Features

24 Hours With… Justin Hind, CEO of With Collective

24 Hours With… spotlights the working day of some of the most interesting people in Mumbrella’s world. Today we speak with Justin Hind, CEO of With Collective, a Sydney-based advertising agency Justin co-founded with his wife, Dominique Hind (Dom).

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MORNINGS

4:30am: The first thing I do on waking up is reach for my phone to see if anything urgent has come in overnight.

We’re attempting to secure a major American talent for a new brand campaign, and there’s an email from Lisa, our talent scout with the latest developments. It’s looking positive, but there are still lots of logistics to sort out.

I say ‘yes, please’ first which means that Dom has to get up and make both of us a cup of tea. It’s a game we play where whoever says it first gets to have tea in the bed. I usually let her say it, but today I’m angling for some more time in bed.

I switch on the TV and watch the headlines for the US news and then watch Channel 9 news for the local headlines.

5:30am: I go to my personal training session – we meet every morning for an intense 45-minute workout. I drive back home and the rest of the morning is spent wrestling Layton (3) and Halley (17 months) to get up, showered and dressed for daycare.

Dom works in the office on Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays, so the kids are in daycare three days a week. Thursday is my day to do the drop-off (and Dom’s day to walk Gertie, our dog), so I swing by on the way to work.
with collective officeIt takes about 35 minutes to drive to our office in Surry Hills, making it a good time to make some calls. The first is to Flo, my executive assistant, who runs me through what I’ve got on today – Flo controls my time, so my answer to the team is that if she can fit it into my diary, then I’ll be there.

I also call my Dad every day. At the age of 73, he still works full-time by choice, and this is our chance to catch-up – our conversations jump from family news to politics and back again.

Paramount Coffee Project surry hills8:30am: I have a quick coffee with Steve Coll, our chief creative officer, at the Paramount Coffee Project. We meet here pretty much every day to map out the day’s work and identify any challenges. Once we’re clear on what needs to be done, we walk across the road to the office. We have a 15-minute all-staff stand-up meeting at 8:50am every morning.

The creative services manager and account leads outline what the priorities are to get out by 6:00pm each night and the staff start horse-trading for resources to make sure everyone gets what they need to meet deadlines.

10:00am: We have a full agency briefing for a new piece of work we’re planning for Virgin Mobile. Our RID (Rapid Idea Development) strategy workshops occur each time we kick off a new project for a client.

These collaborative sessions include the client team, creative, planners and account service and are an opportunity to set the agenda for the campaign – focusing on business problems, successes and any obstacles in the market.

MIDDAY

12:00pm: I take some time to flick through emails and review some work. I see the first concepts and the final version of every piece of work that goes through the agency. It’s my fear that one day a client will call and I won’t know what they are talking about, so I stay across every last piece of work.

Two Good Eggs surry hills1:00pm: Steve, Dom and I grab a quick lunch at Two Good Eggs in Surry Hills. It’s a running joke that we have breakfast for lunch as we always order something egg-based, such as scrambled eggs.

We use this time to deal with management issues such as headcount, new clients, key accounts we should pitch for and the financials.

AFTERNOON

2:00pm: I drive to Macquarie Park for a meeting with Optus. One of the things that clients are often surprised about is that as CEO I have such an active, hands-on approach to every account.

While we trust our suits, as an independent business the quality of the work and the satisfaction of the client are of paramount importance to our ongoing success, so I remain as heavily involved as I was when we first started out. I’ve just got more to fit into the day now.

4:30pm: Back in the office just in time for a ‘family’ get-together to celebrate this week’s birthdays. Everybody’s birthday gets celebrated, so with 72 people we’ve got cake at least one a week, sometimes two, sometimes three. We have a big brass bell that we ring for each get-together and everyone knows they have to come.

5:00pm: Back at my desk I check on emails and spent some time working on the business. Steve shows me the final artwork for a Qantas campaign that’s about to launch, and we make a few final tweaks before he sends it to the client for the final sign-off.

6:00pm: Dom left the office a lot earlier to pick-up the kids from daycare and I get a FaceTime call from her so the kids can say good night. It’s an insurance policy that if I can’t get home because of traffic that I’ve seen them before they go to bed. I use the drive home to call clients or creative teams.

FAMILY TIME

6:45pm: Halley goes to bed at 6:30pm every night, so I’ve missed her, but Layton’s in his room winding down. The lights are out, so I read him a story by the light of my iPhone until he falls asleep. Dom and I have his ritual where at the end of the day you have to wash the day off, so I have a quick shower, then we talk about our respective days.

p8295477_b_v9_acWhile we both built the business together, we don’t spend as much time together as people think. If there are business matters to deal with we’ll either do it at a management meeting with other managers or we’ll try and catch up for half-an-hour while preparing dinner, and from then on ‘work talk’ is banned.

8:00pm: After dinner I have to do something mindless, so I don’t have to think about anything for a while. I’ll buy something off Apple TV.

At the moment, I’m re-watching Luther and lose myself in the crime-riddled streets of London. It’s never been a runaway success commercially, probably because it’s too gritty, but I love it. By 10:00pm, I’m in bed and hoping sleep comes easily to me.

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