Old vs New

When I first started my career with my current agency, I was assigned to handle one of the main brand together with two other small brands of a big company (Advertiser). They were one of the big client of ours (their yearly total brand spending were huge). After about 1 and half years handling the account, I was re-assigned to another two major brands of that company as my agency went into some restructuring process. All in all, I've worked for all of the 5 brands under that company. 

I learned a lot. From having no knowledge on how to do an effective TV plan to mastering the whole process. I gotta say that after 2 years handling the account, doing TV schedule seems very kacang tutup mata pon boleh siap, I'm no kidding! But of course, I have a good guru teaching me to become the TV master. I'm forever thankful to her.

This client of mine is very traditional. They believe in TV advertising more than anything is this world. It's measurable and they can capture immediate results based on it hence why we had so much hard time introducing them into doing digital planning. They are so traditional that they only believe in doing traditional advertising. Meaning to say that TV is their main medium supported by either radio or print media. I remember having to arrange some digital training to this client in order to convince them that digital is also working for their consumers. Finally, after 2 years of hard-work, they finally indulged with digital world. Sadly to say, we lost the account after 6 years. Sad! Sad!

Due to this, I was re-assigned (again!) to another client. I kind of don't like the new arrangement but I have no choice. They are very much different from the old one. They are very open, acceptance in terms of idea, willing to explore and very particular in terms of reporting. They just want to make sure that every penny is worth spending.

They are very much different (the old client and the new one) especially when it comes to media strategy. The old client is very systematic in planning their yearly brand plan. There would be some minor changing in between while the new one is not so systematic, change of plan every time. Hence planning for each campaign is very challenging. But the good thing about the new client is that they are not so traditional. They are very much into digital that I, from having zero knowledge on how to do digital planning to not-so-master-yet-but-still-learning.

On my evaluation form, I stated that I need to get more expose to the digital planning. Ha! hambik kau. Dapat sebijik.

I was having hard time coping with this. My new Manager is not so "mengajar" type. She reminds me so much of someone I know back in my old agency. There was a time where I feel like quitting because:-

1. I can't cope with having to plan a heavy digital planning
2. To cope with my Manager which was the main contribution to my quitting.

Rungut banyak kali pon tak jalan, so I decided to just deal with it. 

In my team, I am the planner while my Manager is...  a Manager. Since we are heavy on digital, there is a Digital Manager that work together with us but her role is just to advise on whether the plan that I propose to client is working or not. I will still need to do the ground work. The Digital Manager will roughly brief me how to do the planning and lepas tangan sahaja. Lepas tangan in a way that she allows me to explore in order to do the planning. Lepastu tercungap-cungaplah saya membuat kerja. But I don't blame her though, because at the end of the day, I got all the ilmu and experience.

So, after nearly 5 months of doing digital, I can proudly say that ilmu hampir penuh di dada and I actually glad that I'm doing it and for my Digital Manager to really lepas tangan because her lepas tangan really teaches me a lot. 

If it wasn't because of my annoying Manager and lepas tangan Digital Manager, I would still be the same old planner who doesn't even know how to differentiate a CPC & CPM buys, what conversion really means?, how re-targeting does and how can I serve well a digital campaign. At least now, I can explain how digital works if someone asks. Seriously, I was so dumb and stupid for being angry of the changes.

Changes is not always bad and it does gives good effect especially to your career growth (in my case). And it depends on how you going to take it. I didn't agree at first. Rasa sungguh down, de-motivated, and feel like quitting all the time. But I take it as a challenge. I need to do new things else I will still be stuck being the old planner. I believe that from time to time, we really need changes for our own good. Life is all about learning isn't it?

So, learn while can!