Just a quick note to say we’re now working with NHS Direct. It’s a truly unique organisation that plays an important role. So, we’re pretty excited and can’t wait to get cracking!

It’s easy to get caught up in the fact that we own banks now, Iceland won’t give us our money back and our entire future rests on a bunch of people who got us into this mess in the first place, but we do have some good news!

Our client, East Sussex County Council, has been shortlisted for Best Employer Brand in the Personnel Today Awards. We’ve been working with the guys at East Sussex for the past year to develop their message, their identity and their media channels and it’s great to see them recognised in this way. I think it’s fair to say that the traditional stereotype of public sector = boring work and private sector= exciting work is well and truly dead. It all comes down to a cultural fit, a partnership and a vision. East Sussex is up against some stiff competition but we’ve got a lot of faith in the work, so we’ll find out in November if they win. Satty will be there on behalf of all of us and also drinking for all of us, hopefully East Sussex will still be a client the next morning.

Anyway, a full case study with all of the work will be up soon. In the meantime, check out www.worthwhilework.co.uk for a taster and go to www.personneltodayawards.com to see the shortlists.

A common creative trick is to use a picture of something that also looks like something else to make your point. It was all the rage a few years ago, but thankfully has calmed down a little because it was starting to get silly. Anyway, this website posts everyday photos of stuff that also looks like faces. I can’t believe some of them haven’t been tampered with, funny though: http://www.facesinplaces.blogspot.com/

Last year in the RAD Awards supplement, an agency ran an ad saying that the only reward they really value is their client’s happiness. Regardless of how sincere you think this sentiment is, it does raise an important point.

Over the years, I’ve seen work win awards that, while creatively beautiful, had such sparse and small copy text that it’s impossible to see how candidates could possibly figure out what the job was about. These win awards purely for their aesthetic and conceptual beauty.

Now, the multi-award winning, uber-agencies would make the point that this beautiful work is actually most effective and that’s why they do it. Sometime they’re right, but sometimes they’re being completely gratuitous. I love beautiful artwork, but every year I look at some of this stuff and think to myself that an agency has persuaded the client to invest thousands of pounds in a lump of glass and an ego-boost.

Judgement calls are made for aesthetic, rather than practical reasons. My biggest bugbear is 8 point white text on a four colour background. Sure, it looks great boarded up, but is illegible in any newspaper.

As an ex-judge, I saw first-hand how little credence is given to effectiveness or practicalities, it’s all about the idea and the execution. There is no way on earth that a slightly less visually pleasing, but more effective advert, would beat a more attractive, less effective, competitor. I wish we could change the criteria and make it more about how a problem was solved rather than the fact that an illustrator on £200 per hour was used.

The stronger, more challenging clients want you to get results and solve their problems. If you can do it with style and elegance, that’s fine too. But they put their ego on hold and focus on the job, awards are the last thing on their mind. We’re the arty ones.

I guess my question after six paras of ranting is: Does the way awards are judged encourage agencies to take their clients down a less effective, more beautiful path?

Answers on a stamped address envelope please.

Actually, we’re sorting out blog comments at the moment, so hopefully in the future you’ll be able to respond. Unless of course I’m all alone . . . . . . . .