So, IPAA had me on some pretty interesting projects today. Which would have been awesome if not for the colossal miscommunication between myself, my supervisors and the rest of the office…
I was given two major tasks for the day – putting together an e-document to be emailed to the thousands of people on IPAA’s contact list promoting an upcoming event, and updating the company website with photos and content from a previous event.
I managed to get through the website update without too much drama, ignoring the fact that whatever program I was using was frustratingly slow and useless. The fun started with this e-document. My marketing/PR supervisor said it needed to convey the various key messages of the event while still representing the organisation. I was told to include enough pictures for it to be interesting but mostly focus on written content. Easy peasy.
So I put together the document and showed it to my marketing/PR supervisor who loved it. I was rather pleased with myself for not only figuring out how to work PhotoShop in 20 minutes but also for following a brief and producing a first attempt that was of a high enough standard for my supervisor to not need to change anything. Clever little me!
That didn’t last long. The person in charge of the event itself was not a big fan of my work at all. Too many words, not enough pictures, and far too much focus on the connection with the organisation. Oh, and it didn’t communicate the relevant messages of the event. So basically, everything I’d been told to do originally was wrong.
The issue wasn't that i'd misunderstood the brief. the issue was that the briefs i'd been given were 100% conflicting, which was a serious flaw between team members.
So I made another document which supervisor number 2 seemed to approve of, but marketing/PR supervisor hated it. I have no idea which one they used. I went home and let them fight it out.
The moral of the story is, communication is kind of important. If an organisation can’t even agree on the key messages of one particular strategy it’s going to be pretty difficult to work towards a common goal.
And that’s the end of the story :)
1 comment:
Hi Dana,
I know exactly how you fill. I am myself working in a marketing company and I needed to do PR, Marketing and Graphic Design during my work experience.
I had times where I needed to design posters, direct mails, newsletters and banners for some of our clients and I was briefed the staff.
So, as good student we are, we follow exactly what is asking us to do.
However, when it come to design I realised that sometimes it is easier to deal straight away with the client, otherwise you will need to modify your work a lots of time, as everyone do not have the same opinion. I learn as well that in business, it is not about what we know or what we like or what we think would be good for the client but it is about what the client wants.
I also had some experiences during my work practices where sometimes we brief to the client some oriented and focus strategies for their company to increase the brand awareness; but at the end the client decide to follow his instinct and ask us to do what he think is the best for him.
So, I am totally agree with you that sometimes a misunderstand of what the client wants can’t be annoying and can be seems as a waste of time and money for the company. However, if we need to remember something from this experience, its that at the end of the day, it is what the client want that need to be done and not what we prefer.
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