Which is better: One week off starting tomorrow, or four extra days off every month for the entire next year? A whole pie for dessert tonight, or a slice every night, forever? Five bags of potato chips (but you have to eat them all today), or a steady supply of free chips over the next 20 years? We all agree, right? The long-term play (or lifetime value) is better because long-term stability beats short-term success every time.
If you’ve ever wondered what the recipe for smooth agency operations is, you may be surprised to learn that the type of business you are – your size, how long you’ve been around, the services you offer – don’t apply. A creative agency of five can be wildly successful, yet an event agency of 2,500 can be stuck in a rut.
How would you describe your agency’s operations right now? Chaotic? Falling short? Missing a little something (organization, transparency, alignment)? If you recognize room for improvement, you’re in good company with two-thirds of the agency leaders who participated in our recent agency operations research.
We recently had the pleasure of sitting down with Marcel Petitpas, Co-Founder and CEO of Parakeeto, to unpick his surefire time-tracking framework for agencies. If you’re an agency leader who has ripped up your time-tracking methodology and thrown it out the proverbial window (let’s face it, who hasn’t?) then this blog is for you. Time-tracking is notoriously difficult to get right, but with Marcel’s guidance and the right tools in place, it really doesn’t have to be.
If you’ve tried RACI models for clarifying responsibilities in your marketing project management efforts, did you get the results you were hoping for? For some agencies, RACI delivers incredible clarity. But others find it a little underwhelming, vague, or even confusing. Divvying up project roles into four categories (responsible, accountable, consulted, and informed) is one way to bring clarity to a project.
Does it ever feel like following an agile approach isn’t as, well, agile as it’s supposed to be? For all the advantages agile delivers, there are trade-offs. And sometimes, the framework ends up getting in the way of business agility. Some are turning to a hybrid approach in an effort to achieve better adaptability — and greater agility — throughout the delivery lifecycle. This hybrid approach is a scaled agile framework called Disciplined Agile.
Did you know that businesses waste $1 million every 20 seconds because of poor project performance? It’s a staggering number for sure, and for growth-focused agencies especially, it’s a statistic to avoid becoming a part of. That’s where lean thinking comes into play: to help agencies avoid waste and inefficiencies and keep projects more streamlined and profitable.
With a laser-like focus on eliminating waste through continuous improvement, it’s easy to see why lean project management has caught on even outside its manufacturing origins. Today, lean has become one of the leading styles of project management across software development, marketing, manufacturing, and more. Companies ranging from Intel to John Deere to Nike have implemented lean manufacturing and seen powerful results.
The stats about email marketing ROI seem almost too good to be true: $36 for every $1 spent is a heck of a return. But results like those don’t happen simply by deciding to send a few sporadic marketing emails. They happen when you send the right emails to the right people at the right time, pushing them to the right outcomes.
Running a successful startup is like playing chess — it requires foresight, strategy, and careful planning. Before you make a move, you must consider all the possible outcomes and how your decisions will play out in the long term. The same holds true for startups. Unfortunately, many entrepreneurs overlook the importance of project management in setting up for success.
