Creative Marketing Leadership: Strike a balance between management and production (podcast episode #138)

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Career growth is a funny thing.

That is the goal after all right? Junior copywriter, Senior copywriter, creative director, etc.? We all want a career path.

But that journey towards something – often people leadership – can also pull us away from something else. And it can be the thing we were most passionate about and got us into this industry to begin with.

So when I saw this lesson in a recent podcast guest application, it grabbed my attention – strike a balance between management and production.

That is, really, one of the core challenges of growing a marketing career.

To hear the story behind that lesson, along with many more lesson-filled stories, I talked to Mary Church Cornette, CEO and Head of Creative, FUEL.

Hear the full episode using this embedded player or by clicking through to your preferred audio streaming service using the links below it.

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Lessons from the things she made

Strike a balance between management and production

When Cornette first started managing a creative team at R/GA, she learned an important lesson about balance. Balancing team development, and client satisfaction, while also making a great creative product. When she was there, Cornette was excellent at exceeding client expectations, creating strong relationships and trust with the client, and mentoring, training, and development of the team.

Cornette had great relationships, but she let the product quality slip. She was so consumed by all the relationships that she failed to focus on the primary, and arguably most important, part of her job – facilitating great design. Looking back, she thinks to herself, “how did I let that happen?”

Cornette reflected on all the positive emails, comments, and testimonials from members of the team and feels proud of those relationships but she also realizes how time-consuming being a good manager/teacher/therapist/co-worker can be. Now, she tries to still be the best manager she can be, but she’ll never let it be at the expense of the work.

Learning and adapting to new tools will serve you well

Cornette attended college at CalArts, where they didn’t teach design programs. They just expected you to learn how to use the tools independently.

She started her career in the digital space in 2000 and taught herself how to write ActionScript in Flash to create complex games and experiences inside tiny banners. For those of you who don’t know, ActionScript is an object-oriented programming language used for creating interactive multimedia content and applications on the obsolete Adobe Flash platform.

Knowing herself now, she thinks, “How on earth did I do that?!?” And also, “WHHHYY?” She’s a VISUAL person, not a programmer. Cornette supposes she had a scrappy, learning mindset even though she’s terrible at math.

BUT that ability to pick up and try new tools and learn new skills has served her well. 25 years later, she’s still ready to jump in and try something new. She is constantly pushing the team to seek new ways of working and identify new tools and technologies. She thinks it helps them stay relevant. Curiosity is one of FUEL’s core values, which stems from this key learning. Learning is so important, and if you’re not growing, you will be left behind.

Being open-minded, receptive to new ideas, and curious is essential to creativity.

Maybe

Cornette started her career in 2000 during the .com boom. She accepted her first job at a website and felt humiliated. Jackpot.com, launched by Idealab, was a sweepstakes site offering games like a million-dollar slot machine and solitaire.

She took the job because Kimberly Cooper, who is Kyle Cooper's wife, was the creative director at the time. And Kyle Cooper ran creative agency Imaginary Forces (which did visual effects for films like Se7en, Spider-Man, and The Mummy). And she thought “oh, I'm going to learn so much from Kimberly” (who later went on to co-found Prologue Films with her husband).

Jackpot.com later evolved into Vendare Media, focusing on email marketing and online advertising. For years, she would tell people she worked for Idealab because she didn’t want anyone to know.

Now, she’s proud to say she has 25 years of digital marketing and website experience.

It reminds her of The Story of the Chinese Farmer, the Taoist parable about a farmer whose horse runs away.

His neighbors sympathize, saying it's bad luck, but the farmer simply responds, "Maybe." The next day, the horse returns with seven wild horses, and the neighbors congratulate him on his good fortune. Again, he says, "Maybe." Later, his son breaks his leg trying to ride one of the wild horses. The neighbors express pity, but the farmer responds, "Maybe." Soon after, the army comes to conscript young men but leaves his son because of his broken leg. The neighbors celebrate his luck, and the farmer once again says, "Maybe."

The story illustrates the idea that events are neither inherently good nor bad but are part of a continuous flow of life, emphasizing the value of non-judgment and acceptance of life's uncertainties. What she thought was an embarrassing path turned into a great experience for the Digital Age… “Maybe.”

Lessons from the people she made it with

Build brands as systems

via Christian Kubek, former Creative Director at R/GA

Whether it’s a brand design, websites, or campaigns, Cornette is always looking at the system and how all the elements fit together into a complete puzzle to tell the brand’s story. She is interested in how brand strategy is translated into brand design and how those manifest in a website or come to life in a brand video.

She believes every marketing tactic is an opportunity to grow and develop a brand further, and the insights learned should be memorialized in the brand’s guidelines to continue to build momentum.

Branding and marketing tactics are just building blocks, and each block should be well considered so that when the brand’s city takes shape, it rests on a strong foundation [of brand strategy] and is made up of solid components. If you build your brand on a cracked foundation or are missing essential brand components, it is more susceptible to being destroyed by another competitor or risk invisibility due to neglect.

That’s why her company, FUEL, is positioned as a brand-building agency.

Cornette credits this way of thinking to Christian Kubek, who taught her to be a systematic designer. They worked together at R/GA from 2008–2012. He taught her how to create a comprehensive system of visual elements and understand how they all work together to create a brand and digital experience. He taught her that every detail matters… especially in user interface (UI) design. At FUEL, they apply that same logic to strengthening brands over time.

Appreciative leadership is powerful

via John Cornette, Chief Creative Officer at EP+Co

Her husband, John Cornette, is the CCO of EP+Co in Greenville, SC. He’s had a successful career with stops at R/GA, JWT, BBDO, and Saatchi and has been with EP for over 10 years. Because they both worked from home during the pandemic and both continue in a hybrid working environment, she’s listened to him present, coach, collaborate, etc., for years now.  He’s an inspirational leader and captivating storyteller, but it’s the rock-solid relationships that are most profound to her.

He extends gratitude and appreciation for his team members in big ways. Sometimes, it’s with “positive pranks,” like a desk barricaded with a wall of the person’s favorite cereal or surprise tickets to a Beyonce concert paid out of his own pocket. He spends hours on what personalized gift to give his team of creative directors during the holidays, again, paid out of his own pocket.

But it’s not just gifts; she’s just noticed a constant stream of acknowledgment he gives his team members. Even if it’s a simple “Appreciate you.” at the end of every 1:1 call. She knows that’s contributed to their amazing retention rates on the creative team.

Appreciation is really important to her, too. They use the Bonusly recognition program (which she adores) and send Good Vibes in their Workleap Officevibe 1:1 platform. They also have a Team Highlights section on their agenda every Monday at their Team Therapy meeting, post shoutouts on a Slack ShowAndTell channel, and hand out a FUEL Flame award every year. She may not always stack Diet Dr. Pepper bottles on people’s desks, but she does her best to make people feel valued.

Curiosity fuels leadership growth

via Kris Seitz, Leadership Training & Development, Wells Fargo

Her mom, now retired, was a leadership training and development professional at Wells Fargo, Sony, and other large corporations Cornette is a lifelong learner and naturally curious…Cornette doesn’t think she can watch a documentary without Googling mid-way through for more info.

Her mom has always inspired her to read, learn, and grow as a leader and as a person. She’ll never forget when her mom told her in high school that she used the word “like” too often. She was embarrassed and annoyed, but to this day, Cornette is hyper-aware of others who overuse the word. Her mom has been her leadership coach and cheerleader. Because of her, their shelves are overflowing with leadership and development books.

One of their core values at FUEL is curiosity, which is inspired by her mom. To have the desire to investigate, continuously learn, and explore new paths to progress.

Discussed in this episode

Fintech Marketing: Creativity and technology is a killer combo (podcast episode #50)

Creative Marketing and Advertising Campaigns: Hold the line & get a door kicker (podcast episode #84)

Building Brands: People and culture matter a lot, mentorship matters even more, product matters the most (podcast episode #119)

Career Adaptability: Marketing can lead to many other things (podcast episode #103)

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Transcript

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Mary Church Cornette: Well, I think if you're not careful, you might fall into a vertical because it kind of snowballs. Right. So you like, for example, I feel we had this really big opportunity to rebrand, part company. And for, it's for children companies in manufacturing. And we thought, oh, this is such an amazing opportunity. This is great. You're going to have five brands in our portfolio.

And, you know, it's it's great for our bottom line. We have a lot of opportunity to do some phenomenal work. A big long runway. Well then that sort of snowballed into additional manufacturing work and additional manufacturing work. And all of a sudden we're kind of specializing in manufacturing and go, whoa, wait wait wait wait wait wait. This wasn't necessarily the plan.

Intro: Welcome to how I made it in marketing from Marketing Sherpa, we scour pitches from hundreds of creative leaders and uncover specific examples, not just trending ideas or buzzword laden schmaltz real world examples to help you transform yourself as a marketer. Now here's your host, the senior director of Content and Marketing at Marketing Sherpa, Daniel Bernstein, to tell you about today's guest.

Daniel Burstein: Career growth is a funny thing. That's the goal after all, right? Junior copywriter, senior copywriter, creative director, etc. we all want a career path, but that journey towards something which is often people leadership can also pull us away from something else. And it can be the thing we were most passionate about and got us into this industry to begin with.

So when I saw this lesson in a recent podcast guest application and grabbed my attention strike a balance between management and production. That is really one of the core challenges of growing a marketing career. You're to share the story behind that lesson, along with many more lesson filled stories, is Mary Church Cornett, the CEO and Head of creative at your.

Thanks for joining me, Mary.

Mary Church Cornette: Thanks so much for having me, Daniel. Appreciate it.

Daniel Burstein: Let me tell the audience a little bit about Mary's background to understand I'm talking to you. She's been a freelance designer at VH1 online, a senior art director at Digitas, associate creative director at RGA, just some of the things I cherry pick from her LinkedIn. But for the past six years she has been at fuel. Fuel ranges from 1 to $3 million a year in revenue.

And at fuel, Mary managed a team of a half dozen staff, two dozen contractors and a half dozen strategic partners. So, Mary, give us a sense. What is your day like as CEO and head of Creative?

Mary Church Cornette: It's, it's a day where I wear many, many hats. You know, being part of a really small team, we are constantly kind of switching gears or overseeing creative to make sure that it is consistently exceeding our client expectations to jumping in to having financial conversations, jumping into conversations with, new community members to network, and then having lunch with the team to create, you know, great team culture and giving feedback and then jumping in to solving one of fire, you know, some fire, and then back to kind of creative oversight.

So it's just, you know, switching hats back and forth, back and forth. But, yeah, definitely keeps me on my toes.

Daniel Burstein: So it is that balance I mentioned, in the intro. And, that was one of your first lessons here. You said strike a balance between management and production. And how did you learn this lesson?

Mary Church Cornette: I think I learned the lesson the hard way. I when I first started managing a team at RGA, it's really where I learned the lesson. And I think that it was a hard lesson to learn because. So working really hard on balancing being that team development, you know, making sure my clients were satisfied with the work. I was, you know, mentoring.

I was helping to train the team, develop the team that was somewhat junior and I was doing a lot of things right, but not all of the things well. And one of the most important things that I let slip was really looking at that creative product and making sure that it was excellent. I got so kind of consumed by people, right?

Managing those relationships with the client, managing the relationships with the team, and my peers that I didn't really I took my eye off the ball. Right. And that in some ways would be my most important job is ensuring that whatever we're producing was excellent, was, you know, nothing's perfect, but, you know, really making sure that I was pushing it and making sure that it was, you know, to my best ability.

And I think that, you know, the lesson that I learned is, yeah, sometimes you can't do it all, but there's some things that you you have to know, sort of when to strike that balance and make sure that you're focusing on the right things.

Daniel Burstein: So now I can't help but notice your title is CEO and head of creative, which are two very different things. So is there anything specific you do, any process you set up to find that balance now? Because, for example, I've got a friend who runs a small agency. The two things he told me was one. He figured out some things he just needs to outsource, like he shouldn't be doing the accounting or whatever.

Someone could do it better than him. He should outsource. Another thing he did, which I thought was really interesting, creative because he's a writer like me, that was his background, is he would wear different hats, so he would be like, okay, I got to put on this hat now I gotta put on whatever the company had, this hat or that hat, you would literally take a different hat and be like, okay, I'm going to be in this mind frame, right?

And he also had whatever his creative hat was, and to just kind of free him up and to look at the creative. So when you talk about running an agency, running a company, your CEO that has certain demands or head of creative that has certain demands, is there any process or something you figured out to to get that balance right?

Mary Church Cornette: Not yet. You know, I get something that I'm still learning. I, you know, purchased the company and in 2022. So we've only sort of helping, you know, haven't been in this role as CEO for very long. But at CEO, agency owner as well. So it comes with so many new challenges and, and so many things that I've had to learn as I made the transition from creative director to CEO.

Ultimately, I know that, you know, a CEO is a full time job in itself. And ultimately, when we find the right person and take over the reins of, you know, creative oversight, that will really be the next move that needs to happen. So I can focus on more of CEO duties. But it is hard being, you know, having a 25 year career in creative to let that go.

So I think it's something that I know that I will continue to work towards stepping, you know, and empowering the team to really, you know, and you have complete trust in that team to oversee. And then I can just, you know, watch them, watch them shine.

Daniel Burstein: Yeah. Well, you mentioned you've learned so many lessons so that I guess it's been about three years since you kind of took on this full role about the agency. What what sticks out to the most, what lesson like, really kind of surprises you or, you know, kind of when you first signed up for this and bought the agency, you weren't expecting this to happen.

But now that you're living, it's like, oh, this is boy, if I could have done it again, I do this differently or know this now.

Mary Church Cornette: Yeah, I would say. I mean, the first lesson that I knew that I had to learn is to find the right financial team. Right, okay. And put them into place, which was really the first decision that I made, which was a very, very important decision. I would say, you know, again, I think balance will continue to be something that I work towards, right?

Not just balance. Like, I don't really believe in a work life balance because I think that there's there is not really, especially if we're working from home. Right? We're we're in a hybrid environment now. We have an office, but we work from home as well. So there's tons of flexibility. So it's more like work life integration. So the balance of multiple hats or my role as a mother and also a creative director and also a CEO, is just something that I'm going to probably work on forever.

Really. I don't think it's it's just something that sometimes you have to dial it up and sometimes you have to dial it down just depending on the business needs.

Daniel Burstein: Well, something that we always need to adapt to and learn is the new technology that's coming along. And you said, learning and adapting to new tools will serve you well. So how did you learn this? How do you do this in your career?

Mary Church Cornette: Oh, I love I love learning, I do. So I attended, college at Cal Arts, and they didn't teach design programs. They just expected you to know how and learn the tools independently. And I think, not all design programs do that. And I think that just helped sort of empower me from an early age to figure it out.

Right, to, to to be able to, you know, learn you learn new skills, learn new programs, learn new ways of working, approach things differently. And, you know, I think one example is I started my career in 2000 during the.com boom, and I started working for a company called jackpot.com, and it was a.com, and a lot of my, friends in school had gone to more elite design firms and I was really being pushed.

I had to get a job right away. And there was tons of.com, opportunities. So I took it. I took it because Kimberly Cooper, who is Kyle Cooper's wife, was the creative director at the time. And Kyle Cooper ran Imaginary Forces. And I was like, oh, this is going to be I'm going to learn so much from her.

And what I ended up doing was coding and learning and writing ActionScript, which I have. But for those who don't know what it is, it's, object oriented programing language, and it's used to create interactive multimedia content. It's practically obsolete now, but I was coding these little flash banners and games for jackpot.com. And looking back, I mean, I probably years and years ago, I looked back and I saw the code that I wrote, I couldn't read.

It was pages and pages long. How on earth I'm a visual designer? How on earth did I learn how to do that? But I think even back then I had that scrappy mindset of being able to. I'm like, yeah, I'll figure it out, I'll learn it. And I think now, 25 years later, I still have that scrappy mindset.

And I think it served me well. You know, as an as a small agency owner, you know, who kind of reboot rebooted an agency almost in a startup mode. And I think, you know, one of our core values at our agency fuel is curiosity. And I think it's that continuous learning. And I think all of this kind of connects, and I think if you're not continuing to learn and grow and you're not, you know, you have to be open and receptive to new ideas and new ways of working and new tools.

And don't get me started about tools. There's just so many that I constantly love to explore. But, I just think curiosity is really essential to creativity.

Daniel Burstein: Yeah, well, part of that curiosity sometimes is, you know, I mean, you're not a technologist. I'm not a technologist. I'm a writer, and I'm just partnering with those right people to get the thing done. And I wonder if you have any examples from your career of how you partnered with the right people, technologists or whatever to get it done versus, you know, we we need to know enough about it to be dangerous, but not to actually do it ourselves.

And for example, when I interviewed Melissa and, the head of marketing at Arla Finance on how I made it marketing, one of her lessons was cross-functional power, bringing together product engineering, UX, and marketing and watch the sparks fly in a good way. And she told the story of how they brought, like, AI and machine learning researchers in the same room as go to market sales heads.

And, you know, and that I started my career in 2000, that that is a big, big difference. I saw, I started I was working on print ads like Wall Street Journal, not I wasn't even barely brochure sites, barely doing.com, you know. And so there wasn't as much of this cross-functional need. I mean, you had the media buyer, the writer, the art director, the 80.

That's about it. But now so many things we can do in technology is so important. So kind of building that cross collaboration, that partnership with technology, AI, whatever it is. So key. So you have an example of how you do that. If you've done that in your career, get those right kind of partnerships going.

Mary Church Cornette: Yeah, I mean I think that it's those unique pod structures. It's like who you sit by. I think, and is influencing you and inspiring you on a day to day basis makes all the difference. I can't believe that great ideas can come from anyone. So I feel like the creative process is open. Whether you're an account or you're a creative or a technologist.

Your user experience strategist, you know, I think that being able to have that close collaboration and, and proximity to one another and being able to bounce ideas off of one another is essential. I think we're a small agency, right? So we don't have the luxury of having, you know, all of the different, you know, people and collaborators we need sometimes.

And so we have to be a little bit more scrappy and find new ways to kind of fill those gaps. And so we might be filling each other's gaps, or we might be finding new tools in order to help, you know, accomplish more than we could, you know, by being just such a, such a small team.

Daniel Burstein: And your next lesson, was just one word. You said maybe. What does maybe mean?

Mary Church Cornette: Well, I think, you know, back on the the story of starting Anaconda. And I remember being, you know, kind of embarrassed right? From that first job and then later realizing that, oh, that was a job where I was in digital marketing and websites when that wasn't a thing. Right? That now everyone is in digital marketing and everyone can make websites.

But I think now I go, oh, I have 25 years experience on this now. And I didn't see it then as a as a leg up. I didn't see having that digital experience way back then as being an advantage. And I do now. And I think that I love that story of the Chinese farmer. Do you know there's this parable?

Daniel Burstein: I had heard this. Yeah. I mean, I read it in your application, but I had heard this. But tell the audience.

Mary Church Cornette: Okay, okay. Okay. I'm gonna I'm going to I do have some notes because I can't really remember it, but it's the story of the Chinese farmer. What's a parable? And, it's about a farmer whose horse runs away and his neighbors sympathize, saying, oh, it's bad luck. But the farmer simply responds, maybe. And the next day the horse returns with seven wild horses, and the neighbors come over and they congratulate him on his good fortune.

And he again says, maybe. And then later his son breaks his leg while trying to ride one of the wild horses, and then the neighbors come over and express pity. But the farmer responds, maybe. And then soon after the army comes to, you know, take the young man you know, away to fight. But leaves his son because of his son's broken leg.

And the neighbors celebrate his luck again and say, oh, you know, that's so amazing. Oh, you're so lucky. And the farmer says, maybe. But the story illustrates that events are neither good nor bad, but all just kind of part of a continuous flow of life, you know, emphasizing that. And, and really the acceptance of, life's uncertainties. And so what I thought maybe was an embarrassing past turned into a great experience for the digital age.

Maybe.

Daniel Burstein: Now, do you have any examples of how you've applied that to campaigns or in your career? Because when I read that parable and I saw your application, I can totally relate. Like I have two, two examples from my own career. One, I was recruited here to come to Jackson by the biggest agency in Jackson, was one of the biggest agencies in the southeast, southeast at the time that a plane they had, off the Bahamas and all this stuff.

But I lost the job, I moved here, I lost the job before I started because the big client had this wobble with their budget and had to have these major layoffs, which is a challenge in agencies. And one of the things I've seen with agencies I've seen as a time and again is they win this really big client and oh, this is such good news.

You've got this big client. But the challenges the client needs the agency, so to speak, it changes the quality of the work. They've got to scale up their hiring so quickly. And, and in the long run, it hurts the agency. So that's one I've seen on the goodwill. We see something. Oh, that looks so good. But it's like, well, if you're not thinking like you said that maybe thinking of like, well, there's going to be another side to this, you're not planning ahead for some of these contingencies of how is this going to change the quality of our work.

Ramping up and hiring quickly is not easy to hire good people. That could change our our whole culture and all these things. Now, the flip side, I've definitely seen negative things happen with campaigns all the time. And sometimes that is the catalyst that you need to get a breakthrough and really understand the customer and make the change it really to get your brand to win.

And one place I see this all the time is with AB testing. You know, we've done a lot of a B testing. A lot of times you get a big loss, then it's like, oh, that unlocks something that now, you know, now we're able to make this change that makes a big difference. So something I've seen you talk about digital marketing.

Digital marketing is the data is flowing in so much more quicker than it used to when when I started my career, I didn't start as digitally as you did. We would do a test in the newspaper, would test different, has a different phone numbers. It would take was six weeks before you I really knew. I mean, you can see in the first few days that people are calling, but you want to run it for a while, right?

Now the data is flowing in so quick so we can pivot so fast, right? As opposed to, like, sticking with an actual, strategy and seeing it through, so I just want to give a specific example of, of how you use that maybe philosophy in your career or in a campaign or something like that.

Mary Church Cornette: Yeah. I mean, I think it it's so relevant because like you said, we're we're making really quick decisions all the time. Right? And things move so quickly all the time. And I think that, you know, when I think one example for us is so we especially our agency fuels specializes in branding. So brand strategy, brand design, brand marketing.

But we don't necessarily focus on one vertical. Right. Because we think for, for branding in particular, you would really need to have a bespoke process that would, you know, only serves a healthcare only serve real real estate. And that's just not true. And you have a really strong branding process like it's it's applicable applicable across industries. Well, I think if you're not careful you might fall into a vertical because it kind of snowballs.

Right. So you like for example, if you're we had this really big opportunity to rebrand, parent company and it's for it's for children companies and manufacturing. And we thought, oh, this is such an amazing opportunity. This is great. We're going to have five brands in our portfolio. And you know, it's great for our bottom line. We have a lot of opportunity to do some phenomenal work.

Big long runway. Well then that sort of snowballed into additional manufacturing work and additional manufacturing work. And all of a sudden we're kind of specializing in manufacturing and go, well, wait, wait wait wait wait, wait. This wasn't necessarily the plan to, you know, to to have such a strong portfolio. In fact, manufacturing is hard. You know, there's all these different, whether it's textile or polymers or, you know, there's all these I mean it's it's massive.

Right? So it's it's very, very difficult unless you just choose like one sort of subcategory like textiles, which we sort of have, you know, there's a big ramp up time, there's a lot of onboarding, a lot of learning, to learn manufacturing clients. I think that you really have to have a vision. You have to really, understand that when you're accepting a new client, potentially in a new vertical or not, what the implications could be.

Right. And so I think that's why so many agencies, do niche, right. They stay they stay focused. And it, it helps them quite a bit, because of that. But you I think you just have to have that that foresight into making sure that, you know, it's not happening to you, that it's intentional.

Daniel Burstein: Well, this brings up the $6 million question. How often do you say no? I mean, how often they said, like, I agree with everything you said in theory, but I could hear a lot of agency owners or even small business owners and in different industries, entrepreneurs listening and saying, this sounds good. We have to make payroll, right? And so when sometimes those clients mean it's you're absolutely right with strategy and division.

But like, how often do you say no?

Mary Church Cornette: Not as often as we should. Yeah. You know, and I again I think that's where it goes too. You know we need to niche. We need to focus. And I think that that that will help protect us. And then not to say again you're going to be, you know, experts just in, you know, nonprofit branding, you know, oh, we would love that.

But I don't know if that would support the bills. Right. That would make payroll if we were actually we'd love to specialize in nonprofit arts, but we we don't because manufacturing clients, real estate clients, you know, and some non-for-profit as well, they help, you know, they pay the bills.

Daniel Burstein: So those are some lessons from some of the things Mary made in her career. And just a moment where look at some of the lessons from some of the people she made them with, because that's what we get to do as marketers. We get to make cool things and we get to make them with other people. But first, I should mention that the How I Made It a marketing podcast is underwritten by MC labs.

I, the parent company of marketing Sherpa. You can get conversion focused training from the lab that helped pioneer the conversion industry in our AI Guild and a community to collaborate with. Grab your free three month scholarship to the AI Guild at. Join.mc labs ai.com. That's joint Mech Labs ai.com to get artificial intelligence working for you. All right, let's take a look at some of the people that, you learn from and work with.

Mary, you mentioned Christian Quebec, the former creative director at RGA, and from Christian. You said you learn to build brands as systems. So how do you learn this lesson from Christian?

Mary Church Cornette: Yeah. Christian, was a systematic designer when when I first sort of understood what what that was I think he had a ton of experience, you know, creating, you know, these micro interfaces for cell phones, for Verizon Wireless. Back in the day and when I, was working alongside Christian, he was extraordinarily meticulous. And he would really sweat the details.

And he understood systems. Think about a phone interface. Right. So it's basically UI design before we really called it user interface design. But all of the little pieces and parts have to fit together. They have to fit together into sort of a bigger puzzle that fits into an even bigger puzzle. And so I think because I spent so much time thinking that way and building sort of, those small pieces and how they fit into sort of the larger puzzle, like it built my way, and it just changed the way I approach design.

And so sometimes when I work, I shock other creatives and I shock other account managers because I'm so process forward. I might start breaking down problems in a spreadsheet or like a user experience designer and wireframes and that's when you see a visual, creative person trying to solve problems in that way. In a spreadsheet. It throws people off.

Right. And I think organization as a way to kind of control chaos. Right. And so I think, of it as an advantage because I think, you know, brand design or websites or campaigns, they're all elements that are fitting together to, you know, tell a story or they should be. Right. So I like to think of them as this puzzle.

Right. And how do all of these individual elements fit together and tell a brand story? How do they fit together to, to, to strengthen a brand so really, every marketing tactic is an opportunity to grow and develop a brand further. And, I think that, you know, branding and marketing tactics are just building blocks. So if you consider, really consider each building block, then you're starting to kind of create a strong foundation that brands can, can build on top of.

And that's really why we at feel consider ourselves a brand building agency, because we're focused on those building blocks.

Daniel Burstein: Yeah, I can't think in a spreadsheet. So well, so when you, when you talk about systems and building blocks and I'm thinking, what can you give us an example of any role you played when you're working on branding to the actual product or product development? So for example, when I interviewed Jana under zero over the CMO of Edu shape on how I made it, my marketing podcast, some of her lessons were that people and culture matter a lot.

Mentorship, mentorship matters even more and product matters the most. And she really got into and talked about how you cannot out market a bad product. And so I've had this conversation with many CMO is and that's difficult, right. You know, you stay in your lane. How do you get involved with product development? It's an extra layer of extrapolation, more difficult for an agency who is outside of the company itself.

However, that agency a lot of times, I mean, when you're in those brand exercises, you're understanding competitive analysis, you're getting closer to the customer. You're really understanding things that if those changes were made to the product, would make a big difference for the brand. Because at the end of the day, that brand is a promise and the product has to come through on that promise.

So, Mary, I don't know if you have any examples. You talk about the brand system. Has product development ever played a role in that?

Mary Church Cornette: It has, it has. And I think when you're trying to differentiate our product, you know, and you're developing the positioning and the story and the sort of key brand values, right, that is helping to create that clear differentiation. The product has to align with those values. And I think, like for example, LED, we were working on a product recently.

It was a brand that was really influencing product for THC beverage and organic ingredients, and organic, flavors. And was was part of the this is part of the values. Right. And sort of a core tenant. And there was some misalignment in terms of what that product, how that product was going to be made. But it had been positioned, so much so on, really relying on that organic kind of platform and natural platform and so certain additives weren't really aligning.

And we were frustrated. Right. Because it's so critically important to be honest and be transparent. And really, if you're saying something, you have to completely follow through and I mean even to, you know, packaging should be recyclable, like everything should really benefit the Earth. And you have to consider how all of those decisions carry through all of your marketing materials.

You know of. You know, you shouldn't have swag because that might go into landfills. How are you printing these things? Is that benefit the environment? What kind of inks and dyes are you using? So I think oftentimes product to clients who are developing products haven't thought about how all of these things interconnect. And I think that's another example of building blocks.

Right. Like that was a whole or maybe a deformed block that would put into place. Right. And that made the I think the entire product weaker, right. And until you fix that issue, I think it just will continue to be weak and sort of a weak part of that, of that brand and of that product.

Daniel Burstein: Yeah. You know, when you talk about building blocks and different parts, we don't own any parts. I think of too, like really the thing that fuels an agency is a team. It's the people. I mean, that's essentially what we're selling. And so like this next lesson, appreciative leadership is powerful. You said you learned this from John Cornett, a chief creative officer at EPA and company.

John, who is your husband? So how did you learn this from John?

Mary Church Cornette: Well, I've been, I think, through the pandemic. You know, I felt like I was, into an employee of Epi and Co because I just, you know, saw them solve problems and, and maintain culture and, and so I got to kind of peak in to their world a little bit. And I think that, I just have always been impressed with his the way that he's managed a team that has a team that has, incredible, incredible longevity.

They've been at the agency for a really, really long time. He's a great coach and collaborator. But I think what I've learned from John and I try to extend it into fuels culture is his gratitude and appreciation for his team members. And I'm sure that that's contributed to the fact that the team has, you know, stayed around for so long because I think, you know, when you feel appreciated, you know, you do, you want you just want to stay and be and continue to be part of the culture and he's done fun things like positive pranks.

Well, which I think he's still doing, wear heels, you know, stack cereal boxes like an, an overwhelming number of cereal boxes on top of someone's desk because he learned that, you know, somebody liked Captain Crunch. And so I think that it's the way he sort of personalizes the appreciation, that I think is so special. And I think you know, when people feel special, it's just so important that people feel appreciated for what they bring to the table, what they do every day.

And that they and then if you can do it in creative ways, then, personal ways, you know, I think from handwritten notes to, you know, I think if you can just go out of your way to make people feel like they, they're doing great work and that they're making a difference, it will it will be all the difference.

And in terms of just, you know, retaining talent and also attracting talent.

Daniel Burstein: You mentioned he bought some prize tickets to a Beyonce concert out of his pocket, which, you know, if you're a Beyonce fan, I got him. And that's going to be super exciting. Let me ask you kind of touched on this a bit earlier when we were talking about what you learned with the agency. So those are kind of nice signs and like doing things for someone.

A big issue with agencies in many companies is work life, whatever you want to call it, hours or whatever you know is there anything you've done with that? You know, for example, I interviewed John Reid, the CMO of I identified on how I made it marketing, and one of his lessons was marketing is not going anywhere.

And he learned this lesson he was at, I think it was publicist. And, he was supposed to go on a trip with his girlfriend and some at a big picture project came through or whatever, and he felt like he shouldn't. And his boss really encouraged him. He's like, go, marketing's not going anywhere. You get burned out. It doesn't help anything.

So I think, you know, with Covid, we saw the burnout stuff. We also saw working at home. We saw move into four day workweeks. But the balance is we got clients, we got to serve, and we got a lot of work to do. So I wonder, have you been able to do anything, when you talk about appreciative leadership, when it comes to hours, work life balance, whatever that type of stuff?

Mary Church Cornette: Oh, absolutely. I think, you know, if you're if you and your employees are not healthy and, and thriving in their and their personal lives, then they're not going to be thriving in their office lives. So we I think I spoke of this before. We're hybrid. So we're in the office together, 2 or 3 times a week.

We have half day Fridays year round. We have, just a ton of flexibility in terms of I don't care when you get it done, as long as you get it done. So there's a tremendous amount of trust, which we all learned during the pandemic, that everyone can actually do their jobs without, you know, buttons. It's at 830 in the morning.

So I think that, you know, someone needs to go to their doctor's appointment or go for a walk in the middle of the day. They don't have to tell anyone. They just do it. You know, they need to do they need to go to the gym. They need to come in late. They just. I think health and wellbeing, wellness is is essential.

And so I think that I think from my own experience I've learned, you know, after maybe the first two years of owning company, working every weekend, it really started to make it to just take a toll. And so I've really started to make health and wellness and exercise and, priority, as I realized I do have the time.

It's not that I don't have the time, it's that I have to make it a priority. And I think that, we try to encourage that.

Daniel Burstein: I feel so half day Fridays sounds wonderful, but I have to mention it's Friday at 322. Did I take away your half day Friday? Today?

Mary Church Cornette: It doesn't count for me.

Daniel Burstein: Oh, yeah. Okay. No it's not. Let me know.

Mary Church Cornette: That I have the.

Daniel Burstein: Different time. Okay.

Mary Church Cornette: So, like, this is fun.

Daniel Burstein: Good. Good of all. Thank you. Okay. Lastly, you mentioned that curiosity fuels leadership growth. And you learn this from Chris sites. Leadership. Who is in leadership training and development for Wells Fargo? Chris, who was your mom and is now retired. How did you learn this from Chris?

Mary Church Cornette: Oh, my mom, she's been, I mean everyone since then. Mom. Right? Everyone says their mom that their, a, an inspiration, but I think, you know, my mom didn't start the work into the workforce, until she was 40. And I think that was so, inspiring to me, you know, also kind of, you know, getting into this role as CEO, kind of, I don't know, later in life, but I think that, she's always been an inspiration for me.

I think I mentioned that curiosity was one of our core values at the agency, but I know that that that stems from her because she has always inspired me to read and learn and grow as a leader. I mean, she was in leadership training and development. So I turn around and then there'd be like for leadership books on my desk, like a hint, I think as a, as a young woman, she was always, you know, mentioning, oh, you're using the word like too much.

You know, I mean, I think I remember that so clearly and distinctly when I was in high school, you know, I was embarrassed and annoyed. But to this day, I'm very aware of making sure that I'm not saying I'm not saying like. And I think that that, you know, it's an important, important tip for living with for, you know, leadership training and development.

And she was constantly, my coach and my cheerleader and, I think, you know, inspired that that core value of curiosity.

Daniel Burstein: Well, having done a lot of interviews, some guests use a lot of filler words like, and, you know, and I don't think I've heard you say one filler word. So I think that lesson work.

Mary Church Cornette: Well, I'll tell her. I'll tell her you said that.

Daniel Burstein: You let her know that. Yeah. Do you ever. So you saw that up close. Your mom working in that kind of professional development at a major fortune 500 company, a bank. Do you have a specific example? Something you've done when you led a team to help fuel their leadership growth and curiosity? For example, when I interviewed Melinda mark cheezy, the chief marketing officer at Prosper Marketplace, one of her lessons was passion and curiosity fueled the best work, and she told the story of when she was at JP Morgan Wealth Management, another big financial company, and how they bring in inspiring outside speakers.

They hold fun events, unforgettable dinners. But they paired that also that kind of just fun, inspirational stuff with always having advanced analytics on all campaigns and brainstorm staff meetings and flip charts, you know, so they were just kind of always had their minds going on expanding and new ideas. But also, hey, let's have these analytics up, look at what's going on these campaigns and see what what new ideas come to us.

They're so on here for you, Mary, is there anything specific you've done leading your team to help fuel that curiosity and leadership and growth?

Mary Church Cornette: Yeah, I mean, I think that it it comes from a lot of different places. I think in terms of sort of traditional leadership training. We do luncheon learns. We had a great exercise just recently where we did Strengthsfinder, and then what was the I'm trying to think of the other name. I can't think of it. But the little cogs, I have to think of it, but we have, employee experience manager that's passionate about, training and development.

So once a month, she comes in and and teaches us something, or we'll have a guest speaker maybe talking. We had one come in last month. Who's talking about, motion graphics. So sometimes instructional leadership and sometimes it's something just to be a little bit more inspirational for the team and, and bring in unique perspectives. But I think, we're going to be starting, I think, a book club with, and sharing.

We're going to all read this, this leadership book together. But I think, in terms of inspiration and curiosity, I think we really look at each individual to understand what what did they want to, you know, to to learn and what is what is, you know, lining up their spirit and what are they passionate about. So we work individually during, you know, our, our weekly one on ones.

And they meet with my user experience strategist and you know, she's interested and you know, learning more about, you know, experimental UX ideas and motion. And so I kind of encourage her to kind of continue on that path. So sometimes we do group exercises and sometimes it's just about sort of helping nurture and support, and, and develop individual passions and, and, and interests.

Daniel Burstein: I mean, we talked about all these lessons from your career, and naturally, some of these things came out about what it means to be a marketer. But if I've asked you directly, you had to tell us directly what are the key qualities of an effective marketer?

Mary Church Cornette: I would say empathy is one of the most important traits, and I think that extends in a lot of different ways. I think it's, you know, deeply understanding the audience that you're trying to reach and understanding really what makes them tick. And, you know, whether it's using personas or, focus groups. Listen right to them, truly, truly listening to to what their, their needs are.

But I think it's also using empathy in an agency environment where you're listening to your team as well and and supporting ideas and nurturing. I think, you know, everyone comes to work with their lives, right? And you don't always know what's going on. And so I think you have to approach not only your marketing challenges, but your teammates with empathy.

Knowing or just realizing you may not know the full picture and, and just being there supporting whether it's ideas or, you know, work from, from that point of view.

Daniel Burstein: Well, thank you for sharing all your ideas and experiences with us today. Mary.

Mary Church Cornette: Thank you so much for having me.

Daniel Burstein: Thanks to everyone for listening.

Outro: Thank you for joining us for how I made it and marketing with Daniel Burstein. Now that you've got an inspiration for transforming yourself as a marketer, get some ideas for your next marketing campaign. From Marketing Sherpas extensive library of free case studies at Marketing sherpa.com. That's marketing rpa.com and.