MDW Boulder April '11 | Matt Howell_New Teams and Process for Making Digital Work

BOULDER DIGITAL WORKS
PROCESS AND STRUCTURE

Thursday, April 28, 2011

Mayhem on Madison Ave Don Draper’s Revenge

or

2

What I believe:

Whether we like it or not, advertising agencies are getting
into the software business.

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By no means are traditional channels going away, but...

“It is much better to have a
smaller share of an exploding
industry versus a growing share in
a declining industry.”

- Rishad Tobaccowalla,
4A’s Conference

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My experience:

Then: small Now: big
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The challenge:

How can we transition teams, processes and cultures that
have for 50+ years, been focused on producing one thing,
very quickly get good at producing something entirely
different. Without ruining what’s already in place.

6

Thinking about process and structure.

The work.

The people needed to build the work.

The process through which the work is realized.


1: The work.


What we’re making is different than it was
18 months ago.


For starters, we’re making a lot more stuff.

Yahoo’s Duncan Watts, in his “influencers” research, used a lighting many fires
analogy that points to the fact that digital media drives cumulative
advantage. He suggests brands are better off “placing lots of bets to give the
best chance of starting a full forest fire - lots of fires in lots of promising
places.”

The cost efficiencies of digital media allow marketers to hedge bets and not
bet the farm on one thing - make ten and see what takes.


A new metaphor.

Grow through volume / diversity.

Bet it all on a couple :30’s.


1. Our work is now more varied.


Put more out there, more frequently.
Campaign in market:
increased awareness, conversation, advocacy

Traditional
Cycle

Campaign goes dark:
conversation volume drops markedly

Distributed
Cycle

Diversity breeds sustained activity:
steady levels of awareness, conversation, advocacy


2. Our work is also more complex.

Digital work is typically the product of a very large number
of small but important decisions carried out across a quick,
iterative development process.


Hierarchal structure incompatible with this process.

GAD
Agency / Client Leadership CCO

CD’s
Account / Client Leadership AD’s

time
AE’s
AD’s / CW’s
Producers
Project Managers
Project Teams Support Staff


2: The people needed to make the work.


Two big, recent inﬂuences on the way we staff.

The work itself is materially different, and those differences
should be reﬂected in the composition of the teams.

Procurement groups ask that we create more work for
less money.


A simple fact.

Maintaining the same team structure + process
while expecting a markedly different work
outcome, is, well, crazy.


Shift team composition to focus on making.
fig. 1 fig. 2
Account Lead
AD Leader P Planner
Account Lead
AD Lead P Planner

AS IAS
IP IP IP EP BP
AE AE AE IAE
Producers
Account Management Interactive A.M.

UX D E SM
IP EP T BP
User Developer Editor / Motion Social Media
Int. Prod Event Prod. Traffic Broadcast Producer Experience Graphics Manager


Becoming nimble by ﬂattening and creating groups.

x-disciplinary leadership team

Team 1 Team 2 Team 3

Hierarchical Org Structure
Teams work with greater autonomy / accountability


Rebuilding teams around a new building block.

Knowledge across disciplines

Core discipline expertise

http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/95/design-strategy.html?page=0%2C1


The T-shaped team.

Goal: Be brutally reductive. Strip team to its essential components,
add only when necessary. Bigger = worse.

2

Creative Technology Production UX


The T-shaped team.

2

Creative Technology Production UX

Concept / Project / Client Functionality /
Implementation
Design + Tone Management User Interaction


A wrinkle: diversity of new work is blurs ownership.

Narrative-driven ARG lead by creative team. Community + tool based service lead by UX and Social teams.


3: The process through which the work is realized.


Poorly designed teams.

Bloated teams = slow, waste of time.


Poorly designed physical environments.

Use co-location / technology to mediate gaps.


Poor substitutions for collaboration.

Email volume = communications breakdown = trouble.


Restrictive processes that will suffocate creativity.

Process must work for you, not vice versa.


Applying the appropriate process to a project.
Replication, minimization of risk, error

Bespoke process, accept variance + risk


Small, empowered teams.
Tight co-location.
Deep, informal client participation.
Minimal, ﬂexible, iterative process.
Embrace the unexpected, anticipate change.


A traditional proxy for digital process.

The shoot.

But imagine if the shoot lasted three months instead of
two days.


You can change your culture through work.


Above all. Try new shit. Fiddle with new things. All the time.

No one has this ﬁgured out.

Shift burden from proving why you should experiment to why
you shouldn’t.

Doing nothing is going to put you behind.


BOULDER DIGITAL WORKS
THANK YOU


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