Part I
What happens when account and creative start covering strategy by default
Account people can think strategically. Creatives can think strategically. Some of the best observations in an agency come from people who have never had strategy in their job title.
The difficulty starts when strategic thinking becomes their second job.
Account teams approach the problem from the client side
Good account people understand the organisation, politics, history, previous rejections, the CMO's priorities and procurement's tolerance. That knowledge is strategically valuable.
It also creates a natural pull towards organising the client's existing logic. Some assignments require the agency to challenge that logic, and independent strategic challenge becomes harder when the same person owns the relationship.
Creatives approach it from the idea
Strong creatives often have excellent strategic instincts. They recognise a powerful human tension, simplify complexity and know when a proposition has no creative energy. A great creative can reach a better strategic answer than a mediocre strategist.
Creative-led strategy has its own gravitational pull. Once an interesting idea starts forming, the argument can organise itself around that idea. One source of independent challenge has disappeared.
The larger problem is economic
Six hours of account-led strategy came from somewhere: client management, commercial oversight or preparation for the next meeting. A day spent by a creative director rewriting the proposition is a day unavailable for leading the creative work.
The agency has redistributed the strategy cost, frequently to people who are equally expensive. It can end up with weaker strategy and fewer hours of account or creative work.
This is easy to miss because the strategy line gets smaller while account and creative utilisation still look busy. The same cost is now recorded against different departments.
Collaboration and disguised shortage look different
Great agencies blur disciplines. Strategists should never own every strategic thought, and collaboration usually improves the work.
The management question is whether blurred disciplines create better collaboration or disguise a resource shortage. Two situations deserve different names. Strategically excellent creatives are an advantage. Asking creatives to work out every unresolved problem because strategy capacity has disappeared is a staffing decision.
Naming that distinction makes it possible to design the work honestly.