Paul Everson is a director and Chief Growth Officer at Paper + Spark, an independent consulting firm specializing in business transformation. But Paul has also enjoyed a career with leadership roles in many of the world’s most famous agency brands, including J. Walter Thompson, Leo Burnett, Saatchi & Saatchi and Young & Rubicam. He is also a lecturer, an advisory board member and a non-executive director and a recent graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors. He is a living example of when you never stop learning or growing.
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It goes to show that even when you are, in my instance, managing director, you still don’t know it all.
And so, I think having that propensity to kind of tap into it and explore that for me anyway, was quite enriching.
Transcription:
Darren:
Hi, I’m Darren Woolley, founder and CEO of TrinityP3 Marketing Management Consultancy, and welcome to Managing Marketing, a weekly podcast where we discuss the issues and opportunities facing marketing, media, and advertising with industry thought leaders and practitioners.
Today, I’m sitting down with Paul Everson, the Director and Chief Growth Officer at Paper + Spark, an independent consulting firm, specializing in business transformation through data-driven strategy, digital transformation, marketing strategy, content marketing, CX, UX, conversational design, and communications who work with deep expertise in health, pharmaceuticals, and government sectors.
But Paul has also enjoyed a career with leadership roles in many of the world’s most famous agency brands, including Jay Walter Thompson, Leo Barnett, Saatchi & Saatchi, and Young & Rubicam. He’s also a lecturer, an advisory board member, a non-executive director, and a recent graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors. Welcome, Paul.
Paul:
Thank you. Thanks, Darren, for having me.
Darren:
Well, look when I started thinking about because we’ve known each other for …
Paul:
Years.
Darren:
More than a decade, let’s say. And when you feel like, well, I’ve known Paul in the context of Leo Burnett and Jay Walter Thompson, and then more recently, with the consulting work that you’re doing, but it’s not until you start to look someone up, so to speak, someone that you feel that you know — you just suddenly realize my God, there are so many more dimensions to this person than I realized.
Paul:
Thank you. Yeah, it’s quite a list there that you read through, but I’ve had a fruitful and colourful career.
Darren:
Well, one of the things I noticed Paul is that a lot of people on their LinkedIn profile, for instance, will have perhaps their base degree or some further education, but you’ve really appeared to embrace all of the opportunities that your professional career has offered to learn something new, haven’t you?
Paul:
I have. Yeah, and I think it’s an age-old saying that, a learner of life, and I genuinely believe that. That I’m someone who over-indexes on growth as a ‘value’ trait. And so, for me, it’s constantly about pushing myself, and that comes through learning and education from all manner of facts, whether that be an in-house leadership course that the company I’m working for is running or my own private studies.
As you referenced there, AICD, I recently completed that off my own bat. And it’s so I can stay abreast and up-to-date. And yeah, I like learning. I like being able to methodically work through things to be able to put them into practice in my professional life.
Darren:
Well, there are some interesting ones here; the McDonald’s Hamburger University. Now, that must have been when you were at Leo Burnett’s.
Paul:
Correct. Yeah, so I ran the McDonald’s business for the better part of seven years, I believe. And through that, obviously, you work quite closely with the McDonald’s marketing team and you are intrinsic to that business and they call it ketchup in your veins.
And so, part of that was going off to Hamburger University, where you learn about the operations and the understanding of the McDonald’s business and that framework because it helps from a marketing perspective when you are presenting ideas and marketing campaigns as to how the infrastructure of the business works.
Darren:
That’s fantastic because one of the things in this sort of fast-paced world is a lot of marketers forget to create opportunities for their agencies to really get under the skin of the business, don’t they?
Paul:
They do. I’ve been quite lucky in my career. If you look back at the likes of Proctor & Gamble, McDonald’s, Subway in more recent times at Jay Walter Thompson, and all of those bigger brands really immersed the agency within their own understanding and learning of the product.
And I think it paid dividends because we all had a collective understanding of how that works rather than just sitting and watching a PowerPoint presentation of “This is our product, this is what we do.” So, for that, I’m incredibly grateful for that investment of time because I think it paid off in the work and the relationship that we had.
Darren:
Yeah, well, I think it was David Ogilvy that said that “The best creative work actually comes from understanding the client’s business and really getting in there and asking questions” and pointed to the Rolls-Royce ad, where, at 60 miles an hour, the only sound jewel you’ll hear is the clock. And the engineer at Rolls-Royce said, “Yes, we must fix that clock one day.” But yeah, it came out of that intimate understanding of the product.
Paul:
Yeah, that’s a great example. And I think too, as creatives or people who are developing strategy, you have to be consumers of life. And so, obviously, not only observing from a consumer perspective but also, looking internally at what’s going on. And some of the best insights that we’ve been able to pull out are through those immersion sessions. And being curious and asking questions around.
I did a great campaign for McDonald’s around the early times of their sustainability. All their play equipment and surfaces are made from used tires. And so, that was a really rich insight that we were able to playback. So, not through not asking or having an immersion session would we have been able to discover that.
Darren:
Now, there are some great ones here, Hyper Island, which is a world-class digital and technology course. How was that?
Paul:
That was good. That was an immersion session over at Cockatoo Island, actually, again with the Burnett team. And I think one thing about Burnett’s back in the day, hopefully, still to today is they did invest in people and invested in performance development. And Hyper Island was one of those courses.
It was intense, it was a two-day off-site, but hugely enriching, and probably ahead of its time when I did it as well, coming into that era of digital transformation and digital disruption. I mean, now it’s just life. But back then, it was still new to us. So, yeah, hugely beneficial.
Darren:
Well, and also you’ve obviously invested in people as well and your management of them, The Living Leader course, obviously the Australian Institute of Company Directors and the Marketing Academy. I mean, these are all really strong people-focused training, aren’t they?
Paul:
Yeah, well, I mean, I guess the further up the chain you go, it becomes less about the work per se. I mean, the work is still very important, but particularly when you’re in those leadership roles, first and foremost is people.
Luckily, I like people, so that’s good. And I’m good at working with them, but you still need to just make sure that you are constantly refining and understanding how to start approaching certain situations.
And so courses like The Living Leader and The Marketing Academy actually prepare you for that. So, these are courses that are for senior leaders, and when you are managing large teams of people. The Marketing Academy, by name, is slightly misleading. It’s not a skills-based course. It is a leadership course on not only personal development but how to manage and get the best out of others. And that is a highly sought-after course that I’m forever grateful to be accepted into that alum, and working with those guys for a better part of nine months.
Darren:
Because they’ve got some terrific lecturers or speakers or whatever title, but people that are really inspirational in what they’ve achieved in their own right as marketers and leaders.
Paul:
Yeah, there are some big names that have been through the course or have lent their time to that. And I was lucky in my cohort to be placed with some really strong marketers, strong leaders that I look up to in that mentoring advice scenario.
And it shows that even when you are, in my instance, managing director, you still don’t know it all. And so, I think having that propensity to tap into it and explore that, for me anyway, was quite enriching.
Darren:
Yeah, I don’t think you ever know it all. If you do, you might as well give up. There’s nothing more to lose-
Paul:
Correct, what’s the fun?
Darren:
Now, I want to take you back Paul to little Paul Everson sitting there in secondary school and deciding what you’re going to do is tertiary education, and what made you choose and sort of set the career path around commerce and particularly marketing?
Paul:
Yeah. Wow, you’re taking me back a fair while now, Darren. But I always had a fascination with brands. And so, when I was growing up, Lynx was a brand that I used that my mom would buy me. And I’d look at the …
Darren:
A Unilever brand?
Paul:
Unilever brand, but I would look at those ads and the storytelling. There’s a famous ad about getting undressed, it’s called. And it plays back to the time of Lynx is all about sexual prowess and masculinity. And I just fell in love with that storytelling. And I was like, “I want a part of that.”
And there was another part that also fascinated me, the making of and the, how things came to be. So, not only the narrative but the actual production execution of it. So, I went and did a marketing degree and turns out hopefully, was quite good at it.
Darren:
Well, the proof is in the career, and as I said, you’ve worked for some of the biggest names in advertising. And it was interesting as I was reading through it, I suddenly realized all these agencies have names of men on them.
In this day and age, we’re much more aware of the benefits of diversity and equity and inclusion, but the big-name agencies were all created sort of the mid to late 20th century, and all by men; Saatchi& Saatchi, Leo Burnett was early ‘26. Jay Walter Thompson was actually from the century before. It’s interesting, isn’t it?
Paul:
It is interesting. And I’m glad it’s changing in terms of particularly now, with the indies coming through and a lot of female founders and for that, I praise and think yeah, we’ve come a long way since that time.
Darren:
But no one’s sticking their name on the door anymore, are they?
Paul:
No one’s sticking their name on the door. No, you’re right actually. I mean, some still are. There’s still some out there that the indies that still put their names on, but-
Darren:
Not many.
Paul:
Not many. No, you’re right. They’re all coming up with obscure, I guess to create some differentiation in the marketplace and how to actually break through that clutter as well because, at the end of the day, they’re businesses that need to promote themselves as well.
Darren:
Well, one of my favourite agency names was, I don’t know if you know this, but do you know the original name of Grey Advertising? It was Fatt and Valenstein. So, it was two good Jewish boys on Madison Avenue who started the agency with their names on it.
And during the First World War, there was quite an anti-Semitic feeling in the U.S. So, they decided that they’d need to change the name and they called it Grey Advertising and the rest, as they say, is history. So, there is no Mr Grey. There are just two good Jewish boys working in advertising called Valenstein and Fatt.
Paul:
Interesting. I like that.
Darren:
It’s a good bit of history. But look, the reason for catching up is a lot of the work you’re doing today is consulting and advising to not-for-profits and charities. Particularly, and I know it’s a personal interest of yours as well, isn’t it?
Paul:
Yeah, I mean, I guess it stems from when I was a kid, mom was a nurse and raised in a family to give back. So, for as long as I can remember, I have always done community work, and charity work, and have always been in that position to be able to do so. So, for that, I’m very grateful.
But I spent most of my youth, well, late later youth, volunteering at the Starlight Express Room at Westmead Children’s Hospital. So, we’d go there with my mom one Saturday a month. And we would literally go to Starlight Express Room and hang out with the kids, and we thought it was fun. But the whole premise around Starlight is, obviously, so they can escape what they’re doing. And so, I guess it’s always been ingrained in me.
And I guess once I got into marketing and advertising, I always gravitated towards the not-for-profits within the agencies. So, Starlight and WWF, more recently, the Indigenous Literacy Foundation, and started to really work with them to realize actually, there’s a job to be done there and a skill of ours as marketers can actually help them.
Because a lot of these charities, not the ones I’ve mentioned, but just there’s many of them that just don’t have the infrastructure or the resources to be able to put them to market. And so, yeah, it’s become a real interest of mine, and it stems from a passion.
Darren:
Well, you said there are a lot of them. There are over 60,000 registered charities in Australia alone; 60,000. And then when they talk for not-for-profits because they are different. A registered charity is different from a not-for-profit. And this apparently includes all of the trusts and those set up for doing good.
There are over 600,000 not-for-profits. But charities alone, according to the Australian tax office, had a turnover about two years ago of 150 billion for that year. I mean, that’s a huge category, isn’t it?
Paul:
It’s a massive category. And if you just look at the number in terms of registered charities from a marketing perspective, all that clutter, there’s a lot of them, many of them probably trying to do the same things. And so, how do you stand out in that? And how do you start to develop the cause, whether that be through funding or whether that be through activism?
I create action off the back of it. And so, it’s an interesting conundrum that I’ve been fascinated with and enjoy working with. I can’t help everybody. But for those that I am, really starting to put them on a strategic path to help reach their objectives as you would do for any private business.
Darren:
Yeah, it’s interesting as well because a lot of these charities are started by people with the best intentions. Either something has happened to them tragically or they’ve had something that they’ve become passionate about as you said, The Starlight Room, where there’s a need that is not being fulfilled by the government or other areas of society. And they’ve set up a trust or a charity to help that.
Others have been long-term. Many religious organizations, for instance, will have organized charities to do various good works. But it’s interesting because they’re all competing for the same pool of generosity amongst the population. What is it? 26 million people in Australia. $150 billion from 26 million people, you would have to say, there’s a point where you are basically just competing against each other.
Paul:
Yeah, and I think from that personal experience, it either comes from purpose, or they are generally trying to develop social change and create good in the world, to your point. Governments, in some instances, should be doing certain charities, whether saving the reef or doing some of the more sustainable environmental causes out there.
But I think when you talk about giving, charities rely on the kind of three pools of money. One is a kind of grant, and we know that not everybody’s getting a grant. Getting a grant from the government is quite a challenging process for these charities. Obviously, through philanthropy and that cause there, and if you’re a bigger one, you’re probably well-known and therefore, more likely.
But to your point, it’s around community giving, and that propensity to give, the studies and the science behind that is actually really hard to un-tap because you know yourself as a consumer or a community person, what’s going to make you stop and give out of your wallet?
Most people generally have one, maybe two chosen charities and or causes that they will give to. The rest of it is just nice to have. And it’s like you’re doing a good job.
Darren:
I recall seeing a Ricky Gervais video where he is walking along and this … I call him professional charity, people stop him and say, “Do you want to help the children of Africa?” And he goes, “No, no, I’m too busy.” “Oh, you don’t care about children?” This guy shouts at him, and he stops, and he turns around, and he says, “You are just doing this for a job. You’re getting paid to do this. You don’t care about the children.” And he has a go at the guy.
Paul:
I’ve not seen that. But I mean, interesting take on things. Hopefully, there is some good in what that guy is doing and getting paid, but it is that.
I mean, you are asking people to stop their day and consider and give. And so, that’s why the “why” for these charities are so important. And that’s where the fundamentals of marketing really come into play to be able to unpack that and understand and resonate at an emotional level with people to be able to give.
Darren:
And yet, my experience is that for the vast majority of charities, marketing is not necessarily core to the way they’re set up, at least in the early days. And even some of the bigger charities are much more focused on what I’d call almost corporate relations and building the right connections than they are working out a marketing strategy to compete in the marketing space.
Paul:
Yeah, I would agree with that. And I think over the course of my years of working with not-for-profits, that has been the case for some organizations, but I think once they get a taste of what marketing can actually deliver for them, obviously, reach, but obviously, distinctiveness against that clutter of 60,000 and really start to project the why which correlates into donations.
Then they can start to see the importance of marketing. But it doesn’t come from a natural place because a lot of these people, to your point earlier, have developed these charities or these not-for-profits out of adversity. So, marketing’s probably not their skill.
Darren:
No, but I think almost when they start to grow that they’re much more interested, obviously, in acquisition than they are thinking of marketing as the source of acquisition.
And what I mean by that Paul, is that you and I have grown up with a career in marketing, and we understand consumer propositions and actually understand how you position your brand within the marketplace so that it has a competitive advantage and things like this or a distinctiveness about it.
But a lot of it feels like it’s driven by relationship marketing, and I know that’s part of marketing, but it doesn’t actually come from that place of thinking of it as a brand, first of all. Very few charities are comfortable thinking of themselves as brands, and yet that’s exactly what they are.
Paul:
Yeah, you’re exactly right. And that’s where we come in as either advisors or agencies who do take on pro bono clients to really advise them and guide them in that way. Because to cut through that, the only way to do that is marketing.
I mean, of course, you can do relationship marketing, and you can work with corporates. And I guess it depends on what type of charity you’ve set up and what you’re trying to do. I know from those that I’ve intimately worked with very quickly, they start to see the power of what a brand can deliver for them.
Darren:
And if they’re actually working from a database marketing strategy i.e., collecting a lot of contacts and building relationships with them, having an underlying marketing strategy that works from is really important. Because it improves the efficacy of that database marketing, doesn’t it?
Paul:
Correct, and I don’t think they realize the potential and power they’re actually sitting on some of these not-for-profits. Because, again, it’s just not an instinct to them. And as we know, in our world, data is king and having that data it’s how you use it and what you go and do with it.
But I think more recent times, as the charities start to evolve, the goal shifts or the focus shifts, I think, with regards to governance and practices, and legal undertakings and policies, and procedures, and so on. And so, that’s when data starts to come into play at a board level, in any case.
Darren:
Yeah, absolutely. And look, a good example of that’s Movember, who we’ve done work with over the years. And a lot of people are critical of Movember because they’ve driven a charitable organization that then collects donations and invests it for the long term.
And some people think that charity should be about taking all the money they get and giving it to the relevant causes they exist for. But I think Movember’s following a strategy, which we saw — remember when Red Nose last century; Red Nose was all the rage as a charity for sudden infant death syndrome, but the novelty of the Red Nose wore off over time, and they tried expanding it and finding other ways.
Now, Movember, I think very early on, worked out that getting men to grow a moustache was going to run out of novelty eventually. So, they’ve already turned themselves into a charitable investment fund because they didn’t just give all that money away. They invested it, and now it’s often the interest of those investments driving the charity.
And it’s a different strategy to some organizations, which it’s all about getting as much money as we can in, keeping enough to operate on, and then handing the rest on.
Paul:
Yeah, and I think, like any brand, you need to evolve. And I think, particularly with charities, if they have met their mission or it’s become a little stale, you must reinvent yourself. And I think in those instances, the advice that if they are receiving backlash that I would be giving is to ensure that there’s full transparency in terms of what and how you are spending funding or community money that is coming through.
And then it’s up to the individual to determine whether or not they want to give to that. But at the end of the day, they are trying to find research and a cure for prostate cancer. So, you have to look at the layers of messaging and go, “Actually, that’s the end goal, how they choose to get there; they’re going through a journey and an evolution. But at the end of the day, hopefully, going to end up in the same result.”
I agree with you in terms of how you keep reinventing from the Red Nose to the moustache and everything in between, and that’s where, particularly from an agency side, when we worked on that, you can have a bit of fun. And help evolve those campaigns.
Darren:
Well, you raised the agency issue. Often working on a not-for-profit or charity was a real boost for the agency. It gave employees a sense of purpose and doing something other than just flogging products for their clients, didn’t it?
Paul:
It did. And I think it was two-fold. I think particularly about the agencies I was working with and the brands I was working on. It gave that outlet, but it also gave the broader agency a sense of purpose in terms of this is the cause we’re going to support through pro bono work.
And so, therefore, put a stake in the ground to go, okay, this agency stands for this, and therefore, we’re going to galvanize behind it, but they were highly sought-after clients and briefs to work on. Not only from suit strategists but particularly, creatives, because they knew it could be quite lucrative in terms of doing really good work.
Darren:
Yeah, which then can win awards, which then can attract good talent to the agency and the clients through publicity.
Paul:
Yeah, exactly. And I think it works both ways. I mean, you need to have a good understanding of your client to be able to say the reason for this. Of course, we want to do good work, and we want to help, but there has to be some payoff in the end as well. And for that, hopefully, it’s going to put us on the map as well.
Darren:
Because one of the things we have seen in the last ten years at least is when we help some charities with selecting agencies, the idea of doing the work pro bono has become few and far between.
Now, one of those reasons is because agencies are not enjoying the sort of profit margin that they had before, but also because some of the larger charities are not seen as having the same creative or strategic opportunities that they were in the past.
And you mentioned it in passing before this idea that as charities grow, the role of governance and especially from the board level, means that they become increasingly risk-averse.
Paul:
Yeah, and I think it’s certainly up to the client’s appetite, like in any situation, even the private sector as well, but particularly for not-for-profit who it’s probably new territory and new ground to go out with a campaign. Some will be a little bit more risk-averse, but others are willing to push the boundaries. And I think it goes back to the comfort level of the board.
And I know particularly, in the instances where I’ve been presenting work to boards is like anything, making sure there’s the pre-sale and you understand their limitations and their appetite before you go in. But I think they all want to see a change at the end of the day. And so, that can come from powerful creativity.
Darren:
So, if there was a charity or a not-for-profit that was listening into this podcast, this conversation, and they are not currently necessarily working with an agency or a consultant around their marketing, what are the sorts of considerations you’d say that is the starting point?
Paul:
Yeah, so I think, like any relationship, making sure that there are common ground and common understanding, I think there needs to be an authenticity as to why the agency is going to come on board or why you would select that agency to make sure that there is a natural fit for that.
And then understand what each will get out of that, particularly from a pro bono sense. So, when it’s a paid-for service, you pay for a service, and you get a certain expectation in return.
With pro-bono, particularly working in larger type agencies, even media agencies, there needs to be that full understanding of roles and responsibilities and what the output will be so that both can be held accountable.
So, like any contractual arrangement you would go into, I think it’s more important for not-for-profits to make sure that it is stitched up and clear at the start because you can get lost. I’ve seen it because agencies are busy places and conflicting agendas and conflicting client issues and opportunities.
And so, often, the pro bono is left to last. And it’s not out of any malice; it’s just a natural cause of the way the day operates. So, I think having that clear understanding upfront is key.
Darren:
Well, what you say to commercial clients all the time is, “What you don’t pay for, you won’t get.” And so, if you are a charity or not-for-profit, that an agency is doing the work pro bono, there does need to be an agreement of expectations so that both parties know what they’re going to meet.
What about if you’re a charity and I’ve seen this happen; small agencies that want to get themselves on the map will often do speculative campaigns and contact the charity or not-for-profit and go, “We’ve been thinking about this, what do you think of that?”
Paul:
I think great. I think that’s brilliant. There’s an opportunity for that. And I think I love the hunger, and you may get a bite. Some of these smaller charities are crying out for marketing expertise, and if a smaller agency can bring an idea to the table that has mutual benefits for both parties, I say, go for it.
Darren:
So, Paul, now, put your Australian Institute of Company Directors hat on, of course, within reason.
Paul:
Within reason, of course. And I think most charities have some governance board. And depending on the constitution, well, depending on what needs to get signed off by when, in terms of how much delegation is put onto the executive or the founder or the owner, whoever it may be — and so, hopefully, it’ll go through due diligence in order before it hits the marketplace.
And then that’s up to the board’s appetite based on their risk matrix as to whether or not they want to take something to market. And so, but no harm, no foul. I say try it.
Darren:
Well, it’s an opportunity, but I think a better approach would be to develop a strategy and positioning so that you could execute over the long term. It depends; I guess you could have a short-term, or long-term strategy.
Paul:
Yeah, I hope whoever is going in with speculative work has done their research and is presenting it. I certainly wouldn’t turn up with just an idea. So, apologies, that was a given in my mind that they would go with some structure based on-
Darren:
I’ve seen a creative team going, “Oh, we had this idea for your charity”, and it’s just a one-off ad.
Paul:
Oh, right, no, it needs to have context and ensure it aligns with that company’s purpose and vision. And quick Google, you’ll be able to find out all that information.
Darren:
And on a personal level, how are you finding this sort of world of advertising and marketing and consulting, which was once described to me as the world of opportunity? It’s expansive; there’s always an opportunity compared to the roles of you a non-executive director, you’re an advisory board member. And now, the Institute of Company Directors is more about governance and risk mitigation; do you think there’s a point where there’s a conflict, or is it easy to balance the two?
Paul:
So far, there hasn’t been any conflict. And I am on those boards and advisory boards because of my skill set. So, I think more and more marketers are getting seats at the table. And they understand that we can add value in the right ways.
And so, for my instance, there hasn’t been that situation, but I guess it depends on the board construct, what their skills matrix looks like, and what their need is.
The beauty of having marketers on not-for-profit boards is most boards need to do fundraising. And most fundraising comes from a form of marketing. And so, having that skill set on there in my instance and my fellow board members can counter has hopefully been invaluable because we’ve been able to guide, direct, and mobilize, which is the beauty of working in agency land.
We mobilize pretty quickly, and we make stuff happen. That land of opportunity you spoke about, everything’s an opportunity, I still have that mindset. I still go into that. However, I need to put a lens over it now based on the governance and the practices, particularly in the Australian charities, which is a board or governance, a body you need to uphold.
And so, you just need to cross your Ts, dot your Is, and ensure things. But I always go in a glass half full, , and then try and figure it out, or we get to a point where we go, “Actually, it can’t work.” But I haven’t come across that yet. I’m sure it’ll come.
Darren:
Well, where you find yourself wearing two hats and having to swap between, if you find yourself conflicted, take them off.
Paul:
Take them both off.
Darren:
Yeah, and decide what makes sense.
Paul:
Yeah. I mean, one thing I do in the board meetings is I say we’re not the exec; we are the board because very easily, in some of these not-for-profits, you can play both roles. Or some people that sit on the board can play both roles.
So, we’ve got rules of engagement at the start of each board meeting, making sure that we are here for long-term strategic play and governance, and making sure that we’ve got that hat on, and if we do find ourselves going into executive land-
Darren:
It’s a really good … no, no, Paul, it’s a good point. Especially where you’re on a board for a charity or organization, which is resource-poor, it is very easy to turn to the board and ask them to be more executive board rather than advisory board because, oh, here’s a whole group of resources, let’s ask them to do it because we haven’t got anyone else. And that’s quite dangerous as well, isn’t it?
Paul:
Well, it’s really dangerous. I mean, it’s dangerous in any business when an executive sits on the board and vice versa, and depending on which side of the fence you sit on, they should be very separate so that the board can govern. But particularly in the not-for-profit space, I can see how it can get blurred very easily to your point.
So, we have made for the boards that I sit on, and I guess just because I’m hypersensitive to it, having just recently completed the course, is ensuring that we are here for board duties and any exec stuff. And for some of them, I do dabble in marketing but can’t help myself.
And that’s when I have an advisory hat on for that particular instance, but I’m very quick to ensure I’m always handing it back to the team for them to implement. The last thing they need is another person muddling their hands.
Darren:
Well, I have anecdotes from ASX 200 boards where that seems to be something that many board members have trouble with, is picking up the pen and starting doing the marketing, or at least having input into the marketing. It seems that everyone’s a copywriter.
Paul:
Well, we’ve known that for years. Everyone is that, but there’s a saying in the board world, “noses in, fingers out.” So, you’ve just got to make sure that you maintain that. And if you find yourself starting to dabble in there, then it’s up to the chair, I guess, to pull that back.
Darren:
Paul, it’s been terrific talking about marketing for good with you. It’s a passion. And I’m glad you could take the time to share your experience and insights with us.
Paul:
Ah, thank you very much for having me. That was fun.
Darren:
I do have a question before you go, and that is of the 60,000 charities; which one’s the one that you put your hard-earned cash into?