You're about to interview your first potential hire, how on earth do you feel right now?

In this chat with Nicole Rajesky, we discuss the journey from not hiring to hiring.

Nicole is a Senior Brand Planner at Rethink in Toronto, Canada. They do good work. Very good work.

Nicole is 18 months into hiring and was kind enough to talk about the guilt she feels when interviewing people, feeling like a fraud, and wanting to be desirable while still making an assertive decision.

You can find Nicole here https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicolerajesky/ and Rethink here https://rethinkcanada.com/

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Find the book "Strategy Is Your Words" and 100 strategy classes at Sweathead here: http://www.sweathead.com

Ever worked in a company that fusses with process and organizational charts but never makes good work? Yeah. The question houses the truth, doesn't it?

Genevieve Grandsen, Selma Ahmed, and Will Grundy work at one of the world's best agencies (although, now I've interviewed six people from adam&eveDDB, it sounds like "the world's best agency" is the "key message" but this is very un-British so I'll be British on their behalf and say "one of...").

Having spoken with CCO Rick Brim and CSO Martin Beverley, I wanted to find out if their relatively low-fi way of working is real. It seems like it is. And this will disappoint many agencies that are new to creative teams and account planners and spend their days in offsite meetings reviewing all their management things. Apparently, hiring people who know how to do what they need to do, expecting good things from them, and letting them talk is a pretty adequate process. And that's what we discuss.

You can find Gen and Selma here http://genandselma.com/ and Will, because he's a planner and isn't on somebody else's website, here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/will-grundy-5835a536/

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Find the book "Strategy Is Your Words" and 100 strategy classes at Sweathead here: http://www.sweathead.com

Why are you so caught up in being accurate instead of compelling? And that 100-slide deck–can anybody even use it?

Rachel Bateast is VP, Strategic Planning, at The Mars Agency in Detroit, Michigan. To the advertising industry on the coasts, the mid-west advertising scene can feel way more conservative so what does it even mean to call B.S. on work in Michigan?

In this episode, we discuss and role-play (you're welcome) specific situations to show people how to question themselves to tighter thinking–from research to creative briefs and presentations.

You can find Rachel here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rachel-bateast-8968478/

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Find the book "Strategy Is Your Words" and 100 strategy classes at Sweathead here: http://www.sweathead.com

So, you've interviewed over 300 strategists from around the world and spoken with thousands more... what aren't we talking about enough?

In this episode published on the third anniversary of the Sweathead podcast, I (Mark) run you through a stream-of-consciousness list of fifteen points that I feel are true but not in a science way. They're true in a "we need to pay more attention to this" way.

You can find this podcast episode as a post on Instagram http://www.instagram.com/markpollard and on LinkedIn if you'd like to share it with colleagues: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/markpollardstrategist_300-strategist-interviews-activity-6770700692966526976-vj-s

Thank you for listening to the podcast and for being part of the Sweathead world.

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Favor: If you have enjoyed the pod, could you drop a kind review or rating? I haven't asked many times before but it's time to step up what I'm doing. Thank you. 

Let's say you have one hundred team members spread across the world. They work on thousands of briefs for massive brands every year. Often, they have to reach great ideas within a matter of days. They're doing well but you believe they can do ever better. Where do you start?

Aly Baer is a Director at Twitter Next in New York and John Lee is a lead of the Twitter Next lab in San Francisco. Their team helps marketers and agencies create ideas worth talking about on Twitter. 

This is an unusual discussion for me because I'm talking with two people with whom I worked on exactly the challenge above. Having spent time with all kinds of companies, I can say that their challenges weren't uncommon in the happening but they can be uncommon in the way companies tackle them. And, because of this, I wanted to talk about the work we did together knowing we'd tread a fine line between what they can feasibly say as representatives of one of the world's most influential companies and not wanting to be too self-indulgent or sycophantic.

We discuss:

- How thousands of ideas travel through Twitter Next

- Giving feedback about work while it happens

- The benefits of frequent reviews of work once the work has happened

You can find Aly at http://www.twitter.com/baer_naked and John at http://www.twitter.com/john_lee.

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Find the book "Strategy Is Your Words" and 100 strategy classes at Sweathead here: http://www.sweathead.com

You have reams of research in your head but you need to whittle everything in your head into an insight fast–what do you do?

In this episode of Sweathead, I share a few steps I like to use–especially in workshops–to take an observation and land on an insight. These steps–or "stumbles"–can work in customer interviews too.  

You can read this episode on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/p/CK9LVGhhyA2/

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Find the book "Strategy Is Your Words" and 100 strategy classes at Sweathead here: http://www.sweathead.com

Advertising agencies have responded to pleas to open their doors to people from different backgrounds in different ways. Some have resisted the pleas, some have faltered in public, and others have managed to listen and make structural, policy, and cultural change happen. 

In this episode of Sweathead, I speak with Tanya Brown who co-chairs the Equals Network and Simi Nijher who co-chairs the Heritage Network. These "networks" are two of the six Diversity and Inclusion networks that sit across M&C Saatchi Group's businesses. 

We discuss:

You can find Tanya here https://www.linkedin.com/in/tanyabrown1 and Simi here https://www.linkedin.com/in/simi-nijher-57809278 

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Find the book "Strategy Is Your Words" and 100 strategy classes at Sweathead here: http://www.sweathead.com