whatleydude

Back in late September 2011, I was fortunate enough to be asked to lecture at the Weekend Media Festival in Rovinj, Croatia.

Now in its fourth year, the festival is known for being the key event for the local communications industry and, with an expectation of 3000+ attendees, Nokia were onboard as sponsors; with both a device launch and a booth on site, part of the deal was that they were able to nominate their own speaker for the weekend.

The brief? An introduction to word of mouth marketing; a relatively unknown discipline in that part of the world. Case studies would be a necessity but, while I was permitted to talk a little about the work with Nokia, any heavy-handedness would not be welcome.

‘Perfect’, I thought. ‘It’ll be me, a room of 20 or so people, talking about (and probably kicking ideas around) the idea of word of mouth marketing and what it means to the modern-day brand’. Donezo.

Upon arrival [landing just after midnight, after leaving Beirut in the morning and making a short stopover in London for lunch - long story], I was asked to come down to the venue to meet the team and pick up my credentials.

‘But it’s really late and I doubt it’ll go on for long, I’ll do it tomorrow’, I said.
‘No’, they insisted ‘the party is only just starting. Come now.’

I did, and they were right: the party was only just getting started. However, that wasn’t the only surprise of the night. After meeting and greeting the rest of the people I was there to represent, I was asked if I’d like to see where I’d be speaking on the morrow – ‘Yes’ I replied, ‘that’d be great’, expecting to be shown to some corner/booth somewhere in the main hall.

Oh no. How wrong could I be?

Imagine my surprise as I was shown into the main conference hall and simply told ‘Yes, you’ll be in here’
‘Sorry? How many people can fit in here?’
‘Oh, about 900 sitting but probably closer to a full thousand when we fill up at the back’

Right.

The following day I rewrote the entire presentation (less Q&A and small numbers, more pretty images and big stories). I had potentially one thousand people to entertain. At 5:30pm. On a Friday. Plus, after once reading about Jyri Engestrom‘s tendency to wear bright red cardigans whenever he gives lectures to large groups of people (it helps the audience keep track of the presenter on stage apparently), I thought I should rock the red trousers too.

So I did – and it was awesome.

PS. Rovinj is gorgeous, I thoroughly recommend visiting if you ever get the chance.

Following on from last week’s entry (and a little bit later than expected – I’m writing this on Tuesday, but back-dating it to last week – sue me), here’s the top five things I loved most from the past seven days -

1. One of my fellow trans-mongolian adventurers, Ben Wallace, finally finished editing together one epic vodka train video (which we all helped in shooting along the way). Coming in at 6mins long, covering over 5600miles and tracking the consumption of quite frankly, a ridiculous amount of alcohol… I can’t stop smiling whenever I watch it.
   .
2. This top 10 albums of 2011 list (via @switzke) is definitely worth a peruse for many an hour of aural pleasure. Dive in.
   .
3. Paul Clarke‘s photography exhibition at Adam Street member’s club on Wednesday was really, really good (personal fave was the stage shot of Jon Culshaw) and I’m glad I was able to make it along. No link available at the moment (Paul’s working on it) but in the meantime, why not check out his portfolio?
   .
4. Writing a comedy, agony-aunt-style blog post that resulted in being followed by Cher Lloyd Twitter bots? Definite highlight of the week.
   .
5. I said goodbye to 1000heads. Good friends, great presents and an epic send off. Well done all.
   .

And for a bonus number six, two videos that came my way on my last day as a ‘head. Both about leaving; one achingly funny and the other achingly inspiring. Enjoy.

PS. Big love to Laura, Angela and Cathy for jumping on the 5Things trail.The latter’s three-fold reasoning as to why this is a good idea are exactly the same as mine. Win.

Good skills.

Next Friday, January 13th 2012, will be my last day at 1000heads.

We’ve achieved a lot together over the past 27mths – from AR phone launches, to movie tie-ins, to ending the year with our biggest ever award haul – the journey with 1000heads has been awesome.

With 2011 disappearing into the distance, the ‘heads go into 2012 with great clients, fantastic accolades and a future brimming with possibility.

However, after two [and a bit] years of working on the best projects, travelling to the best cities and building awesome community experiences with the best people, it’s time for me to take the next step.

On January 23rd I’ll be doing just that, by joining Ogilvy PR as Senior Associate Director, 360° Digital Influence.

I am very, very excited about joining a super-talented team that is not only going through a period of fantastic growth but also choc full of industry-dominating ambition.

The potential to do even more great work in 2012 is huge and I can’t wait to dig in and get my hands dirty. Until then…

Bring. It. On.

Today I created a folder on my Mac marked ‘DKR’.

That is all.

[Private post - made public Dec 14th, 2011]

Splitscreen: A Love Story from JW Griffiths on Vimeo.

This beautiful video is being blogged all over the place at the moment, and for good reason. Splitscreen is the winner of the recent Nokia Shorts competition (disclaimer – 1000heads worked on this project for the big N) and, work associations aside, the video itself is gorgeous.

The winners (along with the other finalists) should be proud; it’s a great project and the output has been fantastic.

Well done to all involved.

a parable for the envious

There are times in my life when I love my job, there are times in my life when I hate my job, there are times in my life when my job opens my eyes to something so freakingly awesome but no matter what happens, I can never tell anyone.

Friends ask me often if I enjoy what I do, whether I’ve seen anything cool lately and/or if I can tell them of anything I’ve seen – “Y’know, blogger to blogger?”

More often than not, I respond with the following – “It’s like the old joke…”

A preacher who liked to play golf every Wednesday at a modest public golf course was standing on the elevated tee at the sixth hole of that course...

He took a few practice swings, and looked across the river to the immaculate private country club nearby.

“Just once I’d like to play at that gorgeous course,” the preacher said to his foursome.

Another player spoke up:

“My company has a reserved tee time at that club for us every Sunday morning, and it’s all paid for, too. But all of a sudden yesterday the boss says we have to travel out of town for a week. It’s a shame to let that tee time go to waste. I could give you a guest pass and you could have it all to yourself. Would do you say?”

Of course this was a dream come true for the preacher, but it put him in a terrible predicament. If he accepted the gift, he would have to miss Sunday worship. He thought to himself,

“I haven’t missed a Sunday service in 17 years of preaching. A sin to be sure, but I am after all just a man trying to do my best like all the rest.”

He succumbed to temptation and accepted the invitation.

On Sunday, the preacher awoke, called his deacon, and said, “I’m terribly sick today, and will not be able to offer service.”

“Well, we surely hope you are feeling better soon,” said the deacon. “What matters most it that your health is blessed, and we shall all pray for you today.”

This made the preacher feel a little guilty, but it was a beautiful clear cool morning, and promised to be a beautiful day. He opened a box from under the bed that had a new folded golf shirt, his cleaned and polished golf shoes, and he put them on instead of his usual clothes.

Later, on the beautiful practice green, the preacher fit right in but couldn’t help feeling conspicuous. At that exact moment up in Heaven, Saint Peter was looking down. He said to God,

“Do you see what is happening down there? I’m very disappointed in this preacher. Surely you are going to do something?”

God replied, “Don’t worry Pete, I’ve got it all figured out.”

St. Pete knew it was best not to question any further, but to just wait patiently and watch for it all to play out. He watched the preacher walk confidently to the first tee, a short par-4. The preacher teed it up, and hit a pretty fair drive, low and straight.

But just then, God waived his hand and created the perfect little wind. The wind carried the ball as if in the hand of God and lifted it down the fairway. The ball took once bounce and landed on the green, kept rolling, swung to the right, barely crept up to the hole, and fell in. It was beautiful.

Up in heaven, St. Pete was very upset.

“An albatross! Are you kidding me? Here is one of our own preachers committing this sin, on a Sunday no less. Just when I’m certain that you are going to offer up the perfect punishment to befit the sin, you instead go and reward him with a once-in-a-lifetime shot?”

God says, “Yes, but calm down Pete. Who is he going to tell?”

I love my job.
I get to see the coolest things in the world before anyone ever will.
My eternal curse is that 99.99 times out of 100?
I’m never going to be able to tell anyone.
Damn.

.

.

.

Images via Paul Clarke

2011 is going to be a big year for 1000heads; we’re formally opening several offices across the globe (many of which are already hiring, by the way) and the entire team seems to have come back from the Christmas break with a renewed sense of ambition and direction. It’s electric.

For myself, having spent 2010 defining (and refining) the engagement strategy for the company both internally and externally, it’s time to move onto pastures new*.

When I hit my year anniversary back in October, a conversation began about where we (1000heads and I) could go next. What did we decide? Well…

I’m about three weeks into my new role** and, as the challenges ahead grow ever larger and more exciting, I’m this close to being in the perfect position to knock every single one of them out of the park.

Bring. It. On.

.

James Whatley
Marketing Director
1000heads

*staying on at the same farm, obviously
**leaked in the press at the weekend

Are we over water now? I think so. At least, we should be. I guess we’ve been up for an hour now, maybe longer. My toes hurt.

Damn shoes.

I love my job. Six seats to my right a couple of competition winners sit happily drinking beer, looking forward to their prize; two VIP red blue carpet tickets to the Tron: Legacy ‘World Premiere’ in Hollywood.

I was at the London one last weekend. That was cool. Although Patrick probably nailed it best when he said “Premieres are fun but it’s essentially like going to the cinema with a suit on” – Yes Pat, just like that (if you ignore the Hollywood superstars arriving around you and of course the free popcorn.. that’s always a winner. Let’s not forget that).

LA. Again.

I’ve been there before y’see, although last time was a holiday, this time it’s for work. I think I’ve managed to wangle some down time over the coming week, with both Sunday evening and Monday daytime currently cleared for catching up with some of my favourite Californians. Matt & Jen namely and probably Jeb too, if there’s time.

I love the internetz for stuff like this. Having such a large global network means that more often than not there is always someone to see or meet. Some might see that as an annoyance (and to an extent, I can understand why), however if I ever want to completely escape… utterly switch off… then I know how to do that too.

Obviously you wouldn’t know when those times happen because I don’t actually talk about them. But they are there. Gently. Flowing back and forth.  Slowly. Like a soft breath on the wind…

But I like people. I love people. Even the inconsiderate German chap in front of me on this flight (seat thrown back, feet pushing against the wall in front) I love them all.

Well, I try…