LIFE MOVES PRETTY FAST...

My Marathon - can you help?

I posted on here earlier this year that I wanted to do a marathon before I (gulp) turn 40 next year. 

There was a charity that I decided I wanted to support. It's called Winston's Wish and it helps young children dealing with the death of a parent or sibling. There was a very personal reason for wanting to run for this particular charity. 2 years ago Ben Brooks-Dutton was out on a Sunday afternoon with his wife and son. Totally normal Sunday, nothing out of the ordinary. When a passing car suddenly lost control, mounted the pavement and killed his wife Desreen in front of them. I remember reading about the accident and crying about the thought of how cruel life can be. Then I found out that Desreen was the best friend of one of our great NCT buddies and that Jackson their little boy was at nursery with lots of our friend's children. Ben started blogging (Life as a Widower) as a way to deal with his grief. The blog gained a huge following and was in fact turned into a book It's Not Raining Daddy It's Happy. I asked Ben if any charities had helped him and Jackson and he said that Winston's Wish had been unbelievably brilliant. 

I did the Amsterdam Marathon last weekend. And it was really really hard. At one point I contemplated locking myself in the porta-loo. But the thought of the charity made me finish it. 

I would love to increase the amount raised. 

If you would like to help the Just Giving page is open until the end of 2014. 

Many thanks 

Amelia Torode's Just Giving Page for Winston's Wish. 

TEDx "brands on the brain"

When I was first asked to do a TEDx I really wanted to say no. 

It's the pressure of the mantra "Ideas Worth Spreading." It weights heavy. I was absolutely wracked with doubt - were my ideas big enough? Were any of them worth sharing, were any of them worth spreading? I've been feeling that quite a lot recently. It might well be one of the reasons that I have found it quite hard to blog recently.  Was what I was writing about going to add to the conversation? Would it make anyone think/smile/comment? If not, what was the point. Back in 2006 when I started blogging it was a way of sharing early ideas and thoughts and using the community to help shape and refine them. Now I tend to use Twitter for that and if I have a really "big idea" that I want to share I tend to write it up for a publication like Campaign, PR Week or the Holmes Report. What it has made me realise is that in the past I shared a lot more than I do know. I used to really enjoy it. It is something that I need to start leaning into and doing again. 

Anyway, Mark who I sit next to at work persuaded me that I might just have something interesting to say for 12 minutes on "the magic of brands." (My brief from the TEDx organizing committee)

12 minutes is a perfect length of time. When I was at VCCP we started a weekly session called Curious when we would get external speakers in to come and talk to the whole agency. We told them that they had 13 minutes as I remembered reading that Chris Anderson had said that it's long enough that you have to prepare, you can't wing it but not long enough that you can really bore anyone too much. 

I did more prep for that 12 minutes than any other speach that I have ever given. So many people were so hugely helpful - Mark Choueke, Pete Trainor, Rory Sutherland, Kevin Murray and Jeremy Bullmore in particular gave me more of their time that they needed to. 

I knew that I wanted to talk about what happens inside the brain when people choose brands. I do think that brands have a rather magical effect on the brain and body. What I needed was help understand neuroscience and some examples. 

Jeremy started me off with some writing that he had done for WPP called Plonk and Placebo (really worth reading!) He had found a study from 1981 in the British Medical Journal in which researchers had found that branding increased the efficacy of analgesic painkillers by 30%. The team took identical tablets and placed one in an unbranded box, the other in a branded box. Jeremy writes: " Their findings were clear, significant and have never been challenged. To the pain relief contributed by the active ingredient, Branding added over 30%. The packaging itself (widely advertised and extremely familiar) had a consistent and measurable beneficial effect. The study confirmed what many suspected: when ordinary people claim to find widely publicised products more effective than generic equivalents, they’re not being conned by snake-oil salesmen. They’re right."

With that as my starting point, the rest of the talk (horlicks, cola, ice cream, baby carrots, turkey, wine) followed quite easily. 

This was my opening example: 

If you were to drink a cup of Horlicks in Hyderabad something very different would happen to you than if you were to drink a cup of Horlicks in Hackney. In India you would feel full of energy, ready to face whatever the day threw at you. In India Horlicks is the number 1 energy drinks brand. If you were in the UK you’d be settling down, warm and comfortable ready for a soothing night's sleep - the product puts you to sleep.

In both India and England, Horlicks is exactly the same product - a malted, milk-based powder.

One product.

One name.

But two brands in two countries, two sets of brand expectations and as a result two totally different sets of physical results.

I would argue that people’s expectation of the brand changed the experience and performance of the product.

I believe that expectations change experiences....

..........................

This is the YouTube of the event. In the Playlist I am number 3. I hope that you enjoy it. 

  

 

 

If you want to read the speech rather than watch it, this is an adaption I wrote for the Holmes Report. 

Google Glass - my first reactions

I was at a meeting and dinner with the lovely folks from Innovation Social last night.

Innovation Social is a gang of London-based Innovation Directors/Strategy Directors/Makers/Do-ers. We meet every so often and have field trips. In the past we've done the YouTube studios, Ravensbourne and Mother/The Trampery. Last night we went to Digitas/LBi to hear about their Astra Zeneca initiative the Digital Innovations Group. One of the Innovation Social guys turned up wearing Google Glass. And it made me feel really odd. So odd in fact that it nudged me out of my blogging-inertia and inspired me to try and capture what my initial feelings actually were. 

It's amazingly disconcerting. Now that might just be because it's something new and unexpected but I think that it went deeper than that. Couple of initial reactions to it - first, its changes the way that you look at a person because it is so prominent on their eyes, you can see straight into their eyes, there's this hulking piece of coloured plastic getting in the way, and that feels odd. Eyes being windows to the soul and all that. Secondly it's disconcerting because you don't know what the Glass wearer is actually doing. They might be fully focused and engaged with you, they might be checking their work agenda for next week, they might be checking their train times home, they might be videoing you or taking photos of you but you just don't know. And that feels odd. It felt less odd when we were actually having a meeting because I think that we're all used to multi tasking discretely (I know we shouldn't!) whether its tweeting, checking texts or emails etc. But at the dinner afterward it felt like the wearer was always one step removed from actually being in the moment. From an etiquette perspective it felt like Glass should be removed when you are sitting down with friends for dinner. 

Nate who works at Google has been wearing Glass for two weeks now. He says that he has had to get used to people starring and doing double-takes and also (shock horror!) talking to him on the tube. People regularly come up to him even when he is wearing headphones wanting to talk to him about Google Glass and try it on. Everyone is fascinated. The waiter in our Brick Lane curry house couldn't wait to try them on, but he had never heard of Google Glass, he had no idea what they were. Nate says that where the glasses have been invaluable have been with his young children so that he can take photos and videos far more easily and far more in the moment than with a camera or a phone. He also talked about the fact that he found the Innovation Social meeting location using maps on Glass as opposed to maps on a smartphone. 

I tried them on and you do see the world differently. 

It is such early days when it comes to this technology but from my inital exposure to it, it raised a lot of questions and feelings that I wasn't expecting. And it actually made me feel very uncomfortable. 

Part Time Power List

Delighted to say that I am part of Timewise Part Time Power List which was published in the FT on December 5th. I am really pleased that there is such a wide-ranging group of senior professionals who are demonstrating that the world of work does not need to run on a traditional and old-fashioned Monday-Friday model. 

These kinds of lists show companies that it is perfectly possible to work in modern, more flexible and smarter ways. I have blogged before about my views on the subject of Smart Time working Vs Part Time work, which I still think still sounds pejoritative ("she's a part-timer really...")

This was my fav tweet.   I like the fact that in other power lists you have to give up something to be on it, this is a list that celebrates winning at life. Not sure if that sums up my world, but I like the sentiment. 

Thank you Chime and The Good Relations Group who have supported me so much both pre and post babies. It takes a trusting company to make jobs like mine possible. 

 

This is the article: 

Running

I started running in 2003. I was emotionally exhausted from a boyfriend break-up and had just moved into a small one bedroom appartment on the Lower East Side in New York. As part of my post-break up get back my life I decided that I wanted to run. I'd been reasonably sporty in the past but had never really seen the point of running, though watching the New York marathon in November 2001 from the rooftop of my Williamsburg home I was almost moved to tears. So I took a decision, I started running. 

At first I was really dreadful, I think that I could probably get to about 15 minutes before I had to stop but every morning before work I would put on my knackered old traininers and go down to the river and run, each day a little bit further. Then suddenly I realised that I could run for half an hour, then an hour and then I entered a 10k race in Central Park. It was one of those beautiful Spring mornings that New York does so well and it all came together for me on that race and I did it in 46:05, a really good time. 

Then I joined found Toby Tanser the head coach of the New York Flyers and joined a running club. I did speedwork every Tuesday evening and through the coaching I recieved (and a lot of runs) I found that I was getting more and more addicted/enamored of running. I did my first marathon in Philadelphia in 2004 and did it in 3:40. I did New York the year after, not so good 4:05 but respectable. I did a ton of half marathons too. And then I moved back to London, got married, new job, had one kid and then a second and suddenly its been years since I ran seriously. 

Time, or rather lack of it, is always the convenient excuse that we all give when it comes to explaining why we aren't doing something. I think that I need to stop using time as an excuse. Eugene our youngest turns 2 next month - nights are fine; I have settled into a new role at work and actually it feels like the right time to re-start something that I love, running. 

Last weekend I signed up to do a 10k and I did it in 51:50, not amazing but given its a decade after my previous PB (Personal Best) I am really proud. So next year is my back to health/back to running year. I'm going to sign up to run New York again in the autumn and have mapped out the selection of races that I need to do to get me to time that I can be happy about. 

I have read that if you publically share a goal, it focuses you and ensures that you really try and do it. 

So here we go, in 2014 I will race: 1 x marathon, 3 x half marathons, 6 x 10k and 1 x 5k. 

Wish me luck...

CANNES: Lessons from the London 2012 - The Game-Changing Games

I am enormously excited. I fly out to Cannes this weekend with Jackie Brock-Doyle, our new CEO at The Good Relations Group, Dan Brooke from Channel 4, Ade Adepitan paralmypic althete and journalist and Jon Ridgeon Olympian and founder of Fast Track. They will be talking on the opening day of the Cannes about Lessons Learnt From The Game-Changing Games with a specific focus on the Paralmypic Games. I think that from a marketing and creativity perspective the story around the Paralympics may actually be even more interesting than those of the Olympics themselves. 

How to position them Vs the Olympics? Could you use humour in tackling disability head on? Could they really be a commercial success story?

The C4 ad Meet The Superhumans was my ad of 2012. Everytime I see it my heart stops, its a superb piece of creative work. 

If you are out in Cannes do try and make the session or get in touch via Twitter (@amelia_torode) and say hi. 

Good Relations are the only PR agency to be talking on the main stage at Cannes. It's a massive honour and there's a really important story to share, one that I don't believe has been fully told yet.  

 

 

Smart Time Working not Part Time Working!

I have been thinking about this a lot recently probably because of my current obsession, Lean In. 

Earlier this year I went to an event that Anna Rafferty (Penguin Digital MD) put on for Seth Godin's new book. One of the things that he said there really hit home, (and I paraphrase) "In this globalized economy there will always be somebody who is willing to do your job and work longer hours for less money. "  The point being that if you make it all about the hours that you work, you will always lose. In fact it is impossible to win. You have to make it about the impact that you have. not the hours that you work. 

Today I had lunch with another brilliant woman, Kathryn Parsons of Decoded fame (and Veuve Cliquot Young Businesswoman of the Year 2013) where we talked about a million different things but one of them was what happens when women have kids and potentially want to decrease the number of hours that they work a week. As I was talking to her it suddenly hit me how much I hate the term "part-time" to describe what I do. I do a four day week but like every other professional working mum that I know the focus and dedication that I have during those 4 days (and evenings) means that I achieve more in those 4 days than I ever used to in 5.

The descriptor "part-time" is just wrong.

Take Nicola Mendelsohn for example. Nicola has worked a 4 day week for the past 15 years and is now taking up an EMEA role at Facebook on a 4 day week and I bet there's absolutely nothing "part-time" about her approach, ambition and determination.

Maybe it's time for a new descriptor of those of us who work shorter weeks? "Compressed-Time"? " Condensed-Time"? Not sure what the right words are, but "part-time" is just plain wrong.

EDITED over-night:

I think that a 4 day week should be considered: "Smart-Time" working, not "Part-Time" working

Does the PR world care about SXSW?

In the advertising world the interactive festival SXSW (South By South West) has acquired a status as a cooler Cannes, a more democratic TED.  But it appears not to have resonated so much with the PR world. At SXSW this year there were 31,000 people including inventors, professors, tech start ups, a lot of clients and, according to the IPA, about 150-200 UK agency folk, but I did not meet a single UK PR professional. 

When I asked clients why they had flown to Texas they gave the same answer: technology is turning their industries upside down so in order to to help shape the direction of their brands they wanted to be much better informed about the leading edge of innovation.

So where were the PR professionals?

Is it that it's just too expensive for PR agencies to cover the costs? But saying that, I did AIR B&B and stayed in a cheap apartment and not a swanky hotel and flew over economy so actually the costs weren't that high. 

Is it that its not seen as relevant to anyone's day job, so it's hard to justify? If that's the case, that's pretty sad. In my opinion SXSW is the one global event where the world of brands, products and services, technology and marketing collide. Attending something like this is a way to raise eyes up from the day job into the near-future. It's a chance to think hard thoughts about where our world, and our clients and our industry is heading. I found it to be invaluable, but it worries me that so few of the PR industry made the trip out. 

If you work in PR in the UK, did you head out to Austin? If you did, what did you think?

Lessons the PR World Can Learn From Advertising

I am a PR newbie. Though the kind of work that I got excited about when I was at VCCP people told me was "sort of PR" - initiatives like blogger outreach programs for o2 way back in 2007, special non-advertising projects for Unilever and social media work for Aleskandr the meerkat. In fact the planning methology that we developed at VCCP which asked these specific questions "Why would I talk about/blog about/tweet about this idea", "how can I participate in this idea" and "what keeps the conversation going" are actually all (I find out now) classic types of PR questions. But the fact remains until January of this year I had never actually worked properly in a PR agency. 

I now divide my working week between a central strategy and innovation role at Chime and a Board role at the newly formed Good Relations Group. Its the space where Digital meets Advertising meets PR which facinaties me most and where I think that the future of our industry lies. There are so many cross-pollination lessons that each of these disciplines can learn from each other but I thought that I would start with what the PR world can learn from the advertising world. 

I think that it is a result of structural issues in the PR world namely that everyone does everything instead of traditionally either allowing for specialisms or T-shaped people. So on the whole most agencies don't have planners, suits or creatives. One person does all of it they just move up the ladder of seniority. 

But its the different approach to creativity that has really struc me and to be honest PR agencies seem to be struggling a bit compared to their advertising counterparts. 

In my experience there are three elements that PR agencies need to focus on if they want to improve their creativity. I don’t think that the solution to our creativity crisis lies in simply hiring a creative director (although I actually do think that PR agencies need them). Rather, it lies in a culture shift towards Curiosity, Constraints and Conflict.

Creativity starts with a curious mindset. Without curiosity there can be no creativity. The most curious people are the most interesting, constantly collecting experiences and ideas from everywhere. They make unexpected connections because they are open, alert and plugged in. It’s the agency’s job to create a curious culture. The American documentary photographer Walker Evans said about curiosity: “Stare, pry, listen, eavesdrop. Die knowing something. You are not here long.” That sentiment should permeate everywhere.

The second thing to think about is constraints. Marissa Meyer, then head of user experience at Google, gave a talk at Stanford in which she said that creativity loves constraints. She was referring to technological constraints such as pixel size, file sizes and download speeds but Meyer makes a valid point about creativity generally. PR creativity suffers because it is unfocused. I was amazed to find out that, often, creative briefs are not written. How can you possibly know what problem you’re trying to solve without a proper, considered brief, complete with constraints?

What would have happened if Michelangelo had been told to paint whatever he wanted in the Sistene Chapel? Or if he had been told to paint the ceiling in order to cover up the cracks and damp or to paint the ceiling using red, green and blue? Those briefs don’t lead to much creativity. However when he was told to paint the ceiling in a way that inspired the audience to believe in the greater glory of God by bringing to life key bible stories then unprecedented creativity was unleashed. Constraining briefs unlock great creative ideas.

Finally, I think PR agencies need to embrace conflict more. Advertising agencies are filled with conflict. It doesn’t always make for a fun working environment, but it does make for better creative work. The triangular structure of ad agencies (suits, planners, creatives) means that everyone constantly faces internal battles which sharpens up ideas long before they are sold to clients. A bit of fear does wonders for an idea. PR agencies need more arguments and more balls.

One quote in the Creativity in PR study read: “PR people are fearful pleasers and wimps. Instead of fighting, we whine. It’s easier.” I agree. 2013 has to be the year that the PR industry ups its game creatively and takes the fight to the advertising world and beyond.

It’s never been a more exciting time to be a creative obsessive in the PR industry. 

 

The Modern Brief

Last year the IPA Strategy Group put on an event at the ICA called "The Modern Brief". It was based out of some research that we conducted with Planning Directors across the UK which showed the anxiety surround what we have taken to call "the modern brief" - realtime, participatory, multi platform, cross-channel (you get the gist!) At the 2012 event we gathered together some of the UK's finest minds from ad agencies, media agencies and communications groups and they talked about their perspective. You can find all those presentations at the IPA website and I really encourage you to refresh yourselves as there are some smart and very actionable thoughts and ideas.

After thet event the Strtaegy Group thought that it the debate would become far more complete if we invited some key clients in to give us their view. This event is taking place at Google on Thursday 25th Jan. We have a hugely impressive line up. Tickets are not expensive and there's a special offer if you bring a client with you.

If you do go, come and say hello!

Why the IPA Search grads are the Chief Strategy Officers of tomorrow

A while back the IPA asked me to deliver the graduation keynote to the grads who had completed the IPA Search Summer School. They asked me to talk to them about the future and my advice for their careers moving forward.

One of my many learnings from my WPP mentor Jeremy Bullmore is to treat every audience regardless of level with time and respect. So I sat down and did some serious thinking about the world of Search and the skills that I thought the discipline unlocked.

This is where I netted out - I think that these Search grads are the Chief Strategy Officers of tomorrow.

Why do I think that?

This slide tries to sum up why:

In a nutshell I think that the grads who are immersed in the world of Search have a better understanding of Brands, Technology, People and Culture than anyone else in the agency world.

The old traditional view of a Planner is someone who understands the consumer and represents them as the agency develops work. This could be done through focus groups, research panel information, ethnographic studies etc. But the fact is that its through the words that people type into Google that give you the best sense of a brand's health. Search terms capture people's inner-most feelings in a way that focus groups never do. So these grads have their finger on the pulse in an utterly unparalleled way.

So keep an eye out for the IPA Search Grads of 2012 and if you have a Search division in your agency and you don't know the guys who are working there, then make it your new years resolution to go and take them out for coffee and find out more about what they do and what they think.

My bet is that you'll be talking to a CSO of tomorrow.

How to pitch and win - lessons from London 2012

I love pitches.

I love the adrenaline.

I love the tension.

I love the brutal focus on a client problem and  the relentless concentration on a strategic and creative solution.

I love working out how best to tell the story that sells the strategy and creative ideas.

I've wanted to meet David Magliano since reading the chapter on the London 2012 bid in Jon Steel's excellent book, Perfect Pitch (best book I have read on how to pitch and win) David's pitch strategy for the bid is a world-class example. He talked at an event at the IPA on the 27th as part of their "Pitching Legends" series. What a speaker! If you ever get the chance to go and hear him talk move mountains to do so - you really won't regret it.

I am going to try and encapsulate his story and share what I took out.

The first thing that David asked the audience to do was to think about the audience, the members of the IOC. He wanted us to put themselves in their shoes. He then showed us the first 30' of each potential host cities opening video - Paris, Rio, Madrid, Moscow, New York and finally London. Each video felt like a love story to a city - beautiful, stirring, emotional. Expansive cityscape shots, fly over views and smiling friendly people. London on the other hand started with footage of a sprinter at the beginning of a race and then showed the story going backwards to that moment when as young child in Africa this boy was inspired by grainy footage that he was seeing on a TV screen of London 2012. This wasn't a film selling a city, this was a film selling a vision - a vision of using the power of a London games to inspire young people all over the world to choose sport, a vision of re-connecting the ideals of the Olympic movement to millions of young people and a vision of legacy. It dramatized a problem and showcased a solution.

It still amazes me that so often agencies still choose to start their pitch with their credentials, Magliano calls it "the plumbing." He said "I trust that you have offices in the right place." Get to the heart of your thought right from the start, build that emotional connection from the outset, show you understand the problem, demonstrate empathy and understanding and then work from there.

The London 2012 bid script was so tight, each word was important. not a single word was extraneous. There was one phrase in particular that I just loved: "As leaders we have a duty to reach beyond our own time and borders." It's beautiful, like poetry even. It also makes the audience feel that its not a choice between cities, its a vote for the belief in the lasting legacy that the Games can bring. "What city," they asked, "has the vision that best serves the Olympic vision?"

In the Q&A David was asked how they could prove that London was more likely to inspire young people than New York or Paris. David's response was fascinating. "We didn't have to prove it because no-one else claimed it." I asked whether any other city had a similar singled minded thought that there pitch was based on, he said no and that they all  had multiple messages and all sold the city, not an aspiration.

Some other take outs - Authentic stories not just research facts: Seb's story of being 12 and being taken in a school hall to watch the Mexico City Olympics was hugely moving because it was authentic and because it turned Seb into a walking case study of what the London 2012 team were hoping to achieve around the world. Seb also talked about the fact that his heros were Olympics, "my children's heros change every month." Every parents or grandparent in the IOC must have been nodding along. 'But we must understand and respond to their world."

Know your audiences and tailor your messages: On the night before the bid the London 2012 team had a list of the floating voters (mainly the South Americans) who they needed to convert. Blair took a suite on the 55th floor of the convention centre and as each floating voter was coming up in the lift, he was being texted to say what hot buttons to push. Did this IOC member care most about the legacy in the UK of their particular sport, were they passionate about sustainability, did their grandchild just want a kick around with Beckham. They had all the options covered.

Ownership: Let one person write the script of the pitch, the "narrative arch", rather than each presenter write their own little bit and then worry how to piece it together. Its one story, with different parts voiced by different people. Think of it like a script for a play.

It was a night of illuminating anecdotes about the pitch - for example, when London and Paris when back into the conference hall to find out the result there were 57 photographers stationed in front of the Parisian team and only 3 in front of the London team, apparently in some TV footage you see photographers fighting and scrambling to get over to get pictures of the victors, so utterly convinced was everyone that Paris had won. David talked about the fact that they used images of Tony and Cherie Blair at the opening ceremony of the Athens 2004 Games, because Chirac and Bush had both decided that post 2001 the security risks were too great and had not gone. Simply by showing this image as part of a much longer film the IOC were being subtly reminded that GB was always an active supporter of the Olympic movement. Fascinating. Final anecdote, the strategy about inspiring a generation actually came out of an insight into a business problem that the IOC had, namely an aging TV viewing population which was less attractive for broadcasters and advertisers, so originally the strategy had been to get more young people watch the Games than ever before. It was Seb who made the strategic leap to say that actually its not about getting young people viewing, its about getting young people viewing.

I will find out if the event was videoed and post a link if it was.

Great night!

 

Don Draper and the art of pitching

I was running a "behind the scenes in advertising" mentoring session today with a group of sixth form students. I really enjoy doing things like this, it reminds me why I love the industry I am in. It is so easy to get bogged down in the day to day, the niggles and the frustrations that occur in our world of advertising/media/PR etc but when you have to tell a smart bunch of teenagers, who smell bullshit from 100m, what it is that is that makes your chosen profession so exciting it forces you to look up from your desk and remember the good bits. And there are so many good bits!

One of the things that we covered in our session today was presenting and how to engage an audience and tell stories that sell - sell a strategy, an idea or a campaign. One of the students presented to us and to illustrate his point he said, "you know that feeling when you have priority boarding on an aeroplane and you walk past everyone else in the queue and you just feel so special and a bit smug. That's the feeling that we want to bring to life." We just sat there nodding because we all know that feeling. And half the battle of any pitch type presentation is getting your audience onside and nodding. I was trying to think of the best example to give to the students and I still think that the Don Draper "Carousel" example is one of the very best examples that I can think of.

If you haven't seen it recently, take a look again. It's pitch genius.

 

 

Ferran Adria's top 10 tips for innovation

A lot of people tweeted me asking whether I could condense the Ferran Adria post into a top 10 tips list.

Based from Ferran's story I have pulled out what I think to be the key recommendations for any creative organization looking to be world leading. Hope that you find them useful. If I was starting an agency tomorrow these would certainly be my checklist:

 

1. Don’t chase short-term cash without a long-term vision
2. Make the time to reflect and think
3. The journey is not done when you’re number 1, that’s when its time to change
4. Make sure that your physical space is flexible enough to move and change with you
5. Do everything to avoid falling into routines
6. Bring in “agitators” from outside to push your creativity and thinking
7. Being creative doesn’t give you license to be an arse, you still have to take out the trash
8. Work out how your organization can function at its most efficient
9. Don’t sign away creative freedom for the sake of money
10. But always remember at the end of the day, it has to be about making money!

Ferran Adria and the power of innovation

It started with a question about Cannes. "If you could bring anyone in the world to Cannes deliver a keynote, who would you bring?" We'd been talking about the superstar speakers that had appeared recently - the likes of Bill Clinton, Kofi Annan, Bob Geldof, will.i.am (ok, so will.i.am might be pushing the "superstar speaker" descriptor, but you know what I mean)

My dream keynote, I said, would be someone from outside of Adland who would talk about innovation and creativity. The expression I think I used at the time was "science and magic" because to my mind that is the key combination that our industry needs. The person that I thought best encasulated that was Ferran Adria of El Bulli fame. Not that I actually knew an awful lot about him, it was more of the impression of the man gleaned from the incredible tales of his molecular gastromomy and ancedotes such as his closing of El Bulli right at the absolute height of its worldwide fame.

So when I got invited by Telefonica to be part of an audience with Ferran Adria at their start up accelerator Wayra I was enormously excited. I went with a Spanish foodie friend of mine who was quite possibly even more excited than I was. Everything was set up for a great evening. But you know what, it wasn't great. It was so much better than great.

Ferran told a story in three parts: the first was about El Bulli and what occurred there and why; his new Foundation and Bullipedia, the online gastronomic website that he is in the process of building.

I will tell you the story that he told, as far as possible I will try and use his words (I was noting like crazy) but if not then I will paraphrase and hope people don't mind: 

Right from the start E Bulli was only ever open 6 months a year but that's hardly surprising when you think that we were a restaurant located on the Spanish Costa Brava, a holiday coast where tourists simply didn't come to in the winter. So we had no choice in the matter. For the first 14 years El Bulli did not make money, but we believed in something. When success came it was hugely important for us to make time to refect and think, afterall if you don't make that time then you'll never reflect and think. So we decided to close at lunchtime. We lost the equivalent of £6m a year. But it was necessary. Then we decided to get rid of the menu. It got to the point when we had 2 million requests a year for reservations, which was also the point that we knew that we had to change. I said to the press that we were going to take a 3 year sabbatical. And do you know, no-one seemed to believe that we just needed some time out to focus back on creativity. No-one understood when we announced that we were going to launch a new restaurant which would also be a creative foundation and centre. They all thought we were crazy. But that is exactly what we are launching in Cap de Creus. The space will be utterly flexible, think of it like a film set, you're meant to move it all around and change it. We don't want anyone to fall into a routine. So we do things like change the pencils that we use every single year.

We will have three distinct spaces in our new centre - one for reflection, one for brainstorming and one for worksharing in which we will invite in "agitators" from other disciplines around the world to come and give us their point of view. This is about creating dialogue with other disciplines. The whole centre will be sustainable in every way possible, we want to be a reference for the world. We also want to create the most efficient environment possible. Just because you are creative, it's not like it's a divine right. You still have to be efficient. I really admire McDonalds in the way that they function. We take out the trash, we clean the kitchen. But we are also creative. Also I want to think about how best people work  - are you more efficient if you work 5 days and then have 2 days off, or are you better working 10 days and then having 4? Are you better in the morning or the evening? In a group or solo? We need to consider all of that.

We are also creating "Bullipedia" as an online gastronomic resource where you can learn with precision, accumulate knowledge and get inspired. You can think of it like a curated search engine, I like to think of it like a neat and tidy cupboard with a lot of drawers. It will not be sponsored as we want to have absolute freedom, I want to make the decisions. People will pay for it but we are working out the payment model, it's not fair that a young chef pays the same as a large corporation so we are looking at how this will work at the moment. It has to be economically sustainable, that's what the internet revolution has to be about. It's not about giving everything away for free.

It's impossible to do Adria justice with my re-telling of us story. But there are so many elements that I think are hugely inspriational and also hugely applicable for our industry, here are my 5 key take-outs: 

1. Take time to reflect and think  (given the Ferris Beuller quote that this blog is named after, that should be a surprise that I agreee so whole-heartedly with that sentiment)
2. Be prepared to forego short term gains for longer terms success.
3. When designing work spaces flexibility is key- keep changing.
4. Being creative does not mean you're allowed to be an arse.
5. Bring external "agitators" in otherwise you fall into the expected.

I will try and find out if Wayra have a video of the talk that I can post up here.