Coinciding with our 10th anniversary celebrations, our recent Strategy Conference, which took place at Jimmy’s Farm on a gloriously hot September day, was always destined to be a special one for our team.
Bringing together 50+ employees, our conference provides clarity of direction; leaving each team member inspired, motivated, and ready for what the next 6 months holds for us.
“I heard a really good quote that explains how great teams stay connected, and that’s what we’re doing today, bringing everyone together and really forming that one team”
Dan Long, Developer
With several new starter introductions to be had, we initiated our day with an ice-breaker and one of our favourite Strategy Day surprises to date…
StrategiQ’s take on Top Trumps
Created through a few imaginative brains and some pretty hilarious AI prompts, our ‘Top Trumps’ deck quickly stole the show and garnered plenty of laughs from the wider team. The deck includes a card for each member of the StrategiQ team and a personal ‘superpower’, as picked out by each individual’s line manager.
The idea for this project was actually born during a meeting in which a group of us were trying to solve a challenge for one of our clients. Sometimes, creativity comes to you in the strangest of places, and there’s a lot to be said for the value of sitting down and putting a few brilliant heads together.
The scoring system and categories on each card are based on the team’s current Mojo scores, which looks at the core motivators which drive each of us. For example, those with a high ‘Expert’ score tend to be our knowledge-hungry, learning-oriented people, and those with high ‘Builder’ scores are known for being more goal-oriented – and perhaps a little competitive, too!
Mojo’s complete motivational mapping tool has nine categories in total and is a resource used across the company to ensure that managers and mentors are empowered to best support the members of their team. The motivators allow us to celebrate the individual strengths and personalities of each member of the team, which is ultimately what the Top Trumps idea was all about.
“Blown away by the work and effort put into making the strategy conference such an amazing experience for all of us – so many lovely details which did not go unnoticed”
Corrie Jones, Head of Content & Social Media
10 years of failing and building
The next surprise sat within the talented hands of our resident videographer, Mike Wilson, who, after many very long evenings of file hunting and image logging (and with the support of Keiran and Sam), created an emotive, Netflix trailer-style video to mark our milestone year.
Designed to illustrate the success, growth, learnings and vision from our co-founders, Andy and Sarah, we premiered this to our team to kick-start our day of reflections – and what a response it received!
Andy followed this with an eye-opening statement: “Within their first 10 years, 65% of businesses fail, according to the BLS. According to the same source, just 25% of businesses survive 15 or more years. It is a testament to each and every one of our exceptional team members and their drive to succeed, that we stand here and are continuing to grow today.”
We have had our share of challenges along the way, (with two robberies and Covid-19 coming straight to mind), but all are outweighed by the incredible achievements of the team – what a privilege it is to work alongside these champs!
Celebrating a great year
The day gave us a chance to remind ourselves of the goals we had set at January’s Strategy Conference and a few things that have made us proud. This included:
- Performance:
- 27% growth in the toughest market we’ve ever experienced
- Multiple award wins and nominations
- People:
- Continue to strengthen our team with the right people on the right seats
- Recruited in our Strategy, CX and SEO disciplines
- Launched our new employee benefits package
- Process:
- Improved our briefing, pitching and overall sales approach
- Introduced our new onboarding procedure
..and, most importantly, we continued to provide integrated value across our indispensable partnerships – with NPS scores averaging at 75% and a Drum Recommends rating of 8.9.
The vision
Despite any failures, we have continued to succeed because we have a shared vision and are firmly taking our position in the elite agency space. Our Strategy Conference makes for the perfect opportunity to sit back, reset and remember why we exist as an agency.
While repositioning, we landed on three promises:
- Commitment: The decision to be accountable to the needs of many.
- Cooperation: To give up on the ‘me first’ mentality.
- Collaboration: To reach the full height of WE.
It’s always strategy.
As we move into defining our growth narrative, it is clear that we will be integrated in a way that we have never been before – delivering from our very foundations a ‘One Team. One Agency, One Strategy’ approach.
- One team – that puts the challenge first
- One agency – that puts the client first
- One strategy – that puts integrated value first
Starting as we mean to go on, we have already transformed our organisational chart to illustrate our laser focus on client-first, strategy-centric mentality. Our refined set-up highlights that we are all strategists by trade; here to be a critical factor in clients’ success.
“We’ve got some fantastic teams across the disciplines but to be truly integrated we really need to be one team all together working for the same common cause for our clients.”
Tyler Webb-Harding
This movement will see changes in the way we think, communicate, and implement strategic thinking. Thankfully, everyone wants to be a part of it…
Anniversary antics
With the weather hovering around 30°, we ended the afternoon with some light relief, playing ‘strategic’ garden games and enjoying a glass of bubbly.
A day at Jimmy’s Farm wouldn’t be complete without an enrichment experience with the animals. From feeding monkeys popcorn pinecones to keeping hold of slithering snakes – our team got to experience it all!
It was a fabulous day of celebrating 10 years of StrategiQ – why not watch our round-up?
“So inspiring. It’s amazing to know that I’m going to be part of this amazing team – there are so many talented people around me. What an amazing venue and focus to start the new financial year.”
Lucy Edwards, Office Manager
Feeling inspired? Take a look at our current vacancies…who knows, you could be at our 20th Anniversary event!
