Tell us a bit about yourself and your current role?
After finishing university with the bachelor’s degree in brand management, I started my professional career as an intern in the strategy department of an international digital agency. Today, I am senior strategic planner at GGH MullenLowe in Hamburg. In this role, it’s my responsibility to ensure the consistent growth of brand and communication strategies for several FMCG and OTC brands in Germany. As GGH MullenLowe is part of a global network my responsibility also goes beyond the German market. We usually join the local forces in order to develop global strategies. Giving the local market perspective and ensuring a continuous exchange of views is a pleasant and always surprising part of the day-to-day.
How did you get your start as a strategist? What led you to pursue it as a career?
The time I spent at university paved my way to become a strategist, it showed me that this job is the perfect way to combine an overall interest for people and their behavior with my enthusiasm for brands and their communication.
This excitement remains to this day and makes my job an ever-lasting joy.
What set of skills do you believe it takes for a strategist to thrive in the current advertising landscape?
Strategy is all about creating a deep understanding for people – their fears, wishes, and ambitions. With a mass of data, it seems like it has never been easier to comprehend what drives people in different situations. But this is only half of the truth. The flood of data makes the small insights, that appear through casual observation fall from view. Therefore, I am convinced that empathy and the understanding for what really resonates with people will always remain the most important skill for a strategist.
As the world around us is getting more complex day by day, being a strategist becomes more challenging as it’s our main task to understand this new complexity and dive into it, to make things simple. In a nutshell: A good strategist is able to reduce complexity with precision while being inspirational and opening new worlds at the same time.
What’s the most challenging aspect of the job? What helps keep the work interesting for you?
Based on the new opportunities to track brand and communication performance, the way our industry is evaluating campaigns has massively changed, and we somehow lost trust in (professional) gut feelings. Lost in discussion around short-term performance and cost-efficacy, the long-term effect of brand communication is sometimes hard to argue. Encouraging the team, partners and clients to do what is right in the long-term, means from a brand perspective, not just to go for the quick wins. That is definitely a big challenge.
But as every job has its own challenges it is pretty easy to tolerate this. Especially, as being a strategist is rich in variety of tasks. Starting with the deep dive into new branches and products. Or the search for the best solutions to different business and communication challenges. The most interesting thing about that: There is never a right or wrong. So, it’s never boring, that’s a promise.
Is there a part of the role that you feel is often misunderstood?
As a strategist, you are often in the position of being the mediator between client and creative colleagues. This sometimes leads to the perception of strategists being the devil’s advocate, and I think this is exactly the biggest misunderstanding of the job. Because in the end we all long for the best results. While a strong strategy makes creative work even more impactful, a strong strategy is nothing without an excellent creative execution. So, it’s all about joining forces in order to create work that resonates with people.
Do you have any advice for those looking to work in a similar role?
There is just one simple thing. Stay curious and leave your eyes wide open when moving down the streets, talking to people, joining events, etc. The small insights you’re casually collecting are potentially the key to success for the next strategic development you will work on.
And one last thing: Strategy is also about having fun – don’t underestimate this.
How do you keep your finger on the pulse of culture? Where do you look for inspiration?
There is no one way to keep your finger on the pulse of time, but as is often said sometimes a conversation is more helpful than a huge global survey. Contact with people is what keeps me updated, practicing with my teammates, visiting diverse events, going out with friends as well as reading up on pop culture, surfing through blogs and magazines.
And of course, my mail post box is flooded with different newsletters from business consultancies, market research companies, futurologists etc.
In addition to that, it is very helpful to stay updated on the advertising industry itself as it ideally reflects what drives people at the moment.