Tag: culture - Page 4

It's Saturday and as reluctant as Brandon Reviere and myself are to be working away in the office, we both have decided that this is what we needed to do to find the next 'Marketing Eye'.

Brandon is our incredibly talented Art Director in Atlanta and is instrumental in deciding who the two new team members in the Atlanta office are going to be.

We have done a few interviews over the past day, and there are a few things that we both would love to share.

Interviews are a two-way street

If you have taken the time to come to a job interview, be prepared. As much as you want to learn about us, we want to learn about you. "By the questions you ask, you learn more about the company and yourself than about the interviewee," says Brandon Reviere. "You find out what you want in that person and how your company presents itself."

The next 12-months is going to be incredibly different for people who work at Marketing Eye. After years of working hard at establishing a product and service that is unsurpassed by industry standards, driven by technology, systems and processes, we are now working tirelessly on how to build the right culture going forward.

There have been many hit and misses and lots of unnecessary frustration, but finally I think as a team we have hit the nail on the head and I am about to test it to the enth degree.

Flat Organizational Structure

Weaning employees off hierarchy-driven decision making has been a test of both patience and perseverance. Gen-Y's have been told that they need leadership in order to be successful, yet some of the most successful companies in the world, like Google, are saying quite the opposite. Their investment in a flat organizational structure has not only shown dividends on the balance sheet, but it has created a workplace and culture that the world-over admires and respects.

As seen on LinkedIn:

When examining our culture at Marketing Eye, one idea usually sticks out at people; that is, our stance on bad ideas. Taking a unique approach (remembering nothing we do here is status quo), I encourage my team to share their ideas daily; the great, the good and the terrible.

Why? Because I truly believe there is value in bad ideas.

If you look in to the journey behind the biggest accomplishments in the world, they’re full of bad ideas. In fact, it’s the mishaps, the arduous trial and error procedure that leads to greatness. A bad idea simply paves the way for a new and improved one. Bad ideas are often discouraged and quickly discounted as failures, but in reality, they identify solutions.

I need my team; from the marketing managers to the interns, to feel that they have an open forum to exchange their ideas with ease; we are, after all, a creative company. And during a consultancy, our marketing managers will implore our clients to lay all of their ideas on the table. And often we find gold from the very idea our clients are hesitant to tell us.

What I know - when you shut down the idea on bad ideas, you close it on future good ones too.

As a person who has employed hundreds of people in my career, I am always amazed at how some people stand out from the crowd, while other's don't.

In today's work environment where work, life balance seems to take precedence, and the millennials and gen-y are looking for more than their predecessors who were mainly happy to be gainfully employed and on a career path that funded their lifestyle - it appears that fewer employees are seeking to be outstanding. They are looking for more than just to be an outstanding employee, but rather a career that is fulfilling, balanced and with the right perks to help them get the outcomes financially they are looking for in their lifetime.

Now, this is not a bad thing. As you get older, you realise that you only live once. This new way of thinking and the younger generation putting life first and career second, can only benefit generations to come.

Where the real problem lies in the blurred line between how to advance your career or how best to maintain your status quo in the workplace.

Landed in Atlanta, and within minutes and I am getting the run-down on what's going on in the office. Clients are happy, new brands are being launched, marketing campaigns executed, clients acquired in January have been on-boarded, moved to a new office within our building because of our continued fast growth and a new employee has started.

It's no secret that our Atlanta team is the highest performing marketing team I have ever worked with. As a team, they are game-changers. They see things that other's don't and communicate creatively and insightfully our clients brands in a way that resonates with their target market.

Winning is part of the culture. Each member doesn't know how to lose. They push each other to perform at a level that blows my mind and are forward thinkers. I never have to ask if something has been done - because it was finished yesterday.

The other day, a few of us from the Marketing Eye team were at a client meeting and they mentioned that they buy all of their employees an ipad for Christmas.

You should have seen my employees faces! They were green with envy. It was as if they had all been given ferraris.

I thought to myself, "that's really cool" but not for a second did I think that they received something worth more than what my employees in Atlanta received. Perception is an unbelievable thing and more and more, companies are being encouraged to "buy" their employees happiness.

Many new age companies, with venture-backed operations offer:

It's an employees world - and don't I know it! I am not about to complain, but gosh, it's hard trying to be a leader and getting 100 percent of your employees engaged - all of the time!

#24yrold asked me the other day, "what can we do better?" 

I couldn't believe my ears!

With the constant issues many of my entrepreneur friends face with Gen-Y, and my own struggle with finding the right people for the right job, that are self-motivated and wanting to be exceptional at what they do - I find that my team rarely asks me for feedback other than in a performance review.

Working for a company is a two-way Street. It is not "what you can do for me" or "just about the money" - it's about together working as a team to achieve a common goal. When that goal is achieved, everyone celebrates and is rewarded through recognition and financial upside.

5 Ways Employees Can Step Up Their Game

Humbled by an employee discussion in our Atlanta office, I was pleasantly surprised that given the hypothetical situation of winning the lotto, all employees said that after a brief holiday, they would want to come back to work at Marketing Eye.

The engagement level on a day-to-day basis in our Atlanta office is very high – not to say, other offices are not the same. Company culture is everything and there are many reasons why it has a direct impact on bottom line.

There are a number of lessons learned from having a start-up in Atlanta that is inherently different from other offices we have.

The first being that all employees have chosen each other

Usually, a senior manager or myself makes the ultimate choice on who is going to join the team and in what capacity. Instead, in Atlanta, I have been over-ruled twice, and both times, I had to put my hand up and say that my choice would have been wrong for the team.

Creating the perfect culture is impossible if everyone is not on the same page. I always look at big banking firms investment banking arms and admire how hard everyone works, they get paid well, and at the end of the day or deal, they all go for a drink together. It's a culture to admire in many ways. Maybe not the unhealthiness of long hours, stress and then washing it away with alcohol, but more so the fact that they work as a team to achieve a result and then at the end of the day, can go out and enjoy themselves.