From our latest agency leadership podcast episode: Digital marketing agencies RocketMill and PMG reveal how their merger strengthened organisational culture and team retention, moving beyond traditional ESG principles and riding the Gartner Hype Cycle of acquisition excitement.

When RocketMill transitioned from an employee-owned trust to joining global agency PMG, they achieved something remarkable, improved employee retention, even after team members received their acquisition payouts.

"We didn't need to do a deal we wanted to, so it wasn't a deal born out of necessity," says Tom. "We were clear with the team that it was about opportunity creation and career enabling, but the notion of career headroom drove the decision."

"For the first six months, I'm not sure we lost anyone." Tom explains. "I think that curiosity played a large part in it. I think an understanding of the shared vision played a large part in it. And I think the fact that genuinely people could see that if you look at the portfolio of clients that PMG have, they represent some of the most iconic brands in the world."

PMG demonstrated their company culture commitment through strategic change management: "The head of people within PMG moved to London for four or five months with her family to be here on the ground with our team, to be with our people so that they understood. To ensure that they were heard, to ensure cultural sensitivity - it was just a very human thing to do."

Discover more insights about successful agency acquisitions on the Happy Teams podcast.

Digital agency StrategIQ earned a spot on the Sunday Times Best Places to Work list. On Happy Teams, CEO Andy revealed their employee engagement strategy, drawing from business principles found in books like "Traction" from Gino Wickman and concepts like Maslow's hierarchy of needs.

"Every business has to have a strong training culture. Every business has to have a wellbeing culture. You have to have a strong leadership team, have to have clear values," he says. But after an unsuccessful application last year, they discovered gaps in their workplace culture: "We hadn't put enough time and effort into things like, the package that's sat around the wellbeing and additional stuff that I think employees expect now."

The agency implements innovative team development through personality profiling and motivational mapping. "It helps us understand how to communicate with people that are opposite to you," Andy explains. "There's no right or wrong. It's just, we are who we are. It doesn't mean to say I'm a good communicator or a bad communicator if I'm red, I'm green or blue or yellow."

This organisational transparency shapes their company culture. "Everyone's profile is visible to everyone in the company in our staff room. We have a massive wall up, all dedicated to insights and everyone's profile is plotted on the wall," Andy says. "The language is really ingrained. Everyone, when they join, gets their own profile."

The employee engagement approach succeeded, StrategIQ achieved their Sunday Times listing. But Andy acknowledges their workplace culture isn't universal: "Being as transparent as we are and being as ambitious as we are, what I guess I think I've realised is there is a certain type of person that can come into the agency and handle this level of transparency, handle this level of intense coaching."

Discover how to build an award-winning company culture on Happy Teams, where Andy shares StrategIQ's complete transformation story.

On this week's business leadership podcast, David shares how digital consultancy Red Badger transformed their workplace culture when the pandemic forced remote work adaptation.

As a remote work case study, Red Badger's team had to reimagine their organisational culture. Here's what David learned about maintaining team engagement and company culture in a hybrid workplace model.

"Pre-pandemic, we were very much about being in person. Pretty much 5 days a week and by and large being on client site with our clients," David says. "Getting the work done was not a problem."

However, the shift to remote working began impacting their employee experience: "We've always been a company that has tried to listen to what our employees want and what they think is valuable. We were going into the lockdown, we were thankfully pretty well prepared. We very quickly basically said to everyone, go and buy whatever you need to get set up at home... which is actually something we've kept now - if you join us, you get a thousand pounds working from your home budget to make sure that you've got a really good ergonomic setup at home."

Drawing inspiration from Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, Dan Pink's research-based book on motivation in creative industries, David explains the importance of purpose, autonomy and mastery for driving productivity, rather than traditional carrot-and-stick approaches.

Red Badger responded by implementing a hybrid work model through workplace transformation and employee feedback. "We got together as a company and reflected on what we want the culture to be now? And how do we achieve that?" David explains. "That wasn't for everybody. We definitely had a bit of churn in implementing that. But I've always believed in saying, let's make a decision for what's right for the business."

Discover more remote work strategies and company culture insights on the Happy Teams podcast.

On this week's agency management podcast: Ed shares how 7DOTS' workplace culture evolved from its two-person founding team to the thriving digital agency it is today.

When Ed co-founded digital agency 7DOTS, their team culture strategy was straightforward: "Day one, we started the business. There were two of us. We were the company culture. And as we grew, as we brought more people on board, it's very much a top down approach to it."

The organisational culture shift came as the team development expanded: "When we got to 15 people, it's almost like the culture started to take on its own personality. The first time you find out that you've got WhatsApp groups that you're not part of... I certainly didn't take offense and I just thought, that's great. Because people are organising their own things."

This employee engagement success stems from Ed's focus on talent development: "Really understanding what people's strengths are really trying to bring those out. Not getting people to shy away from trying to develop the toolkits to, maybe where they have got weaknesses, but really empower people."

The employee retention rates prove their strong company culture: "We're 15 years in the making. At the start of October, we had three people pass the 10 year mark. There aren't many people I think in this day and age, particularly who hang around for 10 years."

Hear Ed's full story on building lasting agency culture on the Happy Teams podcast.

When Sam and Alana founded digital agency Thought Quarter in 2014, they started with "one major client that paid most of our bills, paid on time, and we had a small team of freelancers." By 2017, they knew this business model wasn't sustainable and decided to grow, but lacking agency management experience, they looked to bring in established talent.

"We thought what we really needed was a big shot from a big agency to come in and take care of us," Sam explains. "So we went to market, we found a couple of candidates, but there was this one candidate who was relocating from a really large, well known London agency." The senior hire turned disastrous, ultimately costing them over £250,000 in salary, lost business opportunities and projects.

The agency growth experience taught them that "there's no substitute for a founder's leadership and clear vision," Sam reflects. "The mistake we made was to try and bring somebody in to do it for us. If you're going to grow a business, you need to do it. You need to drive it." This mindset shift extended to how they view success and failure, Sam references SpaceX celebrating a rocket not exploding as an example of how failure can be an essential part of the improvement process.

This business transformation came just as Covid hit in 2021, when their agency revenue dropped below their first month as a company. Rather than give up, they used it as an opportunity to rebuild: "What we had in front of us was a perfect opportunity to just reevaluate what we were doing, why we were doing it and how we were doing it."

Today, Thought Quarter has refined its business model to focus on the energy transition sector, working on decarbonisation and renewable energy projects. As Sam puts it: "We're constantly refining the services that we offer so that we're doing higher value services that solve more complex problems for a smaller number of clients. And that's what really excites me about the direction that we're going in at the moment."

Listen to more agency leadership insights on the Happy Teams Podcast.

During the pandemic lockdown, agency owner and digital marketing expert Nathan Lomax faced the challenge of virtual networking, conducting an overwhelming number of video calls. "At one stage, I was having 400 conversations a month. I had a super militant process of 20 calls a day, 30 minutes of time, 10 hours back to back," he recalls.

His business networking solution was simple: "The idea was to create a lunch, but in London that would allow us to have 40, 50 meaningful conversations, albeit in a two hour slot over lunch." This initial success led his agency Quickfire to pioneer in-person marketing events, scaling to host 45 professional networking events.

"The cost of running that amount of events comes to about £250,000 a year," Nathan shares. "So we said, okay, we will work with the ecosystem of partners, to sponsor. And so we will go to the tech partners. We'll organise it. We'll book it. We'll sort it."

The event marketing investment delivered solid ROI for the digital agency. "I've got 102 active deals in the last 80 days. We're booked on projects until probably October within reason. And realistically retainers have hit their yearly target at the end of March." But Nathan states that immediate sales aren't the expectation, instead, it's about building long-term business relationships.

Want to learn more about agency growth strategies and event marketing success? Listen to the full episode on the Happy Teams Podcast, your guide to digital agency leadership and business development.

Listen to this episode of Happy Teams to discover how Edinburgh-based Lane Media achieves exceptional employee retention and workplace satisfaction that exceed industry standards. 

In this episode, Managing Director Barry shares the agency's strategies for maintaining 10+ year employee tenures, including radical transparency in business operations, flexible work arrangements, and innovative team-building approaches.

Learn how this Best Workplace Award-winning agency implements practical initiatives like their "80/20 leadership model," where 20% of time is dedicated to peer learning with other agency owners. Barry reveals their unique approach to performance management, using tools like Clockify for balanced client profitability while avoiding micromanagement.

The conversation explores Lane Media's recent B Corp certification journey, their integrated agency model, and how they've revolutionised their workplace policies around maternity, bereavement, and well-being. Discover practical insights about hybrid work culture, office design for collaboration, and building authentic team relationships in a marketing agency environment.

Perfect for agency owners, HR professionals, and business leaders interested in employee retention, agency management, workplace culture, and sustainable business practices in the creative industry. Join us for actionable insights on creating a workplace where talent thrives for decades.

On Happy Teams this week, Becky shares how Reflect Digital's career development conference is transforming local students into digital marketing agency talent.

"It's aimed at sixth form students currently, helping them to understand about the amazing digital careers that exist out there," says Becky. "All the things that are hidden behind this...that maybe as a 16, 17, 18 year old, you don't really know."

Starting six years ago, the digital skills conference has grown significantly. "Last year we had about 500 students and about 20 of the team were there on the day in some way or another, whether that was on stage talking, whether that was helping make sure that we've got the right people in the right rooms, helping set up," Becky explains.

The digital career initiative has even led to direct agency recruitment. "Sophie was there at the very first Aspiration Digital. She came to do some work experience. We then ended up hiring her and then the rest is history," says Becky. "She was with us, she left, she went to work with Ted Baker and then went onto a property business. And then she came back, because she missed us and loved agency side."

Listen to the full Happy Teams podcast episode to hear more about building digital agency culture and creating digital marketing career opportunities for young people.

In the latest episode of Happy Teams, Leigh Gammons, CEO of digital product agency Tangent, shares what it takes to build a thriving, engaged remote-first team. With over 15 years of experience leading global businesses for top clients like HSBC, Ford, and Coca-Cola, Leigh brings a wealth of expertise to the table.

"There's two components of trust," Leigh explains. "There is how competent somebody is and also what their character is. They're only half each. So if you had a glass, then you can only get half of the amount of trust if you've got an amazing character and only half if you've got good competence."

Leigh shares four key pillars of his approach to building happy, high-performing remote teams:

1. 📣 Communication - Leigh explains the critical role of transparent communication in engaging employees. 

Whether you're dealing with the intricacies of remote work or looking to maximise your team's potential, this podcast is a must-listen.

🎧 Tune in now to hear more of Leigh's strategies for building a culture of trust, alignment, and engagement that drives real results.

As TRGT grew, the benefits of a remote model became clear – access to top talent, cost efficiency, and the ability to serve clients internationally. However, the founders soon realised the importance of intentionally shaping company culture.

"It was out of convenience," Patrick explains, "We just thought we'd give it a go and see what happened." In this episode of Happy Teams, Patrick Nancarrow, co-founder of digital marketing agency TRGT, shares his journey of building a successful remote-first agency from the ground up.

TRGT's multinational team has been a key competitive advantage, enabling them to serve clients expanding into European markets better than solely UK-based agencies.

When acquired by Sideshow Group in 2021, TRGT's people-first culture and international reach were major draws. For many employees, the remote lifestyle is a game-changer, fueling their commitment to the agency's success.

🌟 Key Takeaways:

1. Intentionally shape company culture, especially as your remote team grows.

Tune in to learn how TRGT has harnessed the power of remote work to build a thriving team that delivers exceptional results for clients across the globe.