2Bobs—with David C. Baker and Blair Enns

David has eight questions he wants agency principals to ask themselves before hiring him to help add a new partner.

In this follow-up to their July 2020 discussion, "Four Regrets You're About to Have," David interrogates Blair on the extent to which he is a valuable and accurate predictor of what is happening in the marketplace.

Blair interviews David on his recent article in which he was very open and honest about his struggles with depression and anxiety.   LINKS "I Struggle With Mental Health. Maybe You Do Too." mentally-healthy.org Mentally Healthy 2020 Results  

For the last time—ever—David and Blair discuss client-side marketing departments, their struggle to be entrepreneurial and what we can learn from them.

Blair combines a few of the deeper topics he and David have already covered to provide a larger view of the overall pricing journey he recommends creative firms take.

In-house creative departments aren't going anywhere, so David wants agencies to be mindful of the unique value they bring to the projects for which their clients still need them.

David asks Blair some awkward questions to get inside his head about his successful book, The Win Without Pitching Manifesto .

Most of us haven't sold one firm that we've owned, and those principals who have formerly sold their firm aren't always...ahem...telling the truth.

In a nod to the Walt Whitman line, Blair believes successful sales people - as well as agency principals - often need to present themselves as different personalities in different situations. And David believes sales trainers are actually therapists.

As we've seen independent creative marketing and digital firms experience rapid growth over this past year, David offers five factors that principals should consider in order to avoid growing for the wrong reasons and/or mismanaging that growth.

Having a problem with either hearing or saying "no" can lead to problems for your business. Blair has 12 statements about the word "no" that can help.

When people from other industries learn about what goes on inside your firm, are they awe-struck in a good or bad way? Blair and David come up with a list of things that are unique to the creative firm biz and how they've seen outsiders react to them.

Blair shares an overview of all the communication tools creative firms should be using throughout the sales process.

David and Blair discuss what the four performance bands are, eleven critical factors that keep firms stuck at the lower performance bands, and what firms can do to move into a higher band.

David is in a cynical mood and takes turns with Blair sharing clichés they hear their clients use to describe their business.

Blair stops to think about what "agency" actually means, and if it's the right term to describe firms in the creative services space.

David lists eight truths about money that he's identified in his efforts to help entrepreneurs make better business decisions.

Blair addresses the internal struggle for margin that happens in many firms between delivery teams and business development teams due to their lack of distinction between cost and price.

David wants entrepreneurs to live with tension in various aspects of their business, using it to their advantage in making important decisions instead of just worrying about resolving the tension itself.

Blair offers some ways to help prevent over-excited new business people and principals from giving away the shop and appearing unprofessional.

David draws a picture for Blair about the implications of this statement he hears almost all of his clients and prospects say about being able to close new business.

Blair shares the tradeoffs creative firms have to deal with when pursuing firms of a particular size, and David gets Blair riled up again about procurement.

As agencies are trading their big city offices for working at home during the pandemic, Blair wants to know if David thinks he should get into real estate.

David thinks firms have too many meetings and offers some solutions, and Blair pushes back.

David torches Blair's highfalutin notions of timekeeping and offers four instances when timekeeping can actually be used without polluting your pricing.