Realise Talent

There’s one thing I’ve noticed in the award-winners and agency success stories of the last few years. The ones who consistently win - and win well - feel a bit different. But why? In my opinion, it’s their brand. A brand built on people, normally, people who take risks. Not the colour of the logo or the tone of voice, but the confidence, the energy, the vibe. The best brands - and the agencies that build them - are agile and take risks where others play it safe. Sometimes that means giving their team more creative freedom, sometimes it means jumping into a new channel, or investing in new technology, or trying a new way to measure value. It’s not always radical. But it is deliberate. Do you think Ryanair thought it was a risk to basically abuse their own customers on social media? Course they did. But they did it anyway, and now revel in it. As much as it’s a risk to try something new, it’s probably a bigger risk not to. The best companies are always testing, trying, tweaking. As the world changes around them, they look even harder for opportunities to improve what they do and adapt it to a new environment. Each foray into the unknown, a new risk to take. Over time, that experimentation becomes the brand, and they attract people who resonate with it. Chancers. Challengers. Entrepreneurs. Do they take risks which don’t pay off? Of course they do. That’s part of the job. But the next one might land, and if it does, they’ll be first to the prize.

Every business under the sun has difficult clients. Maybe they micromanage, maybe they ghost or maybe they ask for the impossible and then nitpick the delivery. The truth? Difficult clients aren’t rare - they’re inevitable. Spotting those red flags is a skill, but knowing when to walk away is a different one. And sometimes, they don’t go hand in hand. At what point do you call it quits? How long does the benefit of the doubt last? Qualifying work is one of the most important skills a business leader can develop. And yet, once you’ve found a new opportunity, it’s hard to let go - even when the warning signs are there. It's so demanding to win business in the current market that the temptation is to grind it out and make it work. As a recruiter, I’ve had roles that just aren’t workable. The client wants an 11/10 candidate. You bring them a 10/10, but it's still not good enough. The process turns from conversation to interrogation: they grind down every CV, every suggestion, and nothing’s right. It’s a pattern I hear from creative clients regularly, too - competition drives bad behaviour and some brands know they hold the purse strings, so they wield that power without care. It’s tempting to push through and hold on a bit longer. But when the writing’s on the wall, it’s better to pull the plug early than pour more time, energy and reputation into a partnership that’s become one-way. Because if you don’t know where your line is, your team might find it for you - on their way out the door.

What’s the intent behind creative work made by AI? That’s a question I keep coming back to. Because for me, the whole point of creative work is that a human made it. The soul behind the idea is what moves us - not just the output, but the intent. Whether it’s a cathedral, a sonnet, or a piece of music, it’s the soul behind the work that stirs something in us. And that’s why I’m always surprised when businesses invest in ideas with no soul to be seen. AI doesn’t know what it’s creating. It just does it. At last week’s Fuelling Agency Growth event, Evelyn Oluwole said something that stuck with me: “AI doesn’t have soul.” She’s right. AI can transcribe a meeting, but it can’t read the room. It can summarise an email, but it can’t sense sarcasm. It can tell you who to meet, but it can’t build a connection. For that, humans really are still number one. So here’s a question I’ll leave you with: before you automate, ask yourself - what’s the intent? For research? Great. For recipes? Go for it. But for creative work where emotion, nuance and humanity are the brief, there’s still no substitute for the real thing.

It kinda feels like hiring has gone full circle. We’re back to hiring from the same pool of people… from the same agencies… with the same backgrounds. It’s a merry-go-round. And everyone’s acting like it’s a masterstroke of strategy. It’s not. It’s a volatile market, so caution makes sense - but playing it safe might be the riskiest move you can make The best businesses know this. I work with a range of exciting businesses, some that are blowing up and hiring like crazy and they don't rely on cut-and-paste job specs whilst only meeting people that tick-the-boxes in their CV. They’re clear on where they’re going, and even clearer on what makes people thrive once they’re there. When their recruiters say "I've met someone spot on for you, just meet them" they welcome it with open arms, rather than look at their CV and pick them apart. That’s why they attract talent others overlook. The ones with the edge. The je ne sais quoi. The potential to make a big impact. Yes, maybe they have the liquidity and momentum to be ambitious, but they also have something else that I see every time: confidence. Confidence in who they are. Confidence in who they want to be. And confidence they’ll spot the next person with it, too. So the next time you’re hiring, ask yourself - are we filling a gap, or creating space for someone exceptional?

I speak to a ton of agency folk. Some of them are hiring. My job’s to find them a person, for the person-sized hole in their team. To punch above their weight as a collective, their people need to be consistently better. Better than yesterday. And consistently better doesn’t happen by chance. It needs the right environment. So this leaves me with the question… What do the best agencies actually produce? I know that sounds like an odd thing to ask. “They produce creative work you moron”. But… do they? I’d argue the best agencies produce the best creatives. The work’s the happy accident. A piece of creativity is one and done. Solitary. A one off. A lot of agencies can produce great work, once. Producing great creatives means you deliver great work again and again and again. It’s a common denominator in the best hirers and employers in the industry. The best hirers are so because they’re the best employers. They train, develop, educate and inspire. They might not necessarily hire ‘the best’, but they’re close to the best by the time they leave. If you’re struggling to hire right now, think about what you could offer someone to give them a chance of being the best. And then give it to them. The quality of your work will just be a happy accident. I've seen it in my career; when I was at Gemini People I was lucky. I was lucky as I had a TONNE of technical training and constant exposure to leaders in my field. It's massively shaped the way I think and work. And when you look at the alumni from that business now - many leading companies and teams - it's clear the environment produced more than good work. It shaped brilliant people. What businesses have helped you level up? And what was it about them that made them so effective?

Do you ever get the sense that brands only care about purpose when it’s profitable? Profits regularly come before purpose. Even if you work for a not-for-profit or charity, profit is what keeps you in a job. But it’s easy to look around creative industries and wonder where the purpose has gone - and whether brands are just paying lip service when they lean the other way. But when purpose comes before profit - or even runs alongside it - magic happens. And that’s exactly what I witnessed at the PR Week Purpose Awards. Award shows often come with a side of scepticism. We’ve all heard the stories of campaigns created just to win trophies, boost agency fame, and little else. But anyone savouring that scepticism would’ve found it fading at the Purpose Awards. The entries were as intelligent and interesting as they were purposeful. Campaigns which celebrated a picture bigger than profits. The Grand Prix winner was a campaign from Ketchum UK that focuses on the London Caribbean community and the importance of talking about health issues, a subject which is taboo for many and thus costs lives. ‘Liming With Gran’ is the kind of campaign that shines a light on a difficult topic and will help more people than is possible to know. It will quietly save lives and the knock-on effects could be dramatic. The pilot reached 48% of London’s 300k-strong Caribbean community and 84% of them said they were more likely to talk about their health. That’s impact. And purpose fulfilled. Should more brands be leading with purpose? Is there more profit to be made in doing so? Or is that a tasteless ideology? The world’s a better place when brands prioritise purpose. And if profit follows? That’s not a compromise, that’s proof it’s working.

A good story built the Wrexham FC obsession. A great one made it global. That’s the ROI of storytelling. Teams get passed down through families like heirlooms. Strangers, hundreds of miles away, become part of your identity. Red vs blue. Us vs them. The language of sport is the language of story. In the UK, football takes centre stage. For me? It’s Plough Lane - home of AFC Wimbledon. It’s more than a club. It’s my 'church'. And it’s why stories like Welcome to Wrexham hit so hard. Who’d have thought a small Welsh club would be fronted by Hollywood royalty? Yet here we are. Because the story sells. Ryan Reynolds & Rob McElhenney understood that. They didn’t just buy a team - they bought a narrative. And that narrative has paid off. Big time. Because in sport - and in branding - the story is everything. Marketing, PR, Creative, Politics, Music - it’s all becoming footballified. Tribal. Emotional. Lifelong. But here’s the thing: fans don’t see themselves as customers. They’re part of the story. It’s personal. It’s generational. It never ends. Want loyalty? Emotion? Belief? Don’t just sell the product. Sell the story. That’s what made Wrexham work. That’s what moves 1.5 billion people to watch a World Cup. They did so for the romance. The unpredictability. The story. Because they’re “(INSERT COUNTRY) til they die”. They’re immovable and immortal. And the story of their team is intertwined in the story of themselves. So the lesson? A good story is still one of the most powerful things on earth. Learn to tell one, and the world is yours.

If you hired a painter to paint your hall, picked a colour, and then decided after they finished that it wasn’t quite right - would you expect them to repaint it for free? Sounds unreasonable, right? Yet in recruitment (and many service industries), that’s exactly what happens. We reach the final stage of hiring, and suddenly… the brief shifts. The goalposts move. We’re back to square one. But hiring isn’t just about making an offer. It’s about hours of: 🔹 Understanding a business, team, and specialism 🔹 Mapping the market and crafting tailored outreach 🔹 Reviewing hundreds of CVs and screening candidates 🔹 Preparing, briefing, and managing expectations 🔹 Negotiating, mediating, and balancing multiple human factors All of this happens before an offer is even made. And when the brief changes late in the process, it’s not just recruiters who feel it - candidates do too. 👉 People invest time, energy, and emotion into every hiring process. When the goal shifts, they’re left confused, frustrated, and questioning their own value. And beyond the human cost, it damages employer brand - something companies pour time and money into protecting. So before you kick off a hiring process, ask yourself: ✅ Are we solving the right business problem? ✅ Is this the best solution, or is there another way? ✅ Are we committed to making this hire—quickly, efficiently, and fairly? ✅ Do we have a structured way to assess candidates and make a sound decision? ✅ Are we ready to support, onboard, and retain this person so we’re not back here in 3 months? Recruitment isn’t about “trying before you buy.” It’s about clarity, commitment, and making the right decision the first time. Because in hiring - just like in painting - it’s a lot easier (and cheaper) to get it right the first time. 🎯

It's ironic - most agencies are fantastic storytellers. They tell stories and they sell stories. But there’s a difference when it comes to hiring and selling an opportunity. Because the story that’s of most interest to the candidate is theirs. Not yours. Everyone likes to be the hero of their own story. And someone looking for a job’s no different. A good recruiter selling your business will use storytelling to sell you with that in mind. They set the scene of your current and past hires. Where those people started, and what they’re doing now. What the environment’s like, and how it nurtures minds. They then tell a story the recipient might go on, should they apply. It’s this same storytelling agencies often forget when hiring. So use this knowledge. Use it to judge the recruiters you work with. Use it to critically assess the job ads you write. Judge the words you put on LinkedIn and job sites. If they start with a lengthy overview of your own business, or the term “We’re Hiring” they won’t perform as well as those which talk about the reader. It’s a simple storytelling technique, but often overlooked. Yes, a candidate will want information about who you are. But remember, they’re not a candidate when they read an ad. They’re a reader. To entice them into becoming a candidate, you must first realise you’re not the most important part of the story. They are. Talk up to them. Put them at the heart of your comms. Set their scene. I promise you’ll hire better and have a better story to tell.