Photo:
Getty
Agencies face similar needs and challenges. New client growth, profitability, cash flow and talent are common areas of focus for every agency. Whenever any of those variables are out of whack, an agency can suffer in one or more of the other areas. However, of the four elements, one has the potential to make or break the foundation of an agency’s success.
Engaged and committed employees are key. Talent can make or break the other three pillars of an agency’s stability and success. Knowing this is one thing; creating an environment that supports and sustains employee engagement and contributions is another. Therefore, culture can become an agency’s secret weapon that directly and indirectly impacts every facet of an agency’s performance and success.
The level of commitment from the individuals who make up an agency is a crucial and intangible key to success. The elusive secret weapon of culture comprises many variables that all lead to the vibe and tone of an agency. To be clear, culture is not created by providing free lunches, snacks and scooters. Those can actually backfire when the more core fundamentals of culture are left unaddressed. When the focus on coconut water or snacks for employees becomes more of an emphasis by the company than work flexibility and more intrinsic factors, culture can suffer demonstrably.
Historically, agencies have had a reputation for being churn-and-burn environments. Agency environments still exist today that run operations according to a P&L that requires low-cost talent with high output. This is typically accomplished by paying talent as little as possible and getting as much work done as possible in exchange. Newer or younger talent come onboard to gain experience, and the agency maximizes profit from a blended hourly rate of executive and junior talent. This worked for a long time — until it started to unravel and backfire.
As millennials have entered the agency environment, they haven’t warmly accepted the more rigid agency structure and time constraints of work and how things were done. Turnover rates have soared as millennials were unwilling to simply accept traditional hours with low salaries and little to no flexibility.
Today, the vast majority of agency talent is comprised of Gen X, Gen Y and Gen Z team members. While millennials got a bad rap for coming across as lazy, entitled and a host of other unpleasant descriptors, they actually challenged the traditional ways work had been done. Even though they care about money, millennials are equally or more driven by the quality of life and life balance. Boomers and Gen X talent were conditioned to see long hours in the office as a right of passage to promotions and more money. Millennials don’t see it the same way.
To help explain the generational differences and perceptions toward work, a study done by PwC found a fundamental generational and attitudinal point of view unique to millennials. They found that for millennials, work is a thing, not a place. Flexibility and balance are about making their work fit in with their daily lives, and this does not align with rigid work rules around hours and locations for getting the job done. To them, everything else in their life can be done from anywhere, so why not work, too?
Applying this knowledge, embracing this mentality and providing flexibility in how work gets done is a key to retention of talent as well as productivity. Retention of talent has a ripple effect on client relationships, work contributions, training and a host of related factors. While some employers are reluctant to give employees autonomy over where and how they work, those who embrace the needs and asks of this generation will be rewarded.
Creating and fostering an agency culture that offers a degree of flexibility, based on the consciousness of virtue and altruism, can become an agency’s secret weapon. These values and this philosophy give people the environment to work freely, fully working from their own passions and empowered to do their best work.
Agencies must make the shift of perception that when someone says they need balance, they’re willing to get the work done and work hard but also need to feel like they have the freedom to have a life. Our younger generation’s natural proclivity to technology gives them a view of the world unique to their generation. To them, a 9-to-5 cubicle can feel forced and unnatural when they can feel more creative and balanced working from a coffee shop or another location when needed or desired.
Once an agency can embrace this paradigm, the work, retention of people, results and the profits of the agency occur organically. The acknowledgment that people are human beings with lives outside the office creates an environment and culture that is elusive yet powerful.
In today’s workplace and at times stressful agency environments, culture is king. While millennials came on the work scene challenging the norms, it turns out they’re actually helping pave the way for a more balanced and humanistic approach to agency life for all. While it still is and has been a bit painful for some boomers and more seasoned managers to embrace this mentality and view of work, in the end, everyone wins. Millennials and Gen Z have spoken up for what they want and need, while everyone has benefitted.
Rather than try to force round pegs in square holes, embrace the expansion of awareness that we are not robots or machines. We are human beings with lives of which our work is a significant part, but not the only responsibility we juggle and take responsibility for. Why not let your culture become your secret weapon?
