of it this way: compare your possible embarrassment to the rest of your life. It’s will be a mere blip on the timeline that is your existence. Just like the entire universe couldn’t give seven shades of snot about what shirt you wear today. Once you get a little perspective, you’ll calm down a wee bit.

Remember, no one knows everything, so there’s no point in trying to appear that you do when you don’t. It’s ok.

So I’ve continued to order prawns with confidence to this day.

Except that one time at the Japanese restaurant, where I plunged my hands into a bowl of miso soup.

*Let me just point out that this is basically more-or-less how the conversation went. I’m not a tape recorder.

Portfolio Advice or, Taking The Sting Of A CD’s Critique So You Don’t Have To

My first year in the advertising industry yielded no permanent positions in any Auckland ad agencies. Obviously. 

That being said, I was tremendously lucky. There was never a time where I was unemployed for more than a week.

In between the various agencies I worked at, my art director, Kishan and I would get right back to work and set out to show our book around Auckland to the Creative Directors who gave us the time of day. All the while, hoping to find the new place we would be happily spending a third of our week in.

The thing with ‘doing the rounds’, as Kish and I would say, is every CD is different and has views and priorities that contradict those of others. It was good because you were criticised from different angles, which only turn you into a sharper creative.

During that time, I collected advice from some of Auckland’s well-known CDs and kept it to myself, referring to my notes every now and again when I had lost my way.

Until now, that is.

A few talented CDs I met with shared some profound thoughts in the art of portfolio building, maintenance and distribution. One thing that has become prevalent since I started blogging is sharing is caring.

ROB JACK
Creative Director, Special

The most important thing to have in the work is a nice thought behind it. Humour is nearly always the best way to go about it, too. You must also show contemporary thinking. It’s doesn’t matter what medium, a good print ad can still work.

Ideally, you should have 10 great pieces in your book. 7 campaigns and 3 one-offs. With a mixture of mediums, new and traditional.

PAUL CATMUR
Creative Director, Barnes, Catmur & Friends

A campaign has to have a big, bold idea behind it.

PAUL HANKINSON
Head of Copy, DDB

Each time you go to add something new to your book, make it the best work you’ve every done. Spend an entire week crafting and perfecting one ad campaign and in two short months, you’ve got 8 examples of your best work. There’s no rush.

GUY ROBERTS & CORY CHALMERS
Creative Directors, Droga5

When thinking about ideas, it’s always good to write down those first thoughts to get them out of your head, but always push further. What’s a different way of looking at what you’re saying?

Do ads in your book about things you’re passionate about. When you’re excited about the work, your best comes out of it.

Guy and Cory were previously CDs at TBWA/Tequila working on the Adidas account, doing a lot of stuff for the New Zealand All Blacks. Being both rugby nuts, the quality of work was high.

MIKE O’SULLIVAN
Creative Partner, Droga5

I’m 42 (then). I’m old. When I look at junior’s book, I should see something I haven’t seen before. In theory, a junior should be teaching me new things, not the other way around.

You need to have digital components and new media in your book.

PAUL WHITE
Head Lecturer, AUT AdSchool

Just keep on going.

Here’s a couple of gems from that book, Pick Me by Nancy Vonk and Janet Kestin:

BOB BARRIE
Executive Creative Director, BDM

One question: are your ideas real world applicable? Having creative ideas is one thing, but creative ideas that work is a whole new level. Your ideas should work across a range, if not all media.

RICK BOYKO
Managing Director, VCU Brandcenter

Online books and mini books make it a lot easier to cover a large group of CDs. Rick recommends you to come in with your book rather than send it. People hire people, not portfolios. It’s about who you are as well.

And finally, my own observations:

One thing that was said a number of times was if you can make your idea work in print, you can make it work anywhere. That’s a good test to see if a campaign has legs.

All the CDs you’ll meet will have contradicting views. In the end, it’s all about what you think is right. After all, your portfolio is a representation of you. Choose the CDs you respect more and want to work for the most and go with their advice.

Take up a CD’s challenge to meet again in a week with improvements made to the book. Even if you are sent away again and again, you’re building a relationship with that CD and if there’s anything as important as getting a job, it’s getting contacts.

Just because you haven’t got a job in an agency, doesn’t mean you don’t work like you do. Just saying. The passionate don’t need to hear this once, let alone twice.

A junior doesn’t necessarily have to be amazingly talented, as long as you show promise by means of your ravenous hunger for the work, you’re gold to any CD.

Evolving or, ZOMG We’re Just Like Pokemon!

When I was a kid not too long ago, I feel in love with a game called Pokemon. Many of you may have as well.

God, I loved that game. I was obsessed. What was not to love? Collecting lots of little monsters, battling, leveling up, evolving. Even 20-odd versions later, the game is still cool.

I remember the twang of excitement I’d get when my Pokemon reached a certain level and there’d be a slight pause at the end of a battle and the following text showed up:

What? PIDGEY is evolving!

And your Pidgey, or whatever, changed into something completely different, but stronger and more powerful.

PIDGEY evolved into PIDGEOTTO!

Awesome.

After that I moved on to other RPG games, mostly on the Internet, where I could take my character and level it up, and evolve.

My latest is, I write with abashment, a recent find. A game called Urban Rivals. A game where you collect different ‘normal’ looking human characters and evolve them into more supernatural forms.

I can’t help it.

I love this game concept of evolution. The ability to gain experience points (win or lose) and once you fill the bar, you raise a level, learn a new ability or change form completely.

I remember I used to sit at my bedroom window as a kid and look at the birds in the backyard and wish Pokemon existed for real*; catching and training the ones that would appear around the house. And at 10, like in the show, I would’ve been off on my own to wander the globe looking for animals to catch and battle.

Never mind the small fact that a ten year-old kid cannot look after themselves.

I still catch myself wishing that all the aspects in our lives were like this: a little EXP bar floating above us showing our level and skills, all of which would grow every time we did something and suddenly, we would glow and transform into a different, noticeably stronger and smarter form.

But then I think.

That’s exactly how life is, isn’t it?

Sure, ok, we don’t have EXP bars floating above our heads, but we have experience levels for all the tasks we ever do in our lives. Right now, my experience levels (if I had to give numbers to them) may look like this:

COPYWRITING: 31
SHAVING: 74
MAKING BANANA MILKSHAKES: 89
SEWING: 4

We change form, we just don’t notice it until we pull out the old photos. And we do take on new forms and learn new ‘attacks’ or abilities. The only difference is we don’t have a constant update on our lives like you see in games:

DAN reached level 21!

DAN learned IDEAS (Level 1)!

DAN learned ART DIRECTION (Level 1)!

DAN learned COPYWRITING (Level 1)!

DAN obtained the item, UNI DEGREE!

What? DAN is evolving!

DAN evolved into JUNIOR COPYWRITER!

DAN learned HEADLINES!

DAN learned IDEAS (Level 2)

DAN learned COPYWRITING (Level 2)!

DAN reached level 22!

DAN learned COPYWRITING (Level 3)!

DAN obtained the item AD AWARD!

What? DAN is evolving!

DAN evolved into MID-WEIGHT COPYWRITER!

The battles we enter are the everyday tasks we do in our work and our hobbies that give us the experience to become more skillful. It’s the constant practice that raises our skill level.

If you lift weights all the time, do our muscles not get bigger? Karl Fleet, Deputy Creative Director at Colenso BBDO told me:

“The brain is a muscle. Just keep working it and it will get stronger.”

Totally true; if you play a card game enough, you tend to become more strategic in your approach, making you a better player.

The same would be for your passion. Simply keep going. Keep battling every day and challenge yourself to get better at what you love doing and gain more experience. You’ll evolve eventually.

DAN learned INSIGHT (Level 1)!

What? DAN is evolving!

DAN evolved into BLOGGER!

DAN learned BLOG POST (Level 2)!

*If you watched or played Pokemon as a kid, you did too. Don’t lie to me.

The Gospel According To Dan or, Twenty-Two Tips For Interns

Over time, younger ad kids coming out of university have talked to me about getting an internship. Some have asked for tips and other times I’m thrown my two cents at them like a passerby to a man in the street juggling hackie sacks.

Either which way, during my time studying and working I’ve picked up a few tips and walkthroughs that I think can be very helpful to the clueless intern, the timid junior or even the unsure fish-out-of-water worker.

ONE

As soon as you’re settled, find the appropriate person and ask for a list of the agency’s clients. As an intern, there’s a chance you won’t see a lot of work for a first couple of days as you’re introduced to the agency and its culture. In the meantime, pick a client from the list when you have nothing to do and come up with some ads for them with your own SMP. This shows that you have initiative and you add value to the agency. Paul White told this to me toward the end of 2009, and I’ve lived by it ever since.

TWO

Any proactive work you do during the week, compile together and show the Creative Director at the end of the week. You’ll look amazing if you can make this a regular thing. This shows the CD directly that you’re always thinking and don’t waste time. If any of it is good, you’ve got some work to go in the portfolio (GOOD), or gets run (AWESOME) or may even be award winning (CRAZY AWESOME).

THREE

Before doing proactive work for the agency’s clients, do a quick round of the creative department and introduce yourself (if you haven’t already) and ask if you can get in and help on anything anyone else is doing. An agency appreciates a hungry intern. It gets you more relaxed and familiar with the other creatives too and you become more approachable to one another.

FOUR

Be talkative, smile and be approachable. Make sure people know you’re there. A small agency I once worked for took in a couple of interns who kept to themselves most of the time. After a month, the CD still didn’t know their names. In an agency with only 6 people in creative department, that’s awkward.

FIVE

As an intern, NEVER (without permission) drink the last beer/wine/spirit from the bar (if you’re lucky enough to get into an agency that has one). Psychologically, people tend to dislike whoever takes the last of something. Also, it can be perceived as a bit of a smart-ass thing to do. I found this out the hard way. I once drank the last of the whiskey at one agency and this news was quickly spread and was received with mild distaste. The senior copywriter even went as far as to make it a new rule and wrote an amendment to the agency induction document.

SIX

Unless work is beating down on you like a drummer in an African tribe, always take up the invitation to join people from the agency for lunch or after-work drinks. Get to know everyone outside of the office. Who knows? You may make some industry friends and (if you’re a swell person) some solid contacts for later in your career.

SEVEN

Get comfortable, but not too comfortable. It’s great if you’re one of those people who can easily adapt to a new environment, but careful not to rub others the wrong way with it. There’s a fine line between a cool intern who’s settling in nicely and cocky shit new kid on the block. One time, I was playing pool with the agency Managing Director and we were giving each other banter, as you do. He made a stab at me being fired if I won the game and I, in jest, made a remark along the lines of

“Please, you need me.” 

To which he replied after a pause:

“Sorry, who are you?”

This was also a joke, but with serious undertones. Got me thinking. Always pack yourself a slice of humble pie for lunch.

EIGHT

When invited to sit in on meetings, contribute. ‘Sit in’ generally means sit there, listen and learn about what’s going on and you’re not really expected to speak up. Show your enthusiasm by diving into the work and getting involved.

NINE

Know that you’ll be working long hours. Expect it. Be pleasantly surprised if they let you go home at 6pm. It helps to inform your family, friends, boyfriend/girlfriend.

TEN

A rule of thumb with most workplaces if you’re interning is to be there before your boss and leave only after he/she does. Special circumstances aside.

ELEVEN

If it’s 6pm and there’s nothing for you to do, stay. I mean, this job is mostly about long hours, you may as well start practising. Pull out that client list.

TWELVE

Know that agency life will be exciting and magical for a first weeks, maybe, if you’re awesome, it’ll last a month for so. But sooner or later, the cherries, rainbows and fairy bread will dissolve and it’ll be crunch time and there’ll be tension and a sea of shit to swim through. But there’s always land ahead.

THIRTEEN

Always check and confirm all meetings, no matter how minute, with your CD. For one, it’ll show that you’re on top of things and you’re proactive about your work. Also, a CD’s schedule is dramatically hectic and dynamic. Don’t be surprised if the number of times a meeting is postponed gets into the double digits.

FOURTEEN

You’re never too busy. Having said this, be sensible. Take on all work opportunities that come your way, but there’s a point where you go from juggling multiple briefs to being ridiculous. Plus, as an intern (and in some cases a junior), you’re hardly in any position to turn people away.

FIFTEEN

The receptionist is the gatekeeper of all things in the agency. She orders the new stationary, she keeps the taxi coupons in her top drawer and she picks the beer brand and biscuits to stock the fridge and fill the jar with. She loves gossip, talking about her (and your) day and dogs or cats or horses or possibly all three. And she loves doing favours for people who are nice to her. Most importantly, she is not, by any measurement, below you in any way. Give her the respect she deserves.

SIXTEEN

Some of the more stressed workers in the agency (usually the creatives) would argue that it is not in fact a good morning or something that even resembles a pleasant evening. But wish them one anyway.

SEVENTEEN

If you’re going to complain about trivial tasks you are asked to do as part of being an intern, don’t trust this to someone within the agency. It’s never a good look, no matter how much they empathise with you. Always be modest in this respect. And never, NEVER describe a task as “tedious” when someone has the gentle kindness to inquire how you’re doing.

EIGHTEEN

The pay will be shit. Deal with it. In my opinion, this is a test of your passion (and budgeting skills). If you can’t survive on the paycheck you’re getting, get a part-time weekend job.

NINETEEN

Sooner or later, you’ll hit the metaphorical fork in the road where you decide whether or not to get involved in the office politics. Try to avoid for as long as possible. If you do, remain as impartial as possible.

TWENTY

Office gossip: collect as much as you want, just don’t be the source of it. It’s fun, I’ll admit, but not worth the crappy consequences. You’ll be surprised at who’s loyal to who and who’s connected to who.

TWENTY-ONE

Attitude is everything. A smile when people enter your office is loved. A groan or a sigh when brochure/mailer work is given to you is not.

TWENTY-TWO

Careful about the bosses you try to impress. You’ll have two. The Creative Director and the Managing Director. In a large agency, you’re probably not going to have much to do with the MD but in a small agency, you’re likely to run into him/her now and again. These two people will have different work ethics. Example: one CD once told my Art Director and I that he didn’t care when we came into the office, as long as the work got done. This led to a couple of times where we sauntered into the office around 11am. The CD didn’t care, but the MD raises an eyebrow to this stuff. Bottom line: who actually does the hiring?

TWENTY-THREE

Always give them more than they asked for. If they want 20 concepts by Friday, go for 40. I once heard about a intern creative team who went into a major car brand creative meeting with one idea. Try not to impale yourself on that end of the spectrum. 

Opportunity or, Catching Lizards In The Shower.

Yesterday I opened my eyes after a rather nice sleep at 8:30am.

Lazily, you know?

Like when you wake up without the alarm, the morning sun is streaming through and you hear the birds chirping and all that.

And you settle your head on the pillow and reflect over how rested you feel.

“WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!”

Now, I’ve read about blood-curdling screams in horror stories but this was the first time I’ve actually experienced such a feeling. I shot up and out of bed as if I were spring-loaded, wide-eyed and disturbed.

I could picture Norman Bates dressed up as his dead mother stabbing the hell out of my flatmate, Zena in the shower.*

“ZENA! WHAT’S WRONG?”

“WAAAAAAAHHHHHHH HAAAAAAAA!”

“ZENA! PUT ON A TOWEL AND OPEN THE DOOR! WHAT’S WRONG?!”

“IT’S A LIZARD! AAAAAAAAAHHHHHH HHHHAAAAAA”

Bloody hell…

Door opened, she scrambled out; crying and hyperventilating like she’d been smacked in the face.

After calming the poor girl down, I strode into the bathroom and went after that lizard in very much the same way we should all be going for the great opportunities that we run into all the time.

Much like we unexpectedly encounter lizards in showers in Malaysia.

The usual scenario is an opportunity scuttles into view and our first impression of it is ‘scary’. And so we tend run from it (sometimes screaming or crying).

The fact is that opportunities will almost always appear to us in this way; disguised as a off-putting challenge, an intimidating obstacle or an undesirable, uninteresting task.

This ranges from a product you wouldn’t look twice at with an advertising budget you wouldn’t look once at, to a contest to design an ergonomically creative felt-tip pen to appeal to 5 year-old girls, to a entire city, ravaged by natural disaster beyond simple repair.

I already spoke earlier about natural instincts we have that hinder creative and personal development…

As a single mind, we look at tasks like those above and cringe and squirm at how difficult and not-comfortable they sound.

Doing something new and exciting (you just don’t know it yet) is always difficult and uncomfortable,  but I’ve found it’s not until you peel back the layers that you find your motivation and see the opportunity for yourself.

Which is why we should take anything that comes our way and not reject it until we’ve embraced it and made a proper judgement about whether it’s a good opportunity or not, and try not to grab our towels right away and scramble out of the bathroom, crying.

Face each new thing (what ever is may be) with optimism and confidence and you can’t go wrong; you’ll snag those opportunities and turn them into something great.

Sometimes, whether you pursue the opportunity or not, it’s a slippery little thing that you just can’t get a proper hold on and will escape your clutches and go scattering out the open window.

No use crying when this happens, just lock the door, have your morning shower in peace and continue on.