Working with the best people

Grant Leboff: Thomas, one of the things you talk about in the book is the importance of marketing people working with the best, which on face value sounds a good option to work with the best people. How, if you’re a marketing director how do you go about making sure you are working with the best?

Thomas Barta: Well that’s a very important question. I’ll tell you why it’s important. Working with the best is so important because in marketing you are multiplying things. The smallest thing you do to campaign the product, everything you create gets seen by a lot of people. Everything you create is so important because it gets multiplied. That’s why its so crucial it’s really good.

Lot of marketers work with people next door. If you’re in London, you work with marketer in London or with agencies in London. If you’re in New York, you have agencies in New York. If you’re in Munich, you have agencies in Munich. Now that would assume for that to be right, you have to assume that the best people happen to be next door. That is very rarely the case.

Steve Jobs – and there’s a lot of things marketers cannot learn from Steve Jobs including managing people, by the way – But what he did really well is he got the best people on board. He flew to Japan to get the latest drives for his early PCs. Adidas the sports brand, much of their such success was based on a very small agency in Denmark called Red. Just because that’s where the best talent was. First of all, if you only work with people next door, the chances are that you haven’t done your homework. What you do is, in your industry look out who are the best people. Who are the best people in around the world? Who do the best campaigns? Who do the best part developments? Look at what the best, the winning campaigns are and see can you work with those guys.

We have examples of an Asian marketer using a Brazilian agency for soft drinks. It created a huge success, almost doubled sales in a certain period. That’s how I would do it.

Grant Leboff: What’s interesting about what you say in the book. I mean obviously today we’ve globalization and technology you can do some of that from your desk. But I think one of the things that’s important in the book and you made the point is, get out. Go to events, go to conferences, get out and sort of see the world. Is that something that you would strongly recommend for the best marketing leaders to do?

Thomas Barta: If you go out that’s where you meet the people. I know that sometimes going to marketing conferences can be tricky because everybody’s on your back and wants something. But I’d say go to important conferences and not just in your backyard but go to other cities, go to other countries and see what talent is out there. You only need one great pick a year that can already make a huge difference.

Grant Leboff: When a marketing person’s looking for the best talent, what would you say they’re looking for? Are there any sort of hints and tips you could give a marketing person to start identifying where that talent is?

Thomas Barta: You’re looking for distinctiveness. You’re looking for someone who has in their industry or in their profession created something remarkable. Something that people talk a lot about. Something that has created a real business impact somewhere and some people can prove that. I would start there. Look for success.

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