AI will transform all businesses; identify processes for change and let the human element thrive, writes, Marty Hungerford, Chief Innovation Officer, BRX.
There is a rather confronting premise in our industry that I feel we all need to come to terms with and discuss in the open: If you don’t engage with AI in a massive way, your business is not going to exist.
When I talk about engaging with AI, I’m not referring to conducting some little experiment or a pilot program, because that approach simply isn’t moving fast enough for the transformation that’s already happening around us. I’m talking about meaningful change to business processes and, in turn, business overall.
This is a topic I discussed recently on the Agency Podcast with Dain Walker. While I’ve previously written about why creatives shouldn’t fear AI taking their jobs, my conversation with Dain surfaced something equally important and obvious, which is that agencies themselves need radical transformation to remain relevant. Both clients and agencies are already feeling the impact of this technological shift.
When BRX CEO Bridget Cleary and I decided to start our agency two and a half years ago, we recognised what the emergence of ChatGPT and pioneering generative image engines could mean for organisations in the marketing and advertising sector. So, the choice became clear: transform radically or become irrelevant.
AI technology is advancing rapidly. At BRX, we use creative models that evolve month to month. There’s always something new, and we can benefit from that agility. But traditional business models with their procurement processes and standardised systems can’t adapt quickly enough. By the time they’ve approved one tool, three better ones have emerged.
I speak to people in these organisations who say “Oh my god, I’d love to be doing this. At home I’m experimenting, but I can’t do it for my clients, I can’t do it within the organisation.” They’re literally handcuffed out of it. Meanwhile, independent agencies that can move fast are already using these tools to do three times the work at half the cost.
So if you feel like your agency could benefit from AI but maybe isn’t doing enough yet, this article is for you.
Map Everything, Transform Everything
Recently, outside of work, I experienced a very clear example of a business AI optimisation opportunity. After injuring my knee doing jiu-jitsu, I was at the physio, and I was sitting there thinking, how could he be using AI?
I asked him, “What’s the thing that takes up most of your time?” He said, “After the session, I’ve got to write up all my notes.”
The solution seems simple; turn on a recorder and let AI handle the transcription. Even this small example suggests that every business could have these inefficiencies, and also how every bit of the business is going to be affected by AI.
Bringing it back to agency land, how might you apply this thinking? Have you really mapped out your end-to-end production? Have you sat there and mapped out every part of the flow? Unless you do that, it’s very hard to start identifying what to automate. And it’s not just AI, there are so many automation programs that could make certain tasks easier.
This goes for all businesses, whether you’re a plumber, running a sole-trader business, or making bespoke shoes on Etsy, write down everything from first enquiry through to follow-up. Then envision what steps will be impacted by AI and start to see what measures you can get integrated already.
Once you’ve mapped your processes, use the ICE methodology to prioritise: Impact, Confidence, Effort. Score each potential change out of 10 for the impact it will have, your confidence in executing it, and the effort required. Add them up. The task scoring 28? Do that first.
Building the New Agency
Another thing I want to address about the role of AI in a creative agency that relates to job security and human value is that many people assume AI in agencies means hiring technologists to replace creatives to drive AI tools because AI is ‘tech’. They’ve got it backwards.
We’ll still need technically literate people, but the increasing accessibility and ease of use of these tools means there’s a rapidly diminishing technology barrier. We’re focused on hiring creatives, with a bit of tech savvy, and a lot of taste and ideas.
When we hired the first creative prompt engineer in Australia, maybe in the world, I selected her because she had no real technical background. Her background was in art direction, design, painting and photography (among others). I hired her because her range of mediums and skills would translate well to what we wanted to deliver for our clients.
In the new way of working that we’ve adopted at BRX, and the vision I expect many others to shift into, my opinion is that current job titles are too constrictive. I hate putting people in boxes.
The rigidity of systems and demarcation is a bad thing. At 75 people, we’re probably doing what 150 people do in a big organisation. Our industry is positioned very well to understand that the best people are multi-disciplinary and curious, and that we need to leverage that.
Like the processes example I gave above, one thing you can do right now is consider every role in your business and assume that you’re going to need to either replace that role and get that person to do something else, or radically improve how that person works using AI.
Again, my optimism for AI largely stems from my belief that this isn’t about eliminating jobs, it’s about elevating people.
For example, we’ve got a brilliant receptionist who really wants to be an account manager., and we’re actually in the process of building an AI receptionist. This will free up her ability to do account management.
Rather than be frightened of what automation might do to jobs, we can more honestly look at roles and our careers and think, ‘does someone really want to be sitting at a front desk greeting people? Is that really productive use of a human’s time?’. We can largely solve the reception challenge and provide a new pathway for a great employee.
I’m optimistic about genAI and AI and automation in general because, at BRX, we’re in a growth phase. We’re not trying to get rid of people, we’re trying to hire people. We’re growing the business because AI enables us to take on more ambitious work. This offers us a massive opportunity to think about how we can better use people.
Commit to Transformation
The advice I hear a lot is “do this one experiment, get comfortable.” I don’t think this approach will have you moving quick enough. Some young business that doesn’t follow the traditional rules is just going to come and take all the business.
There’s a unique opportunity right now for businesses that can say to clients: “We’ve already figured this out. We can do this work when your internal teams can’t.” But that opportunity won’t last forever.
The businesses that survive won’t be the ones that experimented carefully. They’ll be the ones that looked at roles, processes, and transformed completely. In every step in your business, how could AI change it? You’ve got to be thinking that way.
I think this is the most exciting time to be running an agency. Yes, it requires change, but the possibilities for what we can create and how we can grow are massive.
