The War Room Mentality
What political campaigns can teach modern brands about moving faster without getting sloppy.
Political campaigns have a useful constraint that most brands do not: Election Day does not move. There is no extra month because a team needs another round of approvals, no opportunity to revisit the decision next quarter, and no benefit to having the perfect response three days after the moment has passed.
That environment influenced Fose + McKay from the beginning. During John McCain’s 2000 presidential campaign, Max Fose was part of an Internet operation that used the web for fundraising, organizing, advertising and communication with supporters. When momentum arrived, the campaign needed to be able to act while people were still paying attention rather than spending two weeks deciding how to respond.
Corporate marketing teams obviously should not live permanently in a political war room. That would be exhausting, and most brands have different responsibilities and risk profiles. What we have found, however, is that some of the habits campaigns develop under pressure translate extremely well to organizations that simply want to become more responsive.
The biggest one is preparation. Teams move quickly when they have already done the hard thinking. They understand the audience, the message and the brand voice. They know which decisions require executive approval and which ones can be made by the people doing the work. They have templates, systems and responsibilities in place before the interesting moment arrives.
That kind of preparation is not glamorous, but it is usually what people mean when they say an organization is agile.
It also helps to shorten the distance between information and action. When strategy, communications, creative, digital, media and leadership are looking at the same problem, ideas improve and decisions happen faster. When information has to move up several levels of an organization and then travel all the way back down, the opportunity often disappears before the response is ready.
The other lesson campaigns teach quickly is that speed cannot become an excuse for bad judgment. A fast mistake is still a mistake, particularly for an established organization with employees, customers and a reputation to protect.
What we try to create for clients is a productive combination of both worlds: the energy and responsiveness of a campaign with the discipline and polish a serious brand requires. Organizations should not have to choose between being thoughtful and being ready. The best teams build systems that allow them to do both.