All Together Now

Colman believes that the question is somewhat misguided and argues that the departments in question already work together, whilst the creative work or ideas rarely need ‘selling’:

“I think good agencies work coherently all the way through the process. That is to say they reject the idea that; the account team get the brief, hand it to the planner who re-writes it, he then hands it to the creatives who sprinkle some sort of magic on it, they then hand it back to the account team, who then try and sell it to the client. No, good agencies understand that strategy never ends, and all any communication is trying to do is find more and more interesting iterations of the current thinking.”

Northern Planner argues:
“Ideas ‘flourish’ and grow through lots of input. This includes the client who knows their business better than anyone. An enthusiatic team that believes in what they’re proposing (and each has had a stake in it) is far more persuasive than one that’s been banished to respective corners to do their job-espescially when the person that is supposed to approve the work has had a big part of it’s development in the first place…”

Some excellent food for thought.