Wednesday, November 16, 2005

nasty memories

not sure what triggered the brain cells last night but it got so bad she woke up at 2am, fretting and tossing in bed with a few bad work memories churning upsetting thoughts. for her entire 5 years in the agency business, she's met a dozen morons and a few good men (and women). the dozens of morons include colleagues as well as clients but she's never in her 5 years screwed up anything like the ISP provider client at the last agency. the nightmares are still well imprinted in her mind and she would cringe at the thought of her own stupidity then.

ah well, she learnt from her own mistakes, a HARD one at that.

lesson 1:
never hesitate to switch suppliers at the last minute if you feel uncomfortable cos 90% says your gut feel is right and that you'll be thanking the man up there for saving you a colossal headache after.

lesson 2:
never choose to go with cheaper production/ event suppliers thinking your agency will thank you for making the extra profit cos 99% chances of their workmanship and service is crapshit too. PAY PEANUTS GET MONKEYS. you'll find yourself troubleshooting fucked up whathaveyous from unethical people to responsibility sack hopping and nasty mails for payments over shoddy work. not funny when it happens and she almost got threatened with a lawsuit with the nasty ahseng supplier and overly demanding client. she has worked on such tight timelines before with trusted (but expensive) suppliers and they've always delivered great quality. her mistake was bad judgment but she blamed herself big time cos she definitely could've handled the situation better.

lesson 3:
never ever make decisions on the client's behalf even you're dead tired, sick, don't give a shit about anything anymore and running a one-man-show despite working for an agency. they're fucking tie you down to this BIG (dumb) mistake.

this client had a history of running through agencies like a taitai to her wardrobe. last i heard, the two who took over the account where i left off resigned and not long after, we dumped them. oh, half the client team which we dealt with have also left. they're the clients from hell you know, the kind who gives expired deadlines yet expect MANY versions of creatives, no cent in pocket, red tape and worse, nasty dispositions. a good horrific example below:

- press ad due for wednesday submission
- means FA (final artwork) has to complete by tuesday morning
- agency was briefed only on friday evening (ok, so they worked the weekend)
- presented 2 visuals on monday and 101 retail changes to the ad, finally midnight monday client droid said "looks ok"
- agency proceeded to FA and got fucked by droid's boss who asked why the agency went into FA (conversation took place on tues morning) and that she needed 3 layouts to show her boss, not 2 only. agency got pissed and told her this is not possible with the submission on wednesday unless she prefers to see a fucking BLANK ad space. agency and client in boxing ring now.
- client droid was at the same time taking in 1001 comments from his sales team on how to make the ad better and the agency was ticked off when they refused to make certain changes.
- ad finally made it in time after countless amendments (note extra time wasted coordinating changes with external art director and copywriter cos the inhouse AD was away for vacation and they didn't have any inhouse copywriter).
- agency received a nasty email from client about the whole situation. they didn't do much cos key people knew their hands were tied, especially when there was a particular high titled all talk no action suit prancing around bitching and stirring shit instead of lending a hand. but she believes that what goes around comes around, you get what you give. it's tough being a solo ball breaker and tiring running alone. it's the people that makes the difference, the team players.

and so she opted to get up at 2am and finished an entire homicide novel hoping the gore would take her mind off these unpleasant memories. finally went to bed at 4.30am and was awoken at 9.30 this morning with a call for an interview later today. let's see what they have on the table.

bee wrote this at 10:02 AM

2peekaboos

2peekaboos

At 1:08 PM,  Anonymous said...

try drinking chamomile tea tonight before you sleep. will help to soothe the nerves.

anyhows, all the best for your interview! :)

 

At 11:45 AM,  bee said...

thanks babe!

 

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