The Handbook: The Operations Podcast – Details, episodes & analysis

As an Ops person, the role of IT expert is often part of the job. So how can you ensure your agency’s IT infrastructure is set up for scaling? 

That's the focus of our discussion with Dan Timmiss, Technical Director at Kaizen IT Solutions. With over two decades of experience, Dan has helped hundreds of creative agencies optimize and manage their IT setups, from audits to complete IT overhauls and supporting scaling teams.

In this episode, Dan shares essential best practices:

• The importance of implementing single sign-on (SSO) and multi-factor authentication (MFA) for security and ease of access
• How cloud storage can complement on-premise servers if you have heavy media files
• Using mobile device management solutions like Jamf to manage your fleet of computers, including ‘zero touch deployment’ and easy on-boarding and off-boarding
• Seeking security accreditations like Cyber Essentials Plus, CIS Benchmarks or ISO 27001 to help secure contracts with global clients
• How newer services like MDR (managed detection and response) and XDR (extended detection and response) go beyond traditional anti-virus solutions to monitor your systems for threats
• Why to educate your team on ‘social engineering’ scams that could cause financial and reputational harm

Follow Dan on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dan-timmiss-486ab517/

Follow Harv on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harvnagra/

Stay up to date with regular ops insights. Subscribe to The Handbook: The Operations Newsletter.

This podcast is brought to you by Scoro, where you can manage your projects, resources and finances in a single system.

Winning pitches is tough. 

Ghosting has become a common challenge, and even when you win, clients may be commissioning smaller pieces of the project rather than the full program.

But that’s only part of the struggle - crafting pitch decks takes a lot of time and energy. Surely there’s a better way than packing slides with your best creative ideas. 

In this episode we tackle these challenges and introduce a strategic approach to pitching. The focus shifts from pitching tactics to showcasing value and ROI.

Joining us is Freia Muehlenbein, an agency growth consultant and owner of Be Reyt Consultancy. With over 15 years of experience in agency operations, Freia is an expert in the sales and pitch process, known for closing large deals. 

Freia shares practical advice on:

• Developing a strong qualification process to truly understand your client's needs
• The concept of a war room and how it helps in crafting effective strategies
• Why prioritizing financials and ROI is more important than focusing on tactics

Follow Freia on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/freiamuehlenbein/

Follow Harv on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harvnagra/

Sign up for Harv's webinar with Agency Hackers on productivity hacks taking place Thursday 19th September 2024: https://bit.ly/thehandbook24

Stay up to date with regular ops insights. Subscribe to The Handbook: The Operations Newsletter.

This podcast is brought to you by Scoro, where you can manage your projects, resources and finances in a single system.

Forget about revenue for a moment. Consider how much more profitable your agency would be if you optimized your team’s time and improved utilization. If you could reduce hiring costs by keeping staff for longer. If you understood the leaky buckets in your outgoings and reduced losses like over-servicing through improved best practice. 

Manish Kapur, who has over 25 years of experience in creative ops, explains how he streamlines agency operations and boost profit within agencies of all sizes. 

You’ll learn how to improve these 4 pillars within your agency:

1. Leadership - develop your leaders and improve staff retention.
2. People - create consistency in performance reviews and offer clear career progression.
3. Financial Management - plan for the future using forecasts and leading indicators.
4. Process - be agile and get your team following best practices.

Follow Manish on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/manishkapur/

Follow Harv on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harvnagra/

Stay up to date with regular ops insights. Subscribe to The Handbook: The Agency Operations Newsletter.

This podcast is brought to you by Scoro, where you can manage your projects, resources and finances in a single system.

Our new podcast The Handbook: The Agency Operations Podcast endeavours to create more community for agency operations people – a place where we can hear from our peers and other experts on best practice, experiments, successes and sometimes failures – and also a place to celebrate our journeys into operations. 

Before we kick off with the interview series, Harv Nagra, our host, and former agency operations leader talk about his own journey into operations. 

Agency ops can be lonely – you might be the only person in your agency that works in operations, and you might end up having to figure things out on your own – rather than having a team of people to support you and bounce ideas off of.

That’s where our new podcast, The Handbook: The Agency Operations podcast comes in. 

We’ll be talking to fellow experts and operations leaders about agency life – discussing the challenges keeping us up at night, as well as strategies that help make things run a little bit smoother.

Each episode, we'll have a guest speaker who brings a fresh perspective and gives us plenty of food for thought.

Part of the remit of an ops leader is to ensure they’ve got the right people, in the right place. 

In many agencies, account managers handle sales, client relationships, AND project management. However, this hybrid role often leads to trade-offs. 

Everyone’s got their own strengths and preferences – and these responsibilities seemingly require very different personality types. 

A great sales person might struggle with rigorous project management, resulting in issues like over-servicing. While an exceptional project manager might struggle with developing a sales pipeline, leading to stress, missed targets, and a shallow pipeline. 

So, should these roles be separated?

We'll explore this with our guest, Jenny Plant. With over 20 years of experience in agency account management, Jenny founded her consultancy, Account Management Skills, to share sales training skills with account managers.

Jenny will share:

• The pros and cons of separating account and project managers
• What value agencies seek in their account managers
• How sales training can improve client relationships, retention and business growth

Jenny's website: https://accountmanagementskills.com/

Jenny's podcast: https://accountmanagementskills.com/podcast

Follow Jenny on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jennyplant/

Follow Harv on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harvnagra/

Stay up to date with regular ops insights. Subscribe to The Handbook: The Operations Newsletter.

This podcast is brought to you by Scoro, where you can manage your projects, resources and finances in a single system.

We’re in the age of remote and hybrid working, and our physical distance from one another is having a huge impact on company culture. 

Previously, grabbing lunch or a drink after work was easy. But now, even small talk needs to be consciously brought into our scheduled Slack calls to avoid things becoming too transactional. 

This new way of working can lead to serious challenges like feeling disconnected from colleagues and the company mission, lacking motivation, and experiencing loneliness. 

So what’s the way forward?

In this episode, we speak with Julia Vastrik, an agile coach and team facilitator, about how we can strengthen company culture in a remote/hybrid workplace.

Julia offers loads of great advice, which we’ve summarized for easy reference:

Building Trust and Relationships

We’re a much more effective team when we like the people we work with. 

• Get to know people through small talk
• Use ice breakers, team rituals
• Virtual lunches, coffees
• Encourage silliness for personalities to shine
• Learning together e.g. book clubs, communities around certain topics like AI
• For big meetings, use breakout rooms
• Organize face-to-face activities - both for work and fun

Communication

A lot of information is lost in written communication. 

• Use a good balance of synchronous and asynchronous communication
• Have explicit agreements on communication and how to run meetings
• With written communication, the giver needs to be overly friendly (emojis, kind greetings), the receiver overly accepting that they may perceive the tone wrong
• Use audio and video to prevent misinterpretation

Productivity and Collaboration

• Set clear goals for teams and individuals
• Create working agreements e.g. working hours, punctuality, documentation, ways of working, etc
• Co-create - brainstorm solutions and make decisions together to boost a feeling of belonging

Continuous Improvement

Little changes sum up to bigger improvements over time. 

• Retrospectives, post-mortems & team discussions
• Experiment
• We’re never in an ideal state - there’s always room for improvement

Psychological Safety

Feeling safe to be not perfect, to make mistakes, to be a human.

• Mistakes happen and they are a learning opportunity
• Have leaders model this behavior

Other Resources:

The book Julia recommends to read is called The Culture Map, by Erin Meyer.

The virtual ‘body doubling’ clubs Harv mentioned are flow.club and flown.com.

Follow Julia on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/julia-vastrik/

Follow Harv on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harvnagra/

Stay up to date with regular ops insights. Subscribe to The Handbook: The Operations Newsletter.

This podcast is brought to you by Scoro, where you can manage your projects, resources and finances in a single system.

Without financial results, we can’t see the impact of the decisions we make on our agency’s profit.

In this episode we’re joined by Alfie Wenegieme, a seasoned chartered accountant with over 17 years of commercial finance experience. Alfie shares important metrics for us to understand, report, and improve on. 

We explore the fundamentals of agency finances, common issues agencies face, and tips for improving your team’s understanding of key financial metrics. 

Whether you're a founder, ops person, or part of the senior leadership team, this episode will provide valuable insights into managing and optimizing your agency’s profitability. 

Don't miss Alfie's expert advice and practical guidance.

Follow Alfie on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alfie-wenegieme/

Follow Harv on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harvnagra/

Stay up to date with regular ops insights. Subscribe to The Handbook: The Operations Newsletter.

This podcast is brought to you by Scoro, where you can manage your projects, resources and finances in a single system.

Some platforms for niche use cases don’t require much consideration – you can try, and if it doesn’t work as intended, you can move onto something else. Other platforms, particularly those that are linked to your client services and business finances, require careful consideration. How do you ensure you’re making the right decision? 

In this episode, we discuss why growing and maturing agencies looking to scale make the transition from disjointed tools to professional services automation (PSA) platforms. 

You’ll learn how to define your needs, select the right platform, and implement it effectively to drive efficiency and growth in your business – with expert insights from Matthew Peng, a seasoned software advisor from consultancy Business Continuum. 

Key takeaways include: 

1. Building a list of requirements, 
2. How to research and select the right platform, 
3. How to approach the implementation phase strategically, and 
4. Leveraging data for future business growth.

Don't miss Matt and Harv's valuable guidance for ensuring a successful transition.

Resources mentioned in this episode: G2 and GetApp 

Follow Matthew on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/matthew-peng/ 

Follow Harv on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harvnagra/

Stay up to date with regular ops insights. Subscribe to The Handbook: The Operations Newsletter.

This podcast is brought to you by Scoro, where you can manage your projects, resources and finances in a single system.

Operations is a critical role within agencies today. But beyond the day-to-day, there’s a big opportunity to leverage this role as strategic driver of growth and efficiency. How can you develop both yourself as a leader and your agency to deliver better results?

In this episode, Ryan McNamara, Head of Operations for Rise at Seven, highlights 3 key areas that every ops director should focus on:

1. Financial rigor - what metrics you should be looking at and how often, to help you make strategic decisions.
2. Performance culture - how Ryan sets up performance development plans (PDPs) in his team and the importance of company culture.
3. Operational efficiency - what you should be optimizing to make things faster and easier.

Ryan offers advice on how to use your data for better decision making. He explains how to use metrics such as utilization, revenue recognition, and recovery to build better plans and inform your strategy.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

Harv’s Presentation on Business Maturity Models - https://bit.ly/harvbizmaturity 

Follow Ryan on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryanfmc/

Follow Harv on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harvnagra/

Stay up to date with regular ops insights. Subscribe to The Handbook: The Operations Newsletter.

This podcast is brought to you by Scoro, where you can manage your projects, resources and finances in a single system.