It's a special day and a sad one...As I write this post, there are packers all around me, wrapping the last remains of a small agency called David.It's funny how much I have got attached to this agency in just over 12 months!
Are we the creative hot-shop that the world(well, part of it at least) calls us?
Maybe we are not.
Are we radical in the way the edgier agencies in the western hemisphere have adopted new media?
No again...
But, I can say with certainty that Brand David as it stood and shone is/ was culturally the richest agency brand in India!
Before it was decided to merge it with Bates Asia. Because it makes sense to have a stronger mid-sized network in the region...
But in life and in business what makes sense may not always be right!
Cultures are about shared dreams. They need more nurture and less merger!
After my initial anger and resilienece, the planner in me has bought into the merger.
David hasn't.
You may ask, if we aren't edge-ily creative or new media mavericks...what makes us so special...
My list wud include the following.
1. Josy Paul - the maverick guy who along with Madhukar Sabnavis and now Kumar started it all.
2. I don't know about the other 5 years but in the last one year while I have been a David, Josy has helped create a culture of creative strategists...
Creative in the new millennium is not about 'silo thinking'! The best work comes from a seamless integration of creativity and thinking! And we have here in our play-rooms and on the WallOfDavid.
We have done brave thinking...The results may not match to our efforts...But in our thinking and culture, we may be as edgy as W+K, Mother, Naked, et al...
3. David's model of senior guys hands-on everything and lots of energetic young Davids worked for us!
4. We have possibly the best training program in the country...It was called endless converstaions between youthful energy and passionate experience...
No closed doors, just windows of opportunity for everyone...
And our open-source training programme 'SchoolOfDavid' was amongst the most 'fun-and-play' modules possible in our industry.
5. A while ago I read in BusinessWeek that the metal Tanzanite is rarer than even diamond. As it is mined in just one small dusty town of Tanzania...I may sound utterly soppy and nostalgic, but the spirit of David is a rarer metal than even Tanzanite...
I think I was a David before joining David and believe that all of us(Davids) will retain a part of it where we go next...
It's very easy in today's world to buy technology, sometimes even market shares but it's next to impossible to buy or create BELIEF...
I feel David was a network/ agency with a great belief and energy eco-system...
It's unfortunate that it had an abrupt end. But what is important is that we lived the life of Davids...And hopefully will always retain it...
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