Welcome to episode 89. This episode is for you if you’re curious to understand what a senior account director does in a brand strategy agency.
I chat to Andy Kaye, senior account directory at Mr B & Friends and we discuss:
- the importance of being proactive with clients and staying informed about industry trends
- share tips on staying up to date with your clients business
- discuss how often you should be looking at your forecast
- why and how to build strong client relationships that result in clients coming back to you
- and how to transform your internal briefing process to make it more experiential
- and lots more…
You’re going to take away some great tips from this episode that you can go back to your agency and use. And if you’re in an agency account management role and you’re keen to be seen by your clients as more of an advisor than a reactive order taker, then check out the details of my account management training courses.
Transcript:
Jenny Plant
Today I am delighted to chat to Andy Kaye. Andy is Senior Account Director at Mr. B and Friends, one of the UK’s leading independent brand strategy and design agencies. I’ve asked Andy to talk to me about his role and the tips for success for working in an account management role, particularly in a strategic branding agency. So, very warm welcome, Andy.
Andy Kaye
Thank you, Jenny, really honoured to be invited to join you.
Jenny Plant
Well, I’m delighted that you’ve taken the time to join me today, so thank you. Do you want to just kick off by telling us a bit about you, your role at Mr. B and Friends and what you did before as well, how you got to your role as Senior Account Director.
Andy Kaye
I’m a Senior Account Director, at Mr. B and Friends, which means I am responsible for leading and growing a portfolio of clients and also leading and working with a team. I’ve got a Senior Account Manager and an Account Manager currently working in my portfolio. And really our role is to be really valued client partners. We work with clients to understand their immediate and their broader challenges and we want to look at how we can find the right solutions to overcome them.
Jenny Plant
Just out of interest because I’m aware that I asked you about three questions in one. Before you joined Mr. B and Friends, were you in account management in other agencies? What was your career path to get to Senior Account Director?
Andy Kaye
Yes, I had a really varied start to my career within account management. When I left university, my experience of the professional world really was mainly in hospitality. So, when I left Uni, I found it was a relatively slow job market and I struggled to get that first opportunity, so I decided to make my own opportunities and I did some freelance work and I did – I worked with digital agencies doing some copywriting, some SEO work. I worked with small local magazines doing some writing and some journalism and some actual design work on their magazine. I won’t show my creative colleagues that and they’ll thank me for it, I’m sure. But I also did some videography as well. So, I worked with clients to try and find different stories that they wanted to tell and captured them. But what that experience, that year of freelancing, what that experience taught me was that I was much better at the front end of this. That curiosity of why they exist, what stories they want to tell, how I can help them than I was at the actual execution. So that led me really into thinking, okay, I’m not the doer within this. I’m the person who directs, pulls it all together. So, I looked towards account management as where I would take my career and started an agency called Three/Seven/Five in Bristol, which was a sustainable branding agency focused on telling sustainable branding stories. I started as an account executive. I was there for two and a half years and then moved to Mr. B and Friends. I’ve been at Mr. B and Friends for the past just over seven years, just recently celebrated seven-year anniversary, at Mr. B and Friends and I’ve grown there from account manager to senior account director today.
Jenny Plant
Amazing journey. So, you’ve been there seven years now, Mr. B and Friends is obviously very well-known and because of the work that you do, you work with some fantastic brands and very strategic work. So how is Mr. B different to other agencies and what kinds of work do you tend to do with your clients?
Andy Kaye
Yes, it’s a really good question and it’s one that I have a relatively limited experience with my work. I’ve worked in two agencies so I’m not sure I can guarantee that Mr B and Friends is different because of this. But really, we put the strategy at the heart of everything that we do. We really look to find the truth in our clients and what their challenges are. So, we work with organizations to make them become brand-led businesses. So not just branded, and not just creating a logo or a visual identity or a strap line. We first look at really getting into the bonnet of who they are, why they operate, why they are in this world, why they do what they do, what their ambition is, what they are passionate about. And that’s what we really dig into first to find out what fuels them as a business.
If they could pick one thing, what is that passionate thing that they are trying to achieve for the next five or ten years or what do they want to be remembered for? One of the pieces of work that we often do at our initial brand strategy workshops is we look at, we ask our clients in a relatively morbid way, but it’s quite fun way, is to write their own obituary. If their business wasn’t here anymore, what would it say? What would it say, what would they be remembered for in ten, thirty, forty years’ time for what they’ve done and what they’ve left on the world? So, it’s a good starting point for us to get really into understanding why they exist, what they’re about, and that helps us to fuel an organizing thought that’s built from truth, something that really resonates with not only the leaders in a business, but with everybody within that business.
It’s so important that when people come to work, they know why they’re there. And it’s a message that resonates both internally and externally. We create these organizing thoughts that then drive everything we do from a creative perspective. We look at then what is their organizing thought? How do we bring that to life? Through a manifesto that’s rallying and inspiring and engaging. And then from there, what does that look like in their messaging, in their brand world and their visual identity and their logo and their communications?
Jenny Plant
I love that you’ve explained it so well, Andy, because I think as someone in account management in such a strategic agency, you get to what I call “work upstream” with clients. So, you’re working, as you said, with senior leadership teams within client organizations on why they do what they do, their business, and then everything else falls down from that, whereas some people in account management work for it in quite a tactical way with clients. So, you have that benefit of seeing the whole picture. Tell me, within the organization, within Mr. B, I understand that you have a strategy team. So, tell me a bit about how the account management works with the strategy team. Where is their overlap? What are some things you are expected to do, and they are expected to do? Talk to me a bit about that , the the way of working. That would be quite interesting.
Andy Kaye
It’s pretty well defined, really. I think everybody understands the value and the specialism that they bring to each project. So, we are focused on making sure that our clients have the best experience working with us, that we are all curious about what they do, what they are about. We attend all the workshops and the strategy team then break that challenge down and rebuild the opportunity. So, by pushing the brief initially of what clients think that they need versus what they need, is stage one, really looking at that and do that pushing. If we don’t do that further investigation from the outset, then we are not doing our jobs properly, really, we are not making sure that we are getting to the root cause of the problem. At the very beginning of a project, it is very much a partnership between account management and strategy together, looking at, okay, this is the challenge. What’s our opportunity here? And trying to shape that. But then we turn too from account management, we then turn to the strategy team to really engage their specialism, really engage their skill set to start to bring that to life and really hone in on what that opportunity really is.
Jenny Plant
And then presumably, you take that strategy and make sure that everything is infused, and you use that as a cornerstone to check any future requests that come up from the client’s perspective. So, you become the ambassador of the strategy, is that right?
Andy Kaye
Yes, exactly that. We work in parallel across the project, so the account management team will be the team that works from beginning to end of a project. We are quite unique in that sense that we are the ones who are a common thread throughout, strategy is there to guide and make sure throughout that but once they’ve done that first initial thinking, we’ve got that organising thought, we have got that strategic territory, we have got that manifesto on our messaging strategy completed and the creative brief is there. There are check-in points throughout that, but where we then take the ambassadorship, as you say, Jenny, to make sure that is then lived and comes to life within the creative and everything we do thereafter.
Jenny Plant
Interesting. So, can you describe, like, a typical day in your life from who you are interacting with to how many clients you are managing, to the types of tools you’re using, et cetera, just give us a flavour of what you’re doing on a day-to-day basis?
Andy Kaye
My role is really varied, my day to day is never consistent. So, we like to start the day trying to make sure everybody’s on the same page, everyone knows what’s expected from them, that we are the ambassadors of making sure that everybody has got everything they need to succeed that day, making sure that we are checking in with different projects as the days and weeks go on. But it could also be that I’m taking new briefs from clients, whether that’s by myself, whether that is with the strategy team or the creative team, but really working with clients to figure out their challenges or taking opportunities to clients as well.
So being proactive and saying, look, your competitor is doing this, I’ve just seen this being published. Here’s something that we think that could unlock for you. Here’s something that we think we could do. Or this is a really cool idea that we saw last week that someone, not a competitor, but it’s just a cool idea for something that’s happened in the industry. Maybe we could explore something like this. So, it’s been about being proactive with clients. It’s about making sure that the team is set up for success. And we are being really clear.
Jenny Plant
Are you? With that proactivity piece? Because that’s an interesting one and thank you for explaining exactly what you do. You find a piece of news, some kind of insight, some trend. You go proactively to the client and say, look, this is what we think this means for you, and this is why we should have a conversation. And I think that for me, that is account management best practice, but everyone struggles to do it because a lot of agencies are charged out at the billable rate, and a lot of work is doing delivery of existing projects. So how do you make sure that you carve out that time to do the thinking, to do the proactivity piece?
Andy Kaye
It is hard to do that. It’s a really disciplined thing that you have got to force yourself to do, almost, because it’s not so easy when the day starts to get into being reactive all the time. I am trying to move away from being reactive and just being proactive and making sure that you are in control of what your day looks like. I mean, that’s not to say that if you get an urgent email in your account or an urgent call from a client, you should ignore that. Absolutely not. But some of the things I guess that I find helpful is that I set up Google Alerts for my client sectors, and I look at what’s going on, what’s happening. I have Google Alerts about competitors that come through my clients, what’s happening in their markets. I also sign up to McKinsey Newsletters. So, everything that’s going on in different industries for the clients that I’m looking after.
Then I’m getting information that’s coming through for example, getting newsletters about AI and how that can help. One of my biggest clients is in travel and is in the travel industry and talking to them about what does AI mean for travel? Are you using AI? What are the opportunities with the Metaverse? You are reading articles about booking s – people will be booking hotel experiences in the Metaverse in the future because they will be able to see it. Try before you buy element. And it’s just thinking about these might not be relevant conversations to have with clients about work that we can be doing with them. But you are engaging in their industry, you are engaging in what’s happening around that and making sure that they have some useful content. And it might be, like I say, it’s not that there’s an opportunity there, but it’s something that they might find useful and that’s, they might have that piece of knowledge that they can then take to their bosses or their team.
Jenny Plant
Absolutely agree with you. I think that is very well said. It positions you as that strategic advisor. You are showing up, you are looking interested, you are looking engaged. As you said, you are taking an interest, you are being professional and quite frankly, clients want to stick around with partners as you say that act in that way, so I think that’s really good way of doing it. Just while we are on the subject of AI, and it’s a bit of a left field question, but are you using AI in your day to day running of your account management role?
Andy Kaye
I’m not, no, but I think that will change. I think that it makes no sense for me not to. But using AI to research and find those nuggets and find that information on what’s happening on a weekly basis, or a daily basis is going to be massively helpful. And to your point, Jenny when you were saying that not everybody can find the time to do that, AI does that for you then. And this is not about chargeable time, this is not about making things easier for you so you can charge a client more. It’s not about that at all. It’s about making your life easier so that you can still get the data you need without having to trawl through lots of different sites, lots of different articles, lots of different news sources.
Jenny Plant
Totally agree with you. I think it’s going to be part and parcel of what we do on a day-to-day basis. Tell us about how much you get involved in forecasting for the agency, Andy.
Andy Kaye
Yes, very much involved in that. At the start of every financial year, we will be predicting what we think each of our client portfolios will contribute to the agency performance and then we map that throughout the year, we stay really close to that. So, if things are happening in certain markets, if there’s anything changing, levels go up, levels go down, and then we are conscious of capacity, then what we can take on, what we can bring into our teams. But in terms of forecasting, it’s a daily ritual that we will be involved in, looking at what’s currently in our portfolio, what’s currently in our forecast sheet, and then making sure that we are being, on a daily basis, truthful to ourselves, but truthful to the client as well to make sure that we are not pushing work for our billings. That we are pushing work for the right reasons, but at the same time we need to be across all of that because we need that transparency, and we need that knowledge to be able to operate.
Jenny Plant
And just talking about forecasting, you presumably input into that forecast at the beginning of the year. So, it’s like a shared responsibility with the account management team, is that right?
Andy Kaye
I am asked what do I think my clients will realistically, what do we think they will build throughout the year? And I’ll break it down by client for the year based on what’s happened previously, conversations that we are currently having, maybe there’s annual events that we know will come around each year that are fairly predictable. So, it breaks down and by things that we are very confident by, things that are probable and then things that we are scoping that we can’t see. So, it is making sure that we have got that understanding of this is what’s going to happen. We know that because we are either in progress with it or we are in discussions or it’s something that we do every single year. It’s stuff that there’s conversations around different projects that are happening that’s probable. So, we could be a little bit more confident on those. And that’s the focus point for us then to make sure they convert and that we are working with the teams to make sure they happen.
And then there’s the opportunities that we maybe don’t even know about. These are proactive opportunities that we are thinking about on a day-to-day basis with the strategy team, with the creative team, thinking about what we can be doing that’s going to benefit our clients. Again, it’s not about what can we be doing to build more work, it’s about what can we be doing that offers value to this relationship, how do we share our ongoing value and be that partner, that client’s partner?
Jenny Plant
I think what you’re describing is a role particularly that I see more and more with senior account people. So, you are a senior account director, I would say it is absolutely no surprise that you have just described your role in forecasting because I see that very much as the senior person’s role. What else do you think is different to say, a junior account manager and they might be listening to you explaining your role in forecasting and thinking, well, I’m not involved in that. What else are you doing at a more senior account director level that you perhaps were not doing when you were a more junior level account manager?
Andy Kaye
I guess I’m looking at not only the ways we do things for clients, but the ways we operate internally as well. Having been able to work with a great team, being able to delegate a lot of those, a lot of the day to day, the projects that when I was an account manager, when I was a senior account manager. I love doing those. I found them really fun, to get involved and actually manage a video shoot, manage a rebrand, all this stuff. That’s the “doing” part of the role that’s enjoyable. But now I have an opportunity to still keep my hand in and do that and help coach and guide the team. But I also have the opportunity to think about, okay, what are we really good at, what are we not so good at, and what do we really need work on?
And looking at those things to be able to support the teams if they have the right tools. Briefing, for example. What are briefing templates doing? Are we inspired to write the briefs? Are we coming to those every day and thinking, yeah, great, I know exactly how to do this, I know how to inspire the team because that’s the role of them, right? It’s not just about passing on information. It’s about inspiring and engaging our teams to really engage with the challenge and want to create something amazing, want to walk away from the day and think, yeah, I’ve made something that wasn’t here before. And the way we do that is it starts with the way we approach a brief. So, we are looking at moving away from typical word doc briefs. And how do we make that more engaging, how do we make it more interactive?
What’s the role of the CS team within that? Making sure that we are really engaged in it. Like I say, it’s not just about passing on information. It’s about really engaging with the task, with the challenge, and making sure that what we are giving to our strategy and creative teams is the best start they can have. It’s starting from something that’s really creative, really fun. They can see that the work has been well, there’s some work been done. We are not solving the problem, but we are providing the challenge for which the problem needs to be solved.
Jenny Plant
Interesting. So, you’re moving away from Word docs and what are you making? Is it more of an immersive experience when you brief the team, like more experiential kind of thing. Describe to me what that would manifest into sometimes.
Andy Kaye
Yes, sometimes yes. So, from a more functional perspective, it might be that we use Miro boards instead of Word docs. I know that’s a relatively small change, but it allows us to be able to embed video, embed references, make things a working document from there. That’s where the start of a concepting phase can happen. Our territories are there. It’s all in one place. We’ve contributed straight away to and create a space that we are going to be developing in, that we are going to be working in. But in terms of the experiential briefings, we had one project that we worked with an airport bus company at one point, and our campaign was, or the challenge was, we need to get more people using the bus. We need to get more people using the airport bus to and from the city. And our briefing took place on the bus.
We took the creative team and the strategy team onto the bus, and we did that journey, from the town to the airport and back again, looking at the opportunities that are there. So where are we in the space where our target audience are going to be? What do we need to do to make sure they come back to this? What do we need to do to make sure this stays on their mind? What are our opportunities here within this environment and outside of our environment as well? Let’s think about where we go, whether there’s some gamification that can be done around the journey for kids, looking at different parts so they can engage as they are going through, they can see what they have engaged with before or seen before on an interactive map or whatever it might be. So, there’s different ways that we can do it and make it more engaging. So, from the start, we’re projecting ourselves into that space.
Jenny Plant
Love that. That’s such a good example as well. So, thank you for explaining it. And also, I think you are ultimately immersing yourself in the client’s customer because that’s all, frankly, that the client is bothered about, is their customer. And what you are doing is making sure that you are totally immersing you and the team in what that customer’s journey is like. So, love that. I’d love to hear a few perhaps, actions that you’ve taken in your role that have led to success. It could be that you have expanded a client relationship, or you have proposed ideas outside the scope, or you have acquired a new client. Can you share with us some examples?
Andy Kaye
Yes, I think for me personally, my focus is always on relationships. It’s always on building really good, really strong relationships with clients. And that’s allowed me to enjoy quite a lot of success from returning clients, and I can’t take the credit for that. I work with a creative and really talented team, so it goes hand in hand. I want to make sure that they have the best experience of working with me and working with the agency, but we have to deliver at the end of the day. But creating those relationships, creating honest, trusting human relationships as well, it’s not about transactional, it’s not about things being stiff. We work in a fun agency. A fun world, right? A lot of our clients have very busy jobs, very busy days, a lot of pressure, and we want to make sure that their engagement with the agency is the best part of their week, make sure it is what they look forward to throughout their day.
But I’d say that initially, creating really good relationships is the focus point. And since doing that and working with my main client, really, also, when people have left, we have had return business come back in. If they move on, I get emails a month later saying, hey, I’ve settled into this project now, settled into my new role, would love to work with you again And maybe five, six, seven different clients have come back and brought new accounts into the agency from that one client. So, it’s those relationships that keep coming back.
Jenny Plant
Great! so probably everyone listening has got the same question as me. How do you build a strong relationship? Can you break it down? What does Andy Kaye do to make sure that these clients love you?
Andy Kaye
I think it’s about engagement. I think it’s about being true and honest. And I’m making this not a professional, stiff relationship. You want you want to show some of yourself, your personality, some of your vulnerability as well. Humility goes a long way. It’s important to be a human being in front of people. I think it’s by engaging with their challenge, making them feel special, making them understand that what their challenge is that it is exciting and relevant and true. I think that sorry, I’ve got a bit of a brain fog there. Yes. So early on in my career, I was given some advice by Si – Simon, our CEO, and he said, you don’t have to love what the client does, but love the challenge. And that’s advice that’s always resonated with me and that, I think, is something that I always take into every client meeting that I have, every opportunity, every discussion about a new brief or a new project.
It is all about,
I don’t have to love what we are doing here. I don’t have to love what the client does and what their world is. But what I will love is that challenge, helping them achieve what it is that they are trying to achieve. And that really energizes me. I find that really energizing, I think, because I’m genuinely interested in that. I think that resonates massively. I think with people, it’s not just a, yeah, we can do that. We will look at this. I’m curious, I’m poking. I’m really wanting to find out more. I’m asking lots and lots of questions. I think sometimes there’s a bit of a nervousness to ask lots of questions because you don’t want to sound stupid or get the wrong answer or be seen to not know the right answer. But for me, at those early stages, being wrong is just as important as being right, because all you are doing is just you are closing that gap of what the opportunity is.
Because if I have asked those questions now, it means when I’m briefing the team, when I’m talking to the team, that focus is much more razor sharp. We are much more direct in what the challenge is and what we are looking to solve than a broad challenge that could lead us anywhere and is going to waste clients time and budget. And that’s my responsibility. When clients want to work with us, they are entrusting me to spend their money well. They are entrusting me to make sure I’ve got the right people on the right job. I’ve understood the challenge. I can communicate that properly. And that really is one of the fundamental things I think, it’s really engaging with that challenge and really being curious and inquisitive and just take that time to really love it, love that challenge. It’s fun at the end of the day. And it doesn’t matter if client says no. It’s not that you’ve misunderstood. Great, okay, so tell me where I’ve misunderstood. If it’s not that, what is it? And that’s a really good way of doing it because it means that you are giving yourself permission to get things wrong. It’s important to not be too hard on yourself with those things because you are not the smoking gun, right? You are not the one that’s going to come in and solve it all straight away. You are the first creative person that they are going to speak to.
I think it’s important that we see ourselves as creative people. We work in a creative industry and no matter how creative we think we are, clients think we are, because we are the first-person people that they speak to within a creative agency with a problem that needs a creative solution. So, I talk to our team now about reframing our viewpoint of what we do and who we are as account managers and client services, members of the client services team, as creative consultants.
So as a creative consultant, what do we do? And that’s not about us solving the problem. That’s not about us taking anything away from the creative team or the strategy team. We know that they will do this far better than what we could. But it is about being able to get the right people together to ask the right questions at the right time. That’s consultancy that’s making sure that we understand the challenge, it is asking those questions. It is making sure that we are setting our teams up for success and our client’s success as well, making sure we are that partner, and by being a creative consultant, reframing that position, I think it elevates your role for yourself as well. I know it does for me. Certainly, when I think about this and I think, well, I’m not just here to take notes. I’m not here to be the money person or the note taker or send the emails at the end of it. I’m here to add value. And I do that by being a creative consultant because I’m experienced, I’m engaged, I’m passionate about the challenge and what we do.
Jenny Plant
I’m going to bottle that bit up and use it as a quote. I think what you’ve just said absolutely rings so true, and I think you are right. How you see yourself differently totally comes across with your client relationships. And Andy, you literally came alive when you were talking about that. You genuinely are coming across to your clients that you care about what they care about, and using words like being honest, being vulnerable. So, you are not going to have all the answers, but it’s your job to ask the right questions. So, I think there’s a lot that people can take away from that and apply it in their own relationships because clients can sense if it’s genuine, and it clearly is with you because it does light you up.
Andy Kaye
Yes. And
it’s taken me a bit of time to get to that point of, why do I do this? What am I passionate about? And I am passionate about the challenge. I’m passionate about being a part of a team that’s creating something that wasn’t there before, that’s solving a challenge through creative solutions. I think when you are looking at your role in the client services team, there’s so many things that we have to do day to day. That is, build our relationships, make sure we are on top of all the timings, make sure we are delivering our projects really well, make sure we are communicating clearly to the teams internally and externally. Supplier management it might be, making sure we are over the finance, making sure our admin is up to scratch. But I think focusing on the one thing that gets you out of bed in the morning, that really is your, that’s your passion point within your role that then makes everything else falls into place.
What is it that I’m passionate about? What is my point of differentiation? And it is the challenge of being a part of that creative process. And I know that the other parts are massively important, and I still do them, and they are still a big focus of my day. But giving me that spear point always helps me, because if you’re going in thinking, okay, I’ve got to do all of this 100% perfectly every single day, you have got to burn out. You are going to get so fogged up. You can’t focus on what it is that you are looking at now. It might be that you are passionate about getting jobs over the line. It might be that you are passionate about new business and getting wins in. And that’s great. If that’s your focus, if that’s what you want to focus on every day is, okay, new business, I want to focus on this opportunity. I want to be proactive. That’s my in, then, great. That gives you real clarity on how you are going to focus, knowing that you have got all the other things to do as well. But if that’s what your personal mantra is going to be, that you focus on new business and new projects and being proactive, then that’s great. But for me, what works in my world is that engagement with my clients and their challenges.
Jenny Plant
I think that’s great. How did you get to that point of self-reflection? What made you ask yourself that question? Was it that you reached a point of burnout or was it just because maybe you are exposed to this strategic thinking and these deep questions that you ask clients that you started asking yourself the same questions? Maybe I’m giving you suggestions, but I’m just curious because I think that’s a good exercise, for everyone to do in account management. What actually gets you out of bed.
Andy Kaye
In my early career, I was heads down a lot on delivery, making sure that I’m getting stuff out, making sure that I’m a really safe pair of hands, that clients can trust me. So, when I say I’m going to do this or if I say I don’t know the answer, but I will, they know that I’m on it. But I had my head down a lot in that delivery. And I think when you have your head so far down doing the do, you don’t have the opportunity to really look at, okay, what drives me with this? Because like I said, I’m doing all those things 100% of the time and there’s no differentiation behind that. And I think you do get burnout. I think you do get to that point where you can’t see the wood for the trees. You are just focused on doing and doing. You don’t have the opportunity to say, stop, okay, I need to think of what is for me.
And I don’t think it was a single moment. I think over time it grew. I think as my confidence grew and I have always, through my career, been fortunate enough to be given a lot of trust internally. So, my account directors that I have worked for, the business leaders that I have worked with, they have always given me a lot of trust in my role. And I think that’s given me the opportunity to question that, to think about where I add the most value. And I think that’s what it is. I think it’s where I add the most value for my clients. When I’m thinking about this, the admin side of things is not something that I get out of bed for. It’s just, well, I’m not great at it. I’m not disciplined enough to do that. But clients know that they are going to get a good product because I’m going to be engaged with it and everything else will happen. It’s just not my focus point. But I think it was just from moments of reflection, of really seeing where I have that value and having those opportunities to lead those conversations and notice what you get excited about. If I’m at the office late or I’m in the office on a weekend or whatever, it might be because I want to, because I want to make sure that I’m engaged with this. Then that’s the reason why, isn’t it? That’s why I’m there. And I love the creative challenge. I love that product. I love working with the strategy team, with the creative team, being part of a creative team that’s delivering something.
Jenny Plant
Honestly, I think it’s very inspiring for other people in account management to listen to you, Andy, talk about your job, because it’s always so much more inspiring to work with someone who’s energized and energizing. So, I love that you’ve done that self-reflection. I think you said, I’ve been fortunate that people have given me the trust. I think you earn the trust. So, whatever you were doing what you said you were going to do, and you have built that trust with people so that they’ve given it to you. So well done, you, and then focusing on where you add the most value and what energizes you. So, lots of tips there. What other tips can you share while we’re on tips? Is there anything about how you organize yourself, how you organize your day, how you handle, I don’t know, challenging client relationships or difficult conversations? Anything you can share in terms of other tips?
Andy Kaye
Yes, it’s a good question. I think that with tips, I think, again, we work in an industry that’s fun. We work in an industry that is great to be a part of, creating something great and to be part of that creative work. And we are not saving lives. So, I think a big part of my day really is that self-reflection around, okay, just pause. I can’t do anything well if I’m getting stressed, getting worked up about something, I need to take that time to just breathe and just walk away. We work with talented people that have had lots of different experiences. So, trust in your team. Ask your team a solution that you are really struggling to get to in your own mind, or it’s a hard and tricky challenge in your own mind, but, for somebody else they have done it ten times. They are really experienced at it. So, ask, put yourself out there. Don’t work in a cocoon. We are a team, and the only way that you build that team, you recognize that team, is if you ask for help, if you are vulnerable and you support each other. And I think that’s a huge part of what I’d say as a tip, is to be a team. Don’t focus on feeling that you are the only one who can solve this problem. I’ve been guilty in the past. I’ve definitely sat on problems and thought, oh, how do I solve this? This should be mine to solve. And that’s probably at the detriment of projects and relationships. What I should have done was go to my team and say, I’ve got this problem I’m really struggling to solve, can we just chat about it? Can we talk about what we’re going to do to overcome it?
And it might be a five-minute conversation, it might be someone that says, you know what, I can do that because I’m doing this and this for them as well, so let me pick that up. Or it might be a case of sitting down for an hour with a team and working out what the solution is going to be. So, yes, but within your internal team and with your client team as well. I think if things aren’t going well, that’s totally fine, that happens, right? Give yourself a bit of a break and find a solution. Find a solution. It doesn’t have to be dead, right? But honestly, with clients early to say, okay, we have hit a bit of a roadblock here. We are not going to be able to deliver what you wanted today, but what we are going to deliver, oh and these are the reasons why. But what we are going to deliver is this and this, which will help you see where we are going. We are not squirreling ourselves away here, we are sharing, we are making sure we are being honest, and we are building that partnership, that relationship. That’s two ways. I think for me, , it is about communication. It is about not thinking that you have to solve everything by yourself, work with the team, and it doesn’t have to be within your account management team. It can be anybody within the agency, it can be strategy, creative ops, wherever – these creative ideas and solutions and experience and different points of view and perspective come from everywhere.
Jenny Plant
Such good advice in terms of being honest, open, building relationships, keeping the communications open and asking for help when you need it. Anything else? When it comes to avoiding difficult client conversations, is there anything that you’ve done over the many years of being in account management that have mitigated against the difficult conversations that we end up having? Anything that you do differently that you could share with anyone else?
Andy Kaye
I say timeliness is massively important with that. And again, it does still revert back to that open and honest communication, but it’s about being on top of things. It’s about making sure that if you have got doubts about anything, that you are going to have a more difficult conversation if you leave it to the end of the day. But if you have got doubts about anything, then manage expectations early and be honest and be open. There’s work that I’ve received in the past that we have not cracked it, we have just not yet cracked it. And that’s not anybody’s fault. That’s just because maybe we haven’t had the time. Maybe it’s just you can’t wake up every day and deliver. Perfect creative time needs to be given and people need to be allowed opportunities to ask for more time. So, I think with that stuff, it is about supporting your team and supporting the client and being the client within the agency. I think avoiding difficult conversations, it’s tough because within our role, that is part of our role, we will have to have difficult conversations and there’s nothing that I can necessarily say that’s going to avoid that. But I would say timeliness and being open and honest about everything with those difficult conversations. If we are overrunning on budget, figure out why beforehand. Is that our issue? Are we just over egging this? Are we just trying to create this perfect world? And that’s not the client’s problem if we are over investing in it? Or is it because the brief has changed? So really think about what’s happened and pull it together. So, it’s not about being reactive to stuff, it’s about being considered, it’s about being timely, but it’s not about saying, okay, hold on a minute. You said it was only going to be one amend and this has now gone to two amends. I think you need to sort of fight and pick your battles, because that’s a surefire way to ruin a relationship. If it goes over by one amend and it’s small and then you are seen to be penny pinching. I tend not to talk about money with my clients straight away. If they want to talk about budgets, then that’s fine. But I don’t want my clients to ever think that if they want to pick up the phone to me and have an hour-long call or invite me over to have a bit of a workshop or a thinking or a bit of a brainstorming that they are necessarily going to get a bill at the end of it. Because I want to build that relationship. It’s not transactional, it is valued partnership.
Jenny Plant
Very nice. Any final words of wisdom? You have shared so many already and I’m just conscious of your time. Any other pieces of advice that you could share with anyone that maybe aspires to be in a senior account management role, to do what you’re doing, to lead a team, to kind of sit there in a more strategic role with your clients? Any pieces of advice you would give for someone else in account management?
Andy Kaye
I think working on your own values is really important, it helps guide you. I got ours and I cheated, in a way. I got ours from our old Mr. B and Friends values, which I think work perfectly for account management. It’s something that’s always stuck with me, which is to be there, to act like it’s yours and it can be done. These are three active things that for me, fundamentally, that is what the role is, that is what shapes you and gives you the opportunity. Because if you are there for your client, if you are there for your team, then that is that relationship building. That is that trust and that is that loyalty, and that will be that return business. If you act like it’s yours, you take that ownership and you really engage with the challenge in a way that is emotionally engaging as well. You are emotionally invested in the success of it. And if it can be done, if you’re saying to yourself, it can be done, there’s always a way, then there’s always a way. It might not be the way that it was when it first came in, when the brief first came in, but the way you create that way, you create what it is that’s going to add value to your client. So, the client wants to have three concepts, but you don’t have the budget, okay, what do we do with that? Instead of mapping it up and making it look perfect and beautiful, let’s take our pens and pencils out and let’s scamp things, let’s sketch things, and instead of putting it into a perfect presentation, let’s put it into Miro and take them through a work in progress and that lives. It can be done because there is a way to do it. It doesn’t have to follow our own personal processes or what we think the client expects. The client wants to see creative work. The client wants to see progress, and they want to see that you are engaged and that you are moving things forward. They also love to be involved in the creative part of it. So why would you exclude them from sketches and scamps? Also bring them in a little bit early to take them through that. Get that temperature check. That’s where you can use that money and use that budget much more wisely and make sure that things do get done.
Jenny Plant
So just repeat them. We had “act like it’s yours”. “Act like it can be done”. And what was the third one?
Andy Kaye
Yes, so “Be there”. “Act like it’s yours” and “It can be done”.
Jenny Plant
I think that’s such a good mantra. I’m not surprised that came from Mr B. I really am not. It’s so profound and so true. And I think also, I have just got to add that the people that I’ve seen in account management that have done particularly well and have been promoted quickly, Andy Kaye, ended up being successful like yourself, and do act like it’s yours. It feels like their own business, their own challenge, and they take it on. And I can see that with you, Andy. So very well said. And thank you so much for sharing so much value. It’s been brilliant conversation. I love your passion and energy, and I’m not surprised that you have done so well, and that Simon wants to keep hold of you.
Andy Kaye
That’s very kind. Thanks very much, Jenny.
Jenny Plant
All right, if anyone wants to hear more about the work that you’re doing at Mr. B, what’s the best way that they can contact you?
Andy Kaye
Yes, you can contact me through LinkedIn. You can contact me through Mr. B and Friends website. It’s andy.k@mrbandfriends.uk. Or you can call our office.
