I've read in some blogs that planners should be "creative generalists", which is usually fine by me, but lately I've been thinking a lot about how to form great planning teams, and I'm starting to change my mind about leaving specialists out of planning departments.
The recent posting on the fading importance of skill made me think of some of the skills I had to pick up while living in London. Besides learning how to drink warm ale, sing "Angels" by Robbie Williams at karaoke nights, and eat lamb vindaloo, I learned to appreciate the sport of test cricket. I'm still a novice at watching it, as it can be difficult to follow (which, in some ways, is the point).
It's very good to be a fan of test cricket this week: The Ashes are being played. For anyone not familiar with the newspaper obituary image posted above, The Ashes is one of sport's great grudge matches. In 1882, shocked that Aussie 'colonials' had bested them in cricket, the England team burned some of their cricket equipment and placed the remains in a small urn, which is now the trophy for the ongoing series between Australia and England.
I bring all of this up because the inclusion of Monty Panesar for the third of five tests in the series, has made such a big impact. Besides being the first Sikh to play test cricket for England (he's the 631st player to play for England, in case you were wondering) he's a rarity, a "left-arm orthodox spin bowler."
This is to say that he has to depend mostly on skill when throwing the ball (akin to a knucleballer in baseball), but when he gets it right, he can really hurt the other team. Even at this early stage in his career, some people are saying that he could be one of the greats.
His inclusion hasn't come without controversy, though, because he can't do much else. He's not great with the bat, and he's known to make mistakes in the field. And for not being well-rounded enough, he was left off the team for the first two tests of the series for another bowler, Ashley Giles, who is better with the bat. Many pundits have said that this approach -- selecting a team of very good all-rounders -- has cost England the series. They've brought Monty back now, but it may be too late.
This has led to me thinking about how planners are not Monty Panesars. We're hired to be generalists, not specialists. Typically, this is because planners are expected to know a little about a lot, which comes in handy when working on a variety of accounts. I suppose this is fine when you define the team as one that includes creative people and account people. In this definition, account people are the business specialists and creative people are specialists in their chosen output (like funny television commercials, or websites).
But if you try to define the planning department as a team you can make selections that can make a big difference. You can have a creative director turned game designer. You can build an econometrics unit to measure effectiveness. You can even have an anthropologist specializing in the study of kinship. (I've been lucky enough to work with each).
I've come to believe that building the planning function in agencies is more important than finding the right planner for a particular account. Throwing the right expert into the creative game at the right time seems to make for more wins.
If this seems obvious, consider this: you could follow the countering trend in war strategy, which is to choose generalists because it maximizes your freedom of action. The objectives of military strategy have drifted from winning ground or share and have become more concerned with controlling the conversation. In Iraq, this led to a swift victory by American forces, as light armored vehicles made quick strikes on infrastructure like radio transmitters and supply depots, wiping out the Iraqi army's ability to wage war. Teams were built to work independently, without direct supervision. Multi-functional special forces soldiers trained for each others' roles so that teams with wounded soldiers could still complete missions. (I won't comment on how that philosophy worked after the fall of the dictatorship.)
Returning to the less important world of sport, the National Football League's New England Patriots took the same approach to staffing to win multiple championships. This following description of Bill Belichick's use of multi-function players comes from a New York Times article a few years ago:
He has become a master of deception by identifying players smart enough and physically gifted enough to play several positions. He then uses them in innovative ways. During the American Football Conference championship game against the Indianapolis Colts last season, Belichick kept switching cornerback Ty Law and safety Rodney Harrison, confusing quarterback Peyton Manning and baiting him into four interceptions.
Belichick stretched the conventions of the game further this season. Way back in training camp last summer, he was already worrying about possible backups for the Patriots' defensive secondary, just in case problems arose during the season. Knowing that wide receiver Troy Brown had played a little cornerback in college, Belichick began trying him out on defense, a highly unusual approach in today's ultra-specialized N.F.L. But the move looked prescient when two key defensive backs were lost to injuries, and Brown was ready to step in, even contributing three interceptions, the second-highest total on the team.
So even a couple of years ago, I would have advised department heads to recruit all-rounders like England's Freddie Flintoff. But now I'm not so sure. Perhaps there is some middle ground to be had. Here's a rough list that I came up with for creating a successful team of strategic specialists:
- Make a checklist of all the skills that you need on your team and then make sure that more than one person covers each skill.
- Create partnerships of two or three specialist planners ahead of time to meet specific challenges.
- Make sure everyone is fluent in at least one other planner's game.
- Hold basic training so that everyone is competent and has the same vocabulary.
Any other thoughts on integrating specialists into planning departments?
There's something important that I forgot to mention about Monty Panesar, and that would be his winning enthusiasm. Because of movies like The Seven Samurai, or Ronin, being a specialist is generally regarded as a mercenary, soulless occupation. And there's a lot of superficial ways that Monty's points of difference - his wearing of a turban, for instance - could have set him apart from the rest of the team, or from English fans. But just watch his reaction after he gets a wicket and you'll see why he isn't just another specialist player. Beyond all other reasons, I am a fan of Monty because he shows how you can contribute to a team with both skill and soul.
