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Oh for goodness sake, stop moaning and man up. PRWeek just hosted a round table in a penthouse looking out over the bay of Cannes and the overwhelming sentiment of the assembled guests was that we need to be louder and prouder of what we do.
It's Monday morning and I wake up in New York. Nothing particularly new in the fact that I'm not in Chicago (my home base) but, this time, I'm travelling with my wife and kids, so the benefits of "nearing retirement" are becoming increasingly evident.
The nine-block grid is Jack Welch's famous method for evaluating staff. There are two criteria: potential and performance.
As I write, much of the advertising and media world is preparing to jet off to the Côte d'Azur for a few days.
I was once asked to run a training session on international planning. I got the wrong end of the stick and, instead of banging on about multinational brands, cross-cultural synergies and harmonising global toolkits, I decided to focus on techniques for mitigating jet lag and combating airport ennui.
We're shooting a new ad but our client, who is a notorious pain in the arse, wants to get involved in all aspects of the casting - even down to choosing the wardrobe. How do we politely tell him to go away before he irritates everyone, particularly the director, who is a person of some note?
Remember last summer? The country went into a kind of joyful meltdown, kicked off by Danny Boyle's brilliant Olympic opening ceremony - for many people the finest ad for Britain ever made.
Maybe it's just a coincidence that Cannes week also marks the halfway point in the year - an ideal opportunity for agency senior management to reflect on their performance to date and assess how the rest of the year looks financially.
Fifteen years ago, there were no Media Lions at Cannes. Its growing presence at the 59-year-old festival is testament to the central role media now plays in marketing communications.
"Just a lot of stuff" is my usual answer when asked about my day.
