Big Monocle

Amy Stellhorn was thirty-two when she left her VP of Creative role at a large design firm to start Big Monocle, "the socially minded creative agency" based on doing good. Her one-person firm had a single client: Intel Corporation.

The Make-or-Break Contract

Any possibility of growing Big Monocle depended on Amy's capacity not only to deliver value but to do so in a way that far surpassed offerings of much larger agencies. Intel's globally recognized brand and massive revenue stream guaranteed fierce competition for its business.

When Jennifer Larson, Intel's manager of Consumer Integrated Marketing, reached out about an extensive education campaign for Intel Security, Amy knew this meeting could have major consequences for her career. The contract was for a half-million-dollar project—an opportunity to hire a team and build a prestigious profile to attract future clientele.

Several prominent New York advertising agencies were courting Intel for the project. Amy was a one-person agency competing against established firms with proven track records and large teams.

The Traditional Sales Approach

Amy spent hours researching and polishing a presentation to highlight her previous work projects and storyboard different ideas for the Intel Security project. She prepared slides showcasing her portfolio, demonstrating her capabilities, and proving she was better than the competition.

This was what she'd learned throughout her career: impress the prospect, highlight your accomplishments, convince them you're the best choice. Sales tactics focused on self-promotion and closing the deal.

But Amy reached out to her Arbinger coach for advice. The guidance she received was not what she expected.

Beyond the Contract: The Harder Challenge of Building Culture

Even if Amy won the contract, she faced an equally daunting challenge: building a team that could maintain client-focused excellence while avoiding the common agency pitfalls she'd witnessed throughout her career.

"When you start a company and you realize there's no magic checkbook, there's no dollars that just appear every time you have to run payroll, there's this tendency to weigh and measure people. Like, did I really get this many dollars worth of value out of this person this week?" Amy explained.

The risk was real and immediate: "There can be a tendency to blame them or maybe discount them a little bit or see them as less than they are at each step that you feel a little bit disappointed, a little bit like you didn't get your value, a little bit more like they're taking more than they're giving. And that perspective can be very inward focused and very damaging to the relationship. It can really, really fast completely destroy your relationship with an employee."

Creative teams especially struggled with becoming internal-focused. "It's really easy, especially in creative work to become almost a naysayer. Like just to critique too heavily where you're just saying no to everything. Like, I don't like this, I don't like that. None of these ideas are good enough. None of these taglines are good enough," team member Jeff W. observed.

"Everybody is scared that they have a job to defend. It's really rare that you have an environment where you're safe to give up that personal, 'I've gotta hold onto this because this is my responsibility, my job,'" Jef M. added.

Amy knew that if she built a company where people operated from fear and self-protection, it wouldn't matter how many contracts she won. The culture would undermine everything.

Abandoning Traditional Sales Tactics

The Arbinger coach invited Amy to stop making slides and set her presentation aside. He offered a different way to view and approach the meeting.

"Rather than working so hard to impress Jennifer with all you have done, what if you became really interested in what she is trying to accomplish? What if you got curious about her audience and what she is wanting to get done? Don't try to impress her and close a deal—that's just about you. Try to help her."

Amy was initially taken aback. The suggestion ran counter to everything she'd learned about sales. With such high stakes, wouldn't Jennifer expect a convincing display of past successes and proof of good ideas?

But Amy trusted her coach and believed in the Arbinger approach. She chose to follow his advice and forget her go-to sales tactics.

Focusing on Client's Needs, Not Self-Promotion

When Amy met Jennifer, she focused all her attention on understanding Jennifer's needs and Intel's objectives for the campaign. She asked detailed questions to explore how Jennifer understood the interests and needs of Intel's audience.

Amy set aside her ingrained impulse to self-promote or convince Jennifer she was better than the competition. She left behind all her skills on how to close a deal and stayed present with an outward mindset. She listened. She genuinely cared.

Going Deeper Than Marketing Objectives

"The benefit to really understanding what our clients are trying to do is that we have a better idea of how this project impacts them. So we like to get down into not just what the objective is, the marketing objective and what they're trying to achieve, but really what they're trying to achieve. Like does their bonus depend on how this project goes? Does their promotion depend on how this project goes? What are the other things that we don't know that are in here and how can we just really help them be successful at every level?" Amy explained.

As Amy's team would later collaborate to create the campaign, they were guided by this same outward approach, asking questions central to Intel's mission: "What can we really do to help people be safer online?" and "What kind of experience can we offer that will be valuable to them?"

Building Team Culture Around the Same Principles

Once Amy won the contract, she quickly hired a team, gauging each new hire by their ability to work with the same client-centric approach that had won Intel's business.

The shift required constant vigilance. "As a designer, I still have to sit in front of a computer and design, or build, or build a strategy, or write a piece of communication. The action hasn't changed but what has changed is—who am I thinking about? Am I thinking about creating this experience? Am I thinking about the user who is going to stand behind it and use it?" Jef M. reflected.

"By changing our mindsets and focusing on other's objectives instead of our own, we're able to create an experience for our clients that is just smooth, free of drama, free of the normal obstructions that would prevent good creative work from being done. I think we maintain a really smooth and positive workflow so we can hit the deadlines, please the clients and also not tear each other apart," Jeff W. explained.

The culture Amy envisioned when she started Big Monocle—"the socially minded creative agency" based on doing good—was becoming reality through focusing outward on clients' success rather than inward on self-promotion or self-protection.

"And it's hard sometimes. I mean, you just get stuck in your head, which is why I think having a culture of people who are outwardly focused is great because it always pulls you back to that," Jef M. reflected. 

In all of Jennifer's years working with ad agencies, she had never had a meeting quite like this one. Amy's sincere interest in Jennifer's needs as an individual, as well as Intel's organizational needs and those of end-users, was both relentless and refreshing. Jennifer knew it was exactly what the project needed.

The meeting ended without a solid plan in place for tackling the campaign. But because Amy chose to approach the opportunity with an outward mindset, Big Monocle had won the contract.

Campaign Success Exceeded All Benchmarks

This exploration of their target audience's needs led to a marketing strategy that was far richer and more insightful than most—one that would set new benchmarks of success within Intel.

One key measurement of advertisement success is the number of impressions generated, balanced by overall campaign cost. Based on previous advertising endeavors, Intel was accustomed to spending between $.50-1.00 per impression.

One element of the education campaign engineered by Big Monocle generated 58,000,000 impressions at the cost of $150,000—meaning the cost of each impression was a phenomenally low $.002. That's 250-500 times better cost efficiency than Intel's typical campaigns.

Company-Wide Recognition

The entire security education campaign was such a success that it quickly caught the attention of the Intel C-suite. Jennifer received company-wide recognition with an award highlighting the campaign and establishing it as the new paradigm for marketing at Intel.

The ad campaign also won accolades outside the company and was featured in national media, including The Today Show.

Springboard for Continuing Success

The resounding success of the educational campaign paved the way for future collaboration between Big Monocle and Intel, springboarding the continuing success of Amy's firm.

Amy and her whole team developed a new understanding of how to win contracts and build sustainable client relationships, not through impressive presentations or defensive posturing, but through genuine focus on client needs and team collaboration free from blame and self-protection.

Big Monocle continues to incorporate an outward approach to its work with employees and clients, proving that the same principles that win business also build cultures where people can do their best work.

Big Monocle proved that traditional sales tactics—impressing prospects with past work, self-promotion, and convincing them you're better than competition—can actually prevent you from winning business. When Amy abandoned her prepared presentation and focused entirely on understanding Jennifer's needs and Intel's objectives, she won a $500K contract against prominent New York agencies. But winning the contract was only half the battle. By applying those same outward principles to building her team, focusing on client objectives rather than personal defensiveness, eliminating blame and internal politics, Big Monocle created the culture needed to deliver exceptional results. The subsequent campaign delivered 250-500x better cost efficiency than Intel's typical campaigns, earned national recognition, and established a new marketing paradigm at Intel. The lesson: clients don't buy impressive presentations; they buy genuine understanding of their needs and confidence you'll help them succeed. And teams don't deliver exceptional work when they're focused on defending their jobs, they deliver when they're focused on client success.