For those of you interested in how to leverage AI more effectively for your agency, I’m hosting a webinar for CARMA on August 19 with practical advice for communicators. (Register here)
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Common advice for agency owners is to make the business less dependent on them.
But what does that mean? And how do you know if you have achieved that objective?
In this week’s newsletter, I try to frame your thought on this important topic by shifting the question around a bit.
First, let’s take a look at the latest SAGA content and see what Jen has rounded up for us this week.
— Chip Griffin, SAGA Founder
Latest from SAGA
CHOOSE AUDIENCE OVER ALGORITHM — So many things have changed in the PR world, but your job as a communicator to other humans hasn’t. In the latest Agency Leadership Podcast episode, Chip and Gini discuss what has stayed the same for PR pros through their many, many years in the field (because they’re old).
Jen’s Weekly Roundup
Here’s what caught my eye this week:
WHERE YOU LEAD, I WILL FOLLOW — At Spin Sucks this week, Gini Dietrich says your org chart, not your strategy deck, decides what actually ships, and having seven sign-offs can water down an idea so much that it no longer makes sense. On That Solo Life, Karen and Michelle discuss quiet cracking, employees who are still showing up and performing but are internalizing pressure and uncertainty. And on the For Immediate Release podcast, Shel and Neville dig into why AI workslop is a leadership problem, since telling team members to “just use AI” without guardrails simply moves the real work downstream to whoever has to clean it up.
EVERYBODY CAN’T BE AS UNIQUE AS THEY THINK THEY ARE — From RSW/US, Mark Sneider discusses the State of Ad Agency Positioning & AI Search Readiness —or the lack of it, since only 11% feel their websites are “very optimized”. Blair Enns tells David C. Baker on 2Bobs that most of what agencies are calling a positioning problem is really a strategy problem. Speaking of positioning, David put out a list of real, working examples of well-positioned firms. And on The Innovative Agency, Dominic Tremblay tells Sharon Toerek that leading with intention rather than chasing every big-name client is what actually built his agency’s advantage.
PATIENCE OVER PANIC — Brad Farris waited three years for his raspberry bushes to produce, and he writes about what anxious pushing costs you when you try to rush a business the same way. Courtney Spritzer sold SocialFly on her own timeline, telling Steve Guberman on Agency Outsight that owner dependency kills more deals than anything else, because a business nobody else can run isn’t really sellable. And on the Agency Profit Podcast, Elizabeth Thorn makes the case that time tracking should tell you where you’re leaking profit, not just whether everyone looks busy.
— Jen Griffin, SAGA Community Manager
Are you building a business or a personal support team?
It’s all well and good to say that you should make your agency less dependent on you as the owner, but what does that really mean and look like?
My suggestion is that the best way to look at it is to consider whether you are building a true business or simply a personal support team.
Your agency will always be, to one degree or another, a reflection of you as the owner. How you think and how you work create the culture of the firm.
But that’s not the same thing as having the entire business revolve around you.
Take a look at the team you have surrounded yourself with and how they operate day-to-day.
Does it feel more like a Hollywood celebrity entourage, taking cues and direction from you?
Or do they simply understand the vision, goals, and objectives and have the freedom to navigate their work with minimal intervention from you?
That’s the difference between a real business and a personal support system.
Neither is truly right or wrong. My Build to Own philosophy argues strongly in favor of shaping your firm around your own needs and goals.
If you want to be at the tip of the spear with a retinue of support to make you personally successful, that’s fine.
If you want to steer the ship but create something where you can pass the helm to someone else in the future, that’s great, too.
If you look at Hollywood, there are plenty of actors who go down the path of refining their craft and taking advantage of an entourage to support them in the roles they pursue.
But there are others who have chosen to branch out from being on stage or on screen to creating lasting business enterprises.
We may not be as famous as many of those stars, but we have the same choice with our agency.
Once you understand whether you want a business or a personal support system, it becomes easier to make the choices needed to shape your agency into what you want to own.
