By Lisa Woodall
Saatchi & Saatchi, a renowned global communications and advertising agency, is known for its guiding principles, often referred to as “Saatchi & Saatchi Principles.” Could these principles work as guiding IT principles I wonder?
Nothing is Impossible: A core belief that emphasizes and encourages and rewards creativity, innovation, and the power of thinking beyond conventional boundaries. You often hear “you can do anything with technology” and yet too often that is followed with “too expensive” “take to long” “won’t comply” – come on IT we can do better, it doesn’t have to be too expensive, take too long or be non compliant – or does it?
Lovemarks: The idea that brands need to create emotional connections with consumers, going beyond traditional branding to inspire loyalty and affection. Yes, believe it or not every day our IT products and services are creating emotional connections/reactions – probably and more often than not frustration related emotions – recognise what it’s going to take in the design and deployment of the IT products and services, in a way that every customer and colleague has positive reactions rather than negative reactions to IT.
Inspirational Leadership: The belief in leading with inspiration rather than just management, fostering a culture where creativity and innovation can thrive. Take a look at your management team – does the IT lead stand out as inspirational or a techie who can keep the lights on and protect your data – go for that IT leader who will do the latter but also can be creative and innovative really focused on solving what matters most to your business.
Creative Bravery: Encouraging bold and fearless creativity that challenges the status quo and stands out in the marketplace. IT is evolving fast, there is lot of hype but how do you know if that hype will pay off – IT can and should experiment in small pockets, trial ideas, and showcase that alternative world and the art of the possible – too many rely on the slide deck and report to sell the possibility stand up the demo and showcase the way… (you need seed corn or a business case for that .. groan.. don’t be fooled that slide deck and business case alternative costs time and money too).
Consumer-First Thinking: Always putting the consumer at the heart of every decision and strategy, ensuring that their needs and desires drive the brand’s actions. Do you see evidence from the customer, client or corporate colleague perspective that the IT product or service is supported, serviced and improved based on those insights or is it all tech driven change – come on get your analysts and service designers out observing, talking and capturing what matters and align your IT plans around what you hear.
Integration Across Platforms: Ensuring that brand messaging is consistent and cohesive across all platforms and channels for maximum impact. You all know this one too well, when the world brings you lemons make lemonade – and in an IT world consistent taxonomy, data quality, and connectivity is key and yet too often new solutions and services are deployed which do anything but integrate into your overall operating model and tend to create more data challenges than they solve.
Simplicity: Striving for clarity and simplicity in all communications, avoiding unnecessary complexity and confusion. In IT we too often over engineer our solutions, ending up with complexity and confusion get back to the basics of simplicity first don’t increase cost, prolong timelines to factor in every permutation and combination from the start get far more evidence that the permutation and combination is needed.
Results-Driven: Focusing on delivering measurable results and outcomes for clients, ensuring that creative efforts translate into business success. And there you have it – the measurable outcomes are often costs and data integrity but business success is far much more than that – IT unlocks business potential, it can be a game changer for business and operational models and yet very few organisations really get that game changing result from the IT investments come on we can be better.
Imagine an IT world inspired by the S&S principles – would it be better than the IT world you have today? Get that S&S suit mindset out today and make their principles count in IT.