Hi friend – Rob here.

Today in Salmon Theory+: a summary of 'Man's Search For Meaning', by Viktor Frankl.

A tough book, but that's why it's worth the read.

It gives you perspective.

Wisdom.

On life and beyond.

What might it teach us about strategy, i hear you ask?

Let's find out.

📝 TL;DR:

1. What's your primal reason for doing this?
2. Don't just tell clients, show them
3. Clear rules make the game more fun
4. Assume your client's doing the best they can with what they've got
5. Respect instinctive responses, they generate momentum
6. Where's the tension? Where's the resolve?
7. Always ask yourself: am i representing reality, or manufacturing it?

1. What's your primal reason for doing this?

In 2017, i was talking to a recruiter for some freelance roles and she asked me a wicked question.

"Why should i think of you instead of the 30 other strategists i will meet today?"

Tough.

But fair.

And it got me thinking about what my edge was.

I went back home.

Had a think about it.

Long story short, Salmon Theory was born the next week.

That was my edge.

Philosophy meets strategy.

Fast forward 6 months, the greatest bit of feedback i got was not how smart all of my writing was.

It was that i always showed up.

No exception.

Every single week.

Consistency over cleverness.

Of course, there's a world of difference between writing a newsletter and going through what Viktor Frankl went through.

But knowing your primal reason for doing something is how you ensure you consistently show up, no matter what.

Starting things is easy.

Keeping at them is hard.

Especially when they're not always going your way.

One to keep in mind next time you're struggling with a project, or trying to launch a side gig.

Don't just answer intellectually.

Answer instinctively.

Go as deep and primal as you can.

It's how you can find meaning in an otherwise quite chaotic industry and career path.

2. Don't just tell clients, show them

I saw a fun meme the other day about how summer 2016 was the last great moment in modern times.

Questionable.

But understandable.

It certainly seems to mark whatever post-truth era we're going through right now.

It's easy for us to say the modern world is messy because people don't believe in facts alone anymore.

Part of me wonders... was that ever the case though?

Facts alone are the realm of academia.

But most people don't read those studies because they don't cut through.

This is why you have books, journalism (the good kind), people who are experts in communications.

Facts alone don't work because you need them to cut through.

That's how they become significant.

A cynic will call this spin.

I simply call this framing.

And everything in our lives is about framing.

Consider a pitch i once worked on – and lost – for a major European gaming publisher.

We said all the right things in the pitch.

Solid strategy.

Epic ideas.

Good chemistry.

Competitive costs.

And we lost.

Why?

Because the competing agency – who won – showed up with an actual Twitch streamer in the room.

Now, i am sure their strategy, ideas, chemistry and costs were equally as good.

Maybe better.

But this sealed the deal.

You might thing this feels superficial.

I see it as human nature.

People don't buy on facts alone.

They buy on feeling.

And bringing an actual member of your target audience to the room is an epic feeling.

Definitely more memorable.

Make people feel something they'll remember.

Only then tell them the facts.

This Is The Way.

3. Clear rules make the game more fun

Perspective check.

Impossibly big difference between people in camps and people working on creative campaigns.

But, there is a kernel of human truth in this.

The fact that some folks are optimistic beyond repair.

Let me explain.

I am not against optimism.

But i do believe you want to balance it with a healthy dose of pragmatism.

Pure optimism is showing up with no brief and saying:

• "We can do anything we want"
• "Sky's the limit on this one"
• "If the idea's good they'll find the money"

Now, call me a Donnie downer.

But in 15+ years in this game i have seen more budget being found exactly once.

And that, my friends, is not a great batting average.

So sure, optimism, but what's the pragmatic view in all this?

People think pragmatism is about cutting down options.

I prefer to see it as having sharper options to choose from.

David Ogilvy said, "give me the freedom of a tight brief".

Being a pragmatic optimist is about this.

Incorrigible optimists feel great in the short term.

But in the long term, they come across as a bit naive.

And incorrigible optimism can quickly undermine team morale.

Sky's the limit... again.

But... remind me what happened last time?

Of course, i might be wrong.

But consider this: an open brief always creates more anxiety than a tightly defined one.

Kierkegaard said, "anxiety is the dizziness of freedom".

So reduce the vertigo.

Embrace constraints.

Cut down options.

Then watch the ones you have left cut through like a sharp knife.

4. Assume your client's doing the best they can with what they've got

We like to think strategy is above politics.

Over the years, i've learned politics is a key component to strategic decisions.

Why?

Because organisations are people-based systems.

And that means egos and agendas are in play.

The game's the game.

Which means it's easy to belittle a client's decisions by saying "they don't get it".

Except, maybe they do get it, but are in a political pickle.

One useful thing to do in this case?

Assume clients are in the middle of some other situation.

People are intelligent.

There's almost always a logic.

Your client also has a boss, who in turn has another boss.

What we see (campaign feedback) is not all there is (corporate priorities changing).

It's easy to judge what people do.

But the real test is: assuming we have all the context, what would we have done in their situation?

5. Respect instinctive responses, they generate momentum

We often pin down strategy as 'the thinking', presuming this is something that only ever happens in the mind.

But strategy happens in the body too.

You have gut reactions.

Instinctive responses.

It's body plus brain, at best.

When you start out, this part of you is less active.

You need information to then decide what instinctively feels right.

But as you gain experience, this flips.

Your instinct then starts framing the type of information you look for at all.

Meaning: instinct is often underrated as a strategic tool.

But it can be powerful, because it's literally your body telling you things.

Consider when something just doesn't feel right, and you don't know yet why.

That's instinct.

Your body saying things your mind can't yet get.

In a strategic process, this plays a role too.

Of course, you want to back up your instincts.

But there's nothing wrong with leading with them.

Even data-heavy disciplines like econometrics need a research hypotheses before looking at the numbers.

Instinct informing information.

If nothing else, starting with instinct means you get going faster.

Waiting for 100% perfect info is a fool's errand; at best you get 70%.

6. Where's the tension? Where's the resolve?

Toxic positivity is "the pressure to only display positive emotions, suppressing any negative emotions, feelings, reactions, or experience".

We see it in people.

I believe increasingly you also see it in brands.

Which, weirdly, we now treat as people.

Maybe there's a link here.

A consistent bit of feedback i see: don't dwell on the negatives.

Our brand is a positive brand.

People shouldn't feel bad things.

The problem?

If all you ever give is release, without the tension, then there's no bite.

Nothing to grab your attention at all.

Negativity bias is real, and it can be used to our advantage.

Meaning: you lead with a tense situation, then you resolve it.

Liquid Death: "Your brand tastes like a man's sweat" (tension). So we're gonna literally do that taste test (resolve).

Heinz: Waiting to eat your fries sucks (tension). But if you do wait for the right ketchup, it's worth it (resolve).

McVities: People don't know how to dunk (tension). So we're hiring a Chief Dunking Officer (resolve).

Now, imagine there's no tension and none of the above works.

It's like a joke punchline without no setup.

So the point isn't to dwell on the negative.

It's to use the negative to create impact.

Then offer a resolve to help people like you a bit more.

7. Always ask yourself: am i representing reality, or manufacturing it?

After surviving the Holocaust, Frankl became a logotherapist.

It's a branch of therapy that helps people find meaning in life.

The above analogy really lands it for me.

He's not interested in showing you the world in a new light.

He tries to get you to see what's already in front of you.

There's a great parallel here with solid strategic advice.

Clients may hire us for one of three reasons:

1. They don't have the time
2. They don't have the knowledge
3. They don't have the perspective

Perspective feels like an underrated reason.

Our value isn't in how clever we are, it's in the fact we're literally not in the same office, meetings and situations our clients are.

We bring the outside in, and can show what reality is outside the business park.

This is where primary research can be wonderful.

And, of course, it's severely underused these days.

But it does give you authority, and the client perspective, around what's really going on.

I once worked on a chocolate brand who insisted their sharing product was eaten typically as part of an evening ritual.

We spoke to families with teenagers about this.

It turned out the real benefit was that this product was used for small moments of bonding literally any other time of the week.

By bringing the outside in, we were able to offer perspective on what was really going on.

And because we had researched it, we (and our clients) could do it with authority.

We didn't try to manufacture an eating occasion.

We simply reflected what was already happening.

📝 TL;DR:

1. What's your primal reason for doing this?
2. Don't just tell clients, show them
3. Clear rules make the game more fun
4. Assume your client's doing the best they can with what they've got
5. Respect instinctive responses, they generate momentum
6. Where's the tension? Where's the resolve?
7. Always ask yourself: am i representing reality, or manufacturing it?