How to break a strategist’s heart, and how to win it back
Let's talk about heartbreak, love, and things in-between. Composer Tina Davidson wisely says:
“Let your heart be broken. Allow, expect, look forward to. The life that you have so carefully protected and cared for. Broken, cracked, rent in two. Heartbreakingly, your heart breaks, and in the two halves, rocking on the table, is revealed rich earth. Moist, dark soil, ready for new life to begin.”
Beautiful. Alas, heartbreak comes in many shapes. And strategists have hearts too (i know!), which can be broken on occasion. So, let's say you wanna break your strategist's heart. Here are 10 ways to do it:
“That insight is more of an observation, isn’t it?”
“Can we get to the point soon?”
“We get to write our own brief!”
“We need a few more slides.”
“Can we make it more exciting?”
“Don’t call it a problem, call it an opportunity.”
“Their strategy is to win over Gen Z.”
“The problem is lack of awareness.”
“Do we really need more research?”
“We just need a setup slide.”
On the other hand, let's say you want to win their heart instead. Here are 10 useful places to start:
Don’t worry about insight semantics. Worry about implications for the work.
Respect flights of fancy. We're sorting out our own minds in public.
Protect us by demanding clear guidance from the people in charge.
Don’t ask for more slides, ask for a clearer story.
Focus on whether a strategy is clear, not whether it sounds exciting.
Don’t belittle ‘negative’ language. All great work is born out of tension.
Remember objectives (“we want to X”) are not strategy (“by doing Y”).
Keep an open mind about what the underlying problem might be.
Recognise that we know too little about audiences, so yes we’d probably need some primary research.
Don’t treat strategy as the warm up act, treat it like a MC at a boat day rave.
Do some or all the above, and you're guaranteed to have a fantastic love triangle. Between you, your strategist and, er, the problem you're trying to solve.
Not weird at all.
