It’s been just over 100 days since I started working at Marbury Creative Group. For those that aren’t strong in math, that’s just over 3 months. As is often the case, this milestone is used as an internal yardstick to look back and assess progress that has been made from the start to this point (just ask any former US president). As a former military officer and defense contractor focused on operational issues for the last 30 years, I can tell you that I have already progressed tremendously. For example, I now scrutinize all types of advertising that I see and hear, have graduated from using basic Calibri font (very operational) to the more exotic fonts, and am starting to incorporate colors and graphics into my written documents. As you can see, my creative side has grown exponentially! The team has really made me a part of the family, and they inspire me every day with their spontaneity, creativity, dedication to client service, and outside-the-box thinking.
However, while I have been growing creatively, I have also had the opportunity and privilege to engage with the team in developing critical internal and external operational procedures. Over the last 100 days, the Marbury team has made tremendous progress with regards to establishing and standardizing our strategic business processes and tactics; this is in large part due to the Marbury leadership team making a committed decision to increase our organizational effectiveness. To that end, we have employed the tenets of Gino Wickman’s Entrepreneurial Operating System (EOS)1 throughout the agency, and the results have been outstanding, and we are just getting started!
As a group, we are more focused on our short- and long-term goals, more accountable, better communicators, more integrated as a team, and much more intentional in our processes and procedures. We have established a complete vision for our agency, with complete buy-in from all team members. We are communicating up and down the leadership chain, and are striving to be as transparent as possible. Everyone within the agency knows what is happening, and everyone knows what they are responsible for regarding business operations. You may be thinking “I’ve heard of this before,” and you’re right. These tenets are firmly ground in the applications of solid leadership, and can be applied across the entire spectrum of civilian, commercial, and military operations. Hopefully you’ve been able to experience this type of leadership in action. Rob Marbury and Shelly Hoffman “lead from the front” and they both know the positive impact that effective leadership can have on an organization. The many benefits of implementing the EOS have made us better problem-solvers and business planners, which in turn allows us to provide world-class creative customer service to our clients!
My first 100 days here have been amazing! I already feel like part of the Marbury team and a part of the family. It’s very exciting to see how the agency is developing as we continue to implement and sustain the EOS, and I look forward to updating our progress on our blog as we continue our implementation. As Gino Wickman says, it’s not about the destination, it’s about the journey.2 And I know that I speak for everyone here that we look forward to having our clients journey with us down this road!
Until next time…
1Wickman, Gino (2011). Traction: Get a Grip on Your Business. BenBella Books, Inc. Dallas, Texas
2 Ibid.
