November 5, 2024 • 47 mins
Hiring and training new employees is a big commitment - and getting it right will have a lasting impact on your agency.
Kicking off The Big Agency Club series, we chat with Sarah Brougham, VP of Operations at GenFlow. Sarah’s helped multiple agencies go from start-up to established, having a big hand to play in their growth and maturity journies. Sarah has spent the past six years at GenFlow, helping grow revenue there by 5x and headcount 16x.
Sarah gives us her best tips on:
- Hiring the right people for your agency
- Creating onboarding programs that new hires love and gets them off to a running start
- How offboarding goes beyond formalities and systems removals, and includes decisions on retention
- How to decide whether to fight to keep an employee that's thinking of leaving
Follow Sarah on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarahbrougham/
Follow Harv on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harvnagra/
Agency8x: https://www.agency8x.com/
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.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Thanks for listening to TheHandbook, the agency operations
(00:02):
podcast.
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Now, back to the episode.
Harv Nagra (01:27):
Hey all, welcome back to the handbook.
As Ops leaders, something thatwe're often responsible for is
shaping and overseeing hiring,onboarding, and offboarding in
our agencies.
But doing these things wellisn't always easy.
Hiring is incredibly timeconsuming and costly.
I've used recruiters with mixedresults.
Let's just say that 20 percentrecruitment fee really stings
(01:50):
when a hire doesn't work out.
I've also tried the direct routevia LinkedIn and ended up buried
in CVs.
Screening processes and toolshelp a bit.
I've used VideoAsk as anautomated first stage interview
tool to see who's motivatedenough to participate and ensure
that we're only interviewing themost suitable respondents from
that pool.
None of this has been a silverbullet.
(02:11):
Onboarding, however, issomething that I am very proud
of.
I've built onboarding programsthat start off new hires on the
right foot.
A structured week of businessexposure, team intros through
pre recorded presentations, andtraining and practice
opportunities for key systems.
I've had rave reviews from newhires saying they love knowing
exactly what they're meant to beworking on in their first week
(02:31):
and that they're moving intotheir day to day with some great
exposure on how the organizationworks.
Today's guest has done some evenmore impressive work around
hiring, onboarding, and offboarding, amongst other things.
This is part of a new sub serieson the podcast that we're
calling The Big Agency Club,where we talk to people that
work at agencies that are ahundred plus in terms of
(02:51):
headcount and see what we canlearn.
Our guest today is SarahBrougham.
She began her career back in2012 in the talent management
space, working with BBC radio,DJs, reality stars, and
musicians.
Years later, she joined contentgiants, Unilad to head up their
new talent management agency,building the agency from the
ground up.
Fast forward a few years, andshe joined GenFlow where she's
(03:14):
now the VP of Ops.
In the six years that Sarah'sbeen there, the agency has seen
a huge amount of growth andsuccess, and she's had a big
role to play.
Since she's joined, they'veincreased revenues by 5 X and
grown 16 X in terms of headcountand things are only looking up.
Let's get into the conversationand see what we can learn from
Sarah.
(03:35):
Sarah, welcome to the podcast.
Thank you so much for beinghere.
Sarah Brougham (03:38):
Thank you for having me.
Harv Nagra (03:39):
I'm quite keen to hear about how people get into
operations; it's not the mostnatural career path so how did
you get into the space?
Sarah Brougham (03:45):
Do you know what?
It's not.
And I think, getting intooperations, I think when I
started my career was probablythe, the last thing I actually
thought I would be doing when Istarted my career, I actually
started out in more of the, theentertainment world.
So, working a record label, thenin the talent management space
with, you know, Radio DJs,reality stars, et cetera.
(04:06):
And then, and then moved intothe, the creator economy.
So managing YouTubers,influencers essentially, from
sort of 2015 onwards, was alwaysreally involved in the, the
management day to day strategy,sales, et cetera.
and then I think just becausethen I, I joined a company where
I'm at now, now GenFlow and itwas at its infancy and I was
(04:27):
there when we really built thiscore team.
and we, we grew so fast andthere was such a big opportunity
and me and the rest of the teamjust worked really hard to, to
really sustain that growth andget to where we were.
I think it just, it was anatural progression into an
operations role because I'd doneso many things within the
agency.
I knew how so many differentdepartments ran that it was like
a, a natural next step to thenjust take over the day to day
(04:50):
side of things versus juststicking in, in one sort of
department in that way.
Harv Nagra (04:55):
Right.
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
And that resonates with me aswell.
You kind of get your hands dirtyacross an agency in a lot of
different roles and then it justseems like a natural fit that
when you know how to do a bit ofeverything that you can kind of
take control of it.
Sarah Brougham (05:07):
Yeah, yeah, no, a hundred percent.
Harv Nagra (05:09):
So there's been a couple of agencies where you
have been on the ground floor,right when things are starting
to come together, was thatintentional or is that kind of a
challenge you looked forward toand you kind of threw yourself
into?
Sarah Brougham (05:20):
I think I do, I love the ability to work quite
closely with people and to, Mm Ithink also when you work quite
closely with the people who runan agency or found an agency and
you are so aligned with theirvision and the potential of the
agency, then I think I lovebeing able to be that hands on
and see the actual, the impactthat you can have and the growth
and being really involved inthat.
I think sometimes if it's, Ican't see myself in more of a
(05:42):
bigger, more corporate businessessentially, just because I feel
like I'd, I'd probably feel morelike a number than anything
else.
Like, and personally, that's notfor me in terms of going in and
maybe just doing a nine to fiveand then, and switching off
essentially.
So, so yeah, I don't think itwas a conscious decision.
I think it's been where I'velanded initially, and then I've
enjoyed working in that way somuch that I've continued to, to,
(06:03):
to work in those sorts ofagencies.
Harv Nagra (06:06):
Absolutely.
And, a question that pops intomind is like, when you are in
these very young agencies it'salmost like a blank slate in
terms of how to do things.
So that can be exciting.
That can also mean a bit offumbling along the way.
And we'll be hearing some ofyour stories today as well,
about things that have workedreally well and maybe some
(06:27):
things that haven't, where doyou get that best practice
awareness from in that kind ofcase and that kind of confidence
to move forward with something?
Sarah Brougham (06:36):
I think the first thing is, you know, when
it insides out more than anyone.
So I think you need to be ableto, to do any core job in an
agency before you start to buildthe, you know, the building
blocks and the processes and theSOPs and everything around it.
And I think that's doing thatfirst, I suppose, has then given
me the confidence to then beable to go and build them.
I think the first thing when I,before I'd done anything to do
(06:58):
with operations and we, but wewere at a point where we needed
to build it.
The word process would just makeme like, it's like, what is a
process?
How do you build it?
What's the format you do it in?
Why do you need it?
Like, it was just people inoperations can say process a
hundred times a day, but it'sjust, it's the physical, like,
how do you do this?
What's the template to do inthat?
And there's so much that you canfind online, but not all of it
(07:19):
will always resonate with youand your agency, the services
you're trying to give and howyou want your teams to operate.
So I think it probably took mesix to 12 months to then be
quite confident in like, okay,this is how I'm going to build
it.
This is what works for thisagency.
this is how I want to roll itout.
And I want the team to be ableto execute these different parts
of the actual services that wedeliver in an agency.
So I think, I think it'sdefinitely a confidence thing.
(07:41):
Not when you move intooperations, it's not something I
personally thought was, was anatural thing for me to do.
It's, it's been a, it's been alearning curve I'd say over the
last sort of six years or so.
Harv Nagra (07:53):
Mm so from what you've told me previously,
there's been a lot of changeover the six years you've been
at GenFlow.
One thing that I saw wassomething around headcount.
You started from six employeesand now you're over a hundred.
So tell us about that.
Sarah Brougham (08:09):
It has definitely been a journey and
there's been sort of peaks andtroughs in terms of number of
employees and how we operate andeverything else.
And I think, so when I firstjoined GenFlow, yes, there was
sort of six of us in a Londonoffice.
had about 25 clients or so, andjust really hustling to sign new
clients, launch new brands, andjust increase the revenue that
(08:31):
we were making for the creatorsthat we were, we had signed to
the agency.
I think as well we were quiteearly in the game.
Sean, the CEO, actually startedthe business, in around 2015,
2016.
and he's seen the opportunity inthe market for creators to
actually monetize their audiencewhen it wasn't really a, you
know, mainstream thing.
and for us, because we were soearly, actually.
(08:52):
In terms of having skin in thegame, and then this is where it
really started to take off.
Then we started to see some realsuccess sort of 2019, 2020, and
we, we started then to build theteam slowly, and I think we got
to around 20, by sort of 2019,early 2020.
We then went through a fundinground in 2020, towards the end
(09:12):
of 2020 and raised$11 millionfrom BGF, which is the British
Growth Fund.
And from there, because we hadthe money in the door and a lot
of that was to, okay, here's theopportunity.
Here's the revenue we've made.
Here's how profitable we are.
It was like, okay, now let's goand build this team.
Cause the more people we have,the more clients we'll be able
to manage, the more brands we'llbe able to build, et cetera, et
cetera.
And I think we went soaggressive, especially because
(09:35):
2020, was for us, which wasfortunate for us, obviously
unfortunate for a lot of brandsand everything else, because
obviously marketing budgets werebeing cut, there was COVID,
there was everything else, butthere was a, an opportunity for
creators now to launch their ownbusinesses because they could
have control of their ownaudience and monetize their own
audience.
So that's when we seen this realspike essentially in revenue
(09:59):
demands.
And then also in creatorsactually looking at, okay, I
could actually build somethingof my own cause I can't rely on
brand deals coming through thedoor all the time.
So, we signed about 80 newclients within about 2021
because the funding had justcome in and we hired around 65
people in 2021.
Harv Nagra (10:15):
Wow.
Sarah Brougham (10:16):
because the money was there, it was in the
door and we thought, okay, if wehave all of these amazing new
people, we'll be able to do waymore.
So we did that.
and which was great, but I thinkwe also then learned very
quickly that we were going theninto 2022, having to make some
more difficult decisions when wewere going off the top line
revenue.
And then when we were looking atwhat the market wants, if we
(10:36):
were ever to go for a secondround of funding, actually we
need the profit to be at theforefront.
So we need to focus on thebottom line.
and also we need to be a littlebit more, we need to be a little
bit more selective, I would sayabout clients.
We were just thinking quantityin terms of the clients that we
were signing.
and I think we were in aposition now where we'd matured
a lot.
We had the great reputation andwe had some really exciting
(10:59):
clients that we were workingwith that we didn't have to just
have, you know, over a hundredclients on the books to be able
to sustain what we were doing.
And we realized that we werespending too much time actually
just servicing clients that werenot profitable for us.
So.
Harv Nagra (11:12):
Right.
It's
Sarah Brougham (11:13):
probably one of the first times that we'd
stopped and looked at, okay, whoshould we remove from the
business?
and then from there, I think weremoved around 30 to 40
different clients within thespace of eight months, so that
we could then become moreprofitable.
And then from a teamperspective, we removed, we
removed around, 35 percent ofthe actual headcount so that we
could look at, okay, how do wereduce our, our overheads
(11:34):
essentially, and then work onthe cogs underneath and the
operations and the systems andeverything so that we could be
more effective as a team and getmore out of the team, give them
more of the tools, more of theeducation, everything they
needed to do the job, or do thebest in their job, essentially,
so that we could then continueto increase the source of
revenue per headcount.
And then we were on more of a, asteady path, essentially upwards
(11:56):
in terms of profit as abusiness.
So, so that's kind of a paththat we took in terms of, I
suppose, teams and revenue andclients over the first say four
years.
So we're now just hit over ahundred really in the last
couple of months.
but there has been a massivechange in terms of the way the
team are based.
So when we first had the agency,it was, you know, it was
(12:17):
predominantly UK based.
They were London based.
It was people coming into theoffice.
And as with every agency, Ithink over the last few years,
we've now become a lot moreremote and we've got teams who
are all over the world from,yes, in the US, in the UK, in
Europe, but also in the likesof, Mauritius and Jamaica, and
Nigeria and Ghana.
And there's huge talent poolswho are over in these other
parts of the world.
(12:37):
and it also allows us to servicedifferent clients and even we,
we handle customer service forour, some of our creators, for
their brands, their businesses.
So having people who are basedin these different time zones
also allows us to manage thecustomer service in different
time zones.
So we've been able to justengineer the, the team and the
way we operate in a much moresort of cost effective, but also
(12:59):
like impactful way now.
Harv Nagra (13:02):
Some really good lessons there in terms of
growing too fast and then havingto do a bit of a reset with a
focus on profitability.
But I wanted to focus on thatpoint around team expansion and
hiring, you know, finding theright people, finding people
that are the right fit.
What have you learned in thatregard?
Sarah Brougham (13:19):
I think making sure people are aligned with the
culture that we have at GenFlowbecause we're quite an
aggressive agency in terms ofgrowth and, hiring the right
people has definitely been achallenge.
We've hired a lot of greatpeople.
Don't get me wrong, but peoplewho've just not been the right
fit for GenFlow as an agency.
And, And I think the learning onthat, you know, we've probably
wasted hundreds of thousands ofpounds on, on employees who have
(13:43):
been great on paper and may begood for other agencies, but for
us, we're just not the right fitwhatsoever.
Harv Nagra (13:49):
hmm.
Sarah Brougham (13:49):
I think originally I, when I first
started hiring, I'd never reallyhired before, before coming to
GenFlow and we used to, I wouldlook at a flashy CV and think,
wow, this person's been at thisbrand and that brand, you know,
obviously they're going to comein and they're going to fix our
problems because they know howit works.
These big brands who were doingamazingly well.
and it didn't just wasn't how itworked for us.
(14:10):
They come in and they, they usedto work in a certain way or for
a bigger agency.
And it's just, it didn't workfor us because we were, we were
working with real people,creators for one, they're not
just B2B clients.
You need to manage them in avery specific way, you know,
from personality to the way youreport to them, to the way you
communicate with them.
and then also just their, theiroutlook on, on what pace should
look like internally and, youknow, what growth should look
(14:34):
like and, and everything else.
So I think that was one majorlearning curve.
And then we've had to adapt howwe hire and the, I suppose what
we, what we check in that hiringprocess to make sure people are
actually aligned with us andwhere we're going and, and the
why for me now in therecruitment process is so
important.
Not just like delving into theCV and making sure that, okay,
yes, they actually, they havedone X, Y, Z, and you can test
(14:55):
them on that in the interview.
It's like, why, why are youdoing this?
Like, where do you want to,where do you want to be?
Like, what is the, what, whatgets you up in the morning in a
way?
Because for us, you need to havethat personal drive and you need
to want to do something foryourself.
Not just to, to want to get upand get paid and, and tick a
box.
Because if you don't want toconstantly learn, I think, and
that's what I've, I've learnedis like a, now building the
(15:17):
team, if someone joins the teamand they don't want to develop
personally, they don't want tocontinue to evolve and they
don't want to know what, youknow, new trends are, or they
don't want to keep up with theindustry.
They're not like consuming whatthey're doing day to day, just
generally, and they're notpassionate about it.
They're not going to be someonethat's going to going to work
for us as a, as an agency, justbecause we are all so passionate
about what we do and we want tobe the best in everything that
(15:38):
we do as an agency.
so I think that was a, one ofthe biggest challenges and most
expensive lessons, I think welearned as a, as an agency.
yeah.
And then from a cultureperspective, obviously you can
write it out, you can have yourvalues, you can have everything.
So people know what you want todo from a, from a culture
perspective, but just, Isuppose, lead them by example,
(16:00):
that being sort of the mainthing that we actually do now,
because I think I thought youcan write these values down.
You can sort of instill them inpeople and people would
understand and then just crackon and just believe in it and
probably start to just to liveit day to day because we because
we do, but I think yeah beingsort of having people have that
mindset to really to want to bea winner to do it for themself
and to to really just to deliverthe best source of quality of
(16:23):
work I think is as beingprobably the the most difficult
thing.
But now we had that core teamwho you know, the six of us at
the beginning and the firstother people who come through
the door because they were ableto sort of learn our culture and
we were all able to build such atight knit team, essentially.
It's, it's now become a loteasier for us to just drip that
into the team and for us to justtry and lead by example.
Harv Nagra (16:44):
That's excellent.
Yeah.
I think values can very easilyend up just being words on a
page.
If they're not kind ofreinforced.
Sarah Brougham (16:51):
Yeah.
Harv Nagra (16:52):
it just becomes something people read during
onboarding week and then youkind of forget it.
And also, like you're saying, itneeds to be lived and
demonstrated by the leadershipteam, and linking back to it so
people remember that this is areflection of that, I think is
super key.
I want to go back to that, thatpoint about hiring.
I know a lot of agencies havethis issue and it's so painful.
(17:13):
Hiring is just such a pain inthe butt and you know, whether
it's the recruitment fees or youmanage it yourself, it's a
nightmare either way.
And you know, there is thisawkward thing where people might
look really great on paper ormight even do really well in the
interview, but it ends up notpanning out.
So is it like, you know, a lotof those questions that you're
(17:33):
asking now, is it more aboutthis kind of culture fit kind of
stuff that you're asking abouttheir passion and their drive?
I was trying to glean whatyou've changed in terms of your
hiring process.
Sarah Brougham (17:43):
That's part of it.
But I, I sort of break it downinto, into a, a three stage
phase, basically in terms ofrecruitment now.
What we used to do is we'd putsomething on LinkedIn or we used
agencies really early in thedays.
you know, and you'd have, youknow, especially with LinkedIn,
you have hundreds of CVs comingin and you spend hours sitting
there.
I'm sure we've all done in thepast, just reading CVs and
reading people's profiles,shortlisting and then sort of
(18:04):
moving them on.
And then we do, we do oneinterview to sort of get to know
them, talk about the response tooverall job responsibilities,
then we'd hire really from thereto be completely honest.
So we made, we made a lot ofmistakes.
So now we're, I've put it intothese three different phases.
So the sort of the attract phaseis what I call the first phase,
which is how do we attract theright people into the role?
And that starts with the actualjob ad itself.
(18:25):
Like I look at a job ad as in, Iwant at least 50 percent of
people to look at that jobadvert and go, it's not for me
because I want to be so specificthat it's, they know exactly
what they're getting.
And if it is for them or not,whether it's, I don't know if
it's a client manager, you know,the, the requirements or the
overview of the job to say, youknow, to be able to manage eight
(18:47):
clients across five differenttime zones or something like the
specifics of the job that I knowwill probably put some people
off, but it will also excitesome other people because
they're like, wow, okay, I'mgoing to be working with big
creators who are based in NewYork and Dubai and LA.
And the right person's going tocome in and find that as a
motivation.
And the wrong person's going tocome in and say, I just want to
be an account manager and, youknow, and I'll manage clients,
but hold on a minute.
(19:07):
If you put a meeting in my diaryat 6 PM, like there's absolutely
no way I'm going to turn up toit.
So I think that's the firstthing, making sure that we're
attracting the right peoplethrough the way we advertise a
job.
the application side of thingsis now a lot more, It's like, I
like to build like a form, likeI use Typeform for example, so
that I can understand wherethey're located, how many years
of experience they have, and Ican ask a couple of questions
(19:28):
that just vets out people whomaybe have not done the role
before, like if you use certainjargon that If you've not done
this role, you're likely notgoing to be able to answer it in
a certain way.
Or I don't know if it's a, youknow, if an ads manager, I'll
ask them some of their, theirbiggest, to tell us some of
their biggest wins or the ROASthat they've got on sort of
certain clients or the budgetthat they've managed.
So I can just sort of get to agood understanding of what level
(19:49):
is this person at, regardless ofthem saying I've managed ad
campaigns for this huge brandwhich looks great on a CV.
Just get the detail a little bitmore there.
and then, notice periods, etcetera, so that you've got
enough information in thatactual application side of
things before you start wastingtheir time as well as yours.
Then bringing them to sort of aninterview stage or a task phase.
and then I move on to what Icall a test phase, which is
(20:09):
phase two, which is then where Istart a test, three things.
Their ability, the credibilityand the culture being the third
thing.
So the ability is where then Iwill set some form of task.
So it will get some sort of sortof task where I can actually see
their ability to execute thejob.
If it's a I don't know anoutreach executive, for example
I'll ask them to give me threecreators they would actually
(20:30):
think we should sign and why,maybe draft an email to a
specific creator so I can justsee their thought process and
the communication and how theythink, you know, and just
basically come up with some sortof task that just allows you to
see can they actually do the jobessentially?
then from there, I will move onto interview one.
These can swap around dependingon how senior the job role is.
(20:50):
If it's super senior and we knowsomeone, you know, they're not
going to do a task and it makessense to meet that person first,
then you can swap these twoaround.
But there's the credibility sideof things, which is the first
interview which is where the,the person who's going to be
managing that person will go inand actually interview them
along with sometimes our HRmanager.
And they will really just delveinto the day to day experience.
(21:11):
That is really for me justdrilling down into where I, what
I get a lot in interviews andI've, I've got, I've done
hundreds of interviews.
Like is, you know, we, peoplesaying we in interviews, it's
just really frustrating for me.
And it's like, you know, we didthis or, you know, I asked them
about some to talk me throughchallenges they've had or wins
they've had.
And it's all we, we, we, and I'mlike, okay, great.
But what did you do?
(21:31):
Like, what was your input inthat, in that actual, the
campaign that you ran or, theshoot that happens or whatever
it is, just really just sort ofdrill down into their day to day
so that you can understand thecredibility of the CV and what
they did and their, theirexperience essentially.
If then they've passed that,they then go on to the final
one, which is the culture test.
So that is where then either,myself or the CEO or the chief
(21:53):
brands officer or the personleading the department will join
that final interview.
And just ask some morechallenging questions, I
suppose.
and then if there's anything wefeel like we've left out in the
credibility interview, we can reask them.
And I also like to givescenarios.
So this is where, from a cultureperspective, I can ask them
things and how they would handleit to say, okay, would that be
aligned with how we wouldactually handle the, the
(22:13):
scenario themselves.
if it was a HR manager, I'd givethem maybe something that's
actually happened in the past.
You know, you've got someone, asenior management team member
who's been with us for a longtime, but you know, they're not
delivering, and what's happenedand how would you handle it and
just say, okay, do we agree withthat?
Is that what we do?
and yeah, you can come up withdifferent scenarios for
different roles, but at leastthen you kind of get to
understand the person and theirmindset and sort of how they
(22:35):
think essentially.
and also like to ask them, whatare you expecting from your next
role?
So before you start to tell themwhat to expect, always ask them
what they expect, because assoon as you let the cat out the
bag, they're obviously justgoing to repeat back to you
what, what you're giving them.
So, so that if someone issaying, you know, I want to be
part of a team, that's got agreat social culture and it's
got, loads of personaldevelopment opportunities and
(22:57):
training and et cetera.
And if you offer that great, ifyou don't offer that and you
know, maybe you're not someonewho's got socials every two
weeks as an agency, it's likethis person's going to get a bit
bored and you can just start to,you know, so they expect to come
into a free breakfast and a yogaclass every week.
Like when you're just not whatyou're about.
So I think, yeah, if that's justthen for me, you know, whether
someone's going to stay with youfor a long time or not, even
regardless of the actualexperience that they've got.
(23:19):
and then, yeah, obviously thefinal phase for me is secure
phase and you do everything elsein terms of going to sell modes
at the end of that interview toactually get them through the
door if you want them, offercontracts, et cetera.
So that's like my three phaseapproach now to hire and to make
sure that we're getting theright people basically for the
role.
And we're not spending a hell ofa lot of time looking at CVs.
Yeah.
Harv Nagra (23:38):
Yeah, I love that.
It's so thorough.
And it just sounds like you'vereally kind of nailed all the
pain points you were havingpreviously.
Sarah Brougham (23:44):
Yeah.
Harv Nagra (23:44):
So have you have you noticed, and hopefully you have
like a big difference in termsof having to have fewer of these
kind of concerning conversationsor having to let people go.
Sarah Brougham (23:53):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Retention internally hasincreased by 23 percent in the
last two years now.
and, just the speed to hire nowwe've got sort of approximately
around the source of six weekmark, whereas it used to be, you
know, sometimes three monthsplus, or we'd, or we'd get to
sort of maybe, the finalinterview.
Yeah.
And you'd have to sort of thenstart again.
So, so yeah, massive, massiveimprovement for us over the last
(24:16):
source of, yeah, three to fouryears or so.
Harv Nagra (24:19):
Amazing.
How do you find when you havesuch dispersed team in terms of
getting people aligned in yourways of working, how does that
all work when you're based hereand everyone's in 16
Sarah Brougham (24:30):
Yeah,
Harv Nagra (24:31):
or whatever it might
Sarah Brougham (24:32):
be?
Um, it's not the easiest job.
I think you've probably comeacross this when it comes to
operations.
Generally, I think trying to getpeople into a way of working is
probably one of the biggestchallenges I've faced as a VP of
Operations because you're tryingto change people's mindsets as
well, you know, the way theywork day to day is just like
habit basically.
And you're trying to change thatand make them understand the
(24:53):
why.
So I suppose in terms of theteam that we already had, that
was probably one of the firstchallenges.
And then, yes, as we continue tohire new people who are based
all over the world, it's nowhaving the right structure in
place so that there is a solidonboarding process in terms of
them understanding who we are asan agency, what our vision is as
an agency, the sort of the rolethey will play in our long term
(25:14):
vision and our long termbusiness goals, and then giving
them the actual, the handbooks,the tools, the systems, et
cetera.
with a solid sort of two weekonboarding process where they
meet key people in the team,they have to digest certain
things, certain documents,certain templates, certain
processes, and then we work withthem to make sure that they've
understood everything beforethen they really get into the
day to day, really.
(25:35):
so there's a solid sort ofstructure there.
and then it's just about stayingon top of it and making sure
that it's actually working dayto day.
Harv Nagra (25:41):
That, that sounds really fantastic about that
onboarding program.
So you mentioned two weeks iskind of your full induction.
Is that all like a lot of thatself led or how, how does that
work?
Sarah Brougham (25:50):
I do that, it's quite a regimented way now.
Where every time people join,they're given a clear setup,
which for us is a project inAsana.
It can be a task list in Notionor whatever software that you,
you use as an agency.
So I break it down by one,giving them client education and
services.
So, a list of all the clients,the key links to their websites,
(26:12):
and understanding of theservices that we're doing for
them so that they have anunderstanding of who they're
going to be working with andwhat the agency actually
provides for them, whetherthat's marketing services,
content, whatever your agency isactually doing.
Then I give them a list ofprocesses and handbooks.
So the key processes andhandbooks that are relevant to
them.
So, so that they know what theyneed to follow.
(26:32):
They can read through thepolicies and they're armed with
everything they need to thencrack on to do the job properly.
Then I will give them exampledocuments.
So, again, specific to theirrole.
Are they reporting documents?
So if they're going to bereporting to a client at the end
of a week, end of a month,here's the exact format.
Here's an example of what's beengiven to a client in the last
few months.
Is it a pitch deck if they'regoing to be on the acquisition
(26:53):
team?
Here's how you pitch to aclient, how you talk about the
agency, how you talk about ourservices.
Um, social calendars, contracts,whatever, depending on the role,
give them real example documentsso they can see example of work
that's been executed that you'rehappy with within that role.
Then a list of intro meetings,which is for me is really
important because a lot of thetime you're put in an agency and
(27:13):
then you're, you're told to goand work with a shed loads of
people, but you don't know who'sJohn in finance or whoever
anyone is.
You just got to figure it out.
And I think it just helps you,one, from a social perspective,
and also you are in a remoteenvironment especially, people
are just names on a screen, andunless you've physically been on
a call with someone and got toknow the person behind the name
and the personality, and alsowhat they do and what their
(27:36):
department does, It's difficultto sort of build the rapport and
also just build the speed inexecution day to day.
So I give everyone a list ofpeople they need to meet and
then they can go and set thosemeetings up and then they do
that within the first week thatthey're here.
And then finally is just a listof specific tasks that I want
them to do within the first fewweeks Whether that's to go and
set up obviously all the adminside of things their emails,
(27:56):
their slack, Go and set thoseintro meetings up, Go and review
specific example documents, doany sorts of research tasks or
any then specific executionwithin that job so it's very
varied, but it's basicallygiving them everything that they
need to know about pastexecution and templates,
playbooks and processes they'llneed to follow, and then the
people that they need to meet toget the context as to who they
are, what they do, and how theagency runs day to day,
(28:18):
essentially.
Harv Nagra (28:19):
Amazing.
I love that.
I, I, I think it's verysatisfying as an ops person to
get to that point in youragency's maturity where you have
all that documentation ready andit, it can just be deployed when
somebody new starts.
You know, all this kind of adhoc making stuff up as you go is
well in the past.
So that sounds fantastic.
So, really.
Really well done.
(28:39):
All right.
So we've talked about your bestpractice around hiring and also
what you do with onboarding.
I was looking at something youposted on LinkedIn the other
day, and I found it reallyinspiring.
You were talking about yourprocess, the process you trigger
when somebody hands in theirnotice.
And I have to admit, when itcomes to offboarding, I usually
look at it in terms of kind ofpayroll related tasks and
(29:01):
systems offboarding, andequipment and stuff like that.
What I love about what you weresaying is that retention has a
part to play in that.
So if you could just talk usthrough your thinking around the
offboarding process and yourbest practice so we can see what
you do.
Sarah Brougham (29:14):
Yeah, no, for sure.
I think there's a couple ofthings and I, I'd want to sort
of briefly touch on onboardingbecause I think in terms of
retention, that is so importantbefore you then get to the off
boarding process as to, youknow, reasons why people leave,
how you can retain staff, etc.
and avoid people actuallyleaving the agency.
Because yeah, from an onboardingperspective, I've worked in a
(29:34):
few different agencies now, andI think we've all probably had
that experience start to anagency where you're, you're
thrown a laptop, you're puttinga corner and it's like, just,
just crack on with it basically.
And whether it's like figure itout for yourself or just
actually just start to executethe job that you've been given,
which can be a little bit sortof deer in the headlights vibe.
And great in some instances,yes, then you're in it, then
you're getting in the trenchespretty quick, but not great, I
(29:57):
don't think, in terms ofretention, potentially, because
you're not given the team, thetools they need, the knowledge
around the agency, the educationaround the clients, and mainly
for me, the confidence to do thejob, because I think you have
people that will thrive in thatenvironment, but you have other
people who might actually be thebest people for the job, but
they, they feel like becausethey've not had the best
(30:17):
onboarding and they don't feellike you're bringing out the
best of them.
You're getting the skills fromthem that you're actually
needed, or expected to when theyjoined the agency.
So for me, onboarding is superimportant.
So anyone who actually joins theagency has that, okay, I know
exactly what I'm doing.
I know I have the understandingof who the clients are.
I know who I'm going to beworking with.
(30:38):
I understand the sorts ofhierarchy in the agency and
who's who.
So once you've done that, Ithink you as a, an agency owner
or whoever it is that's managingthat onboarding, has done
everything that you can in my,in my eyes to give them the best
leg up to then do the job anddeliver to the best of their
ability.
So I give usually people betweensorts of up to eight weeks, six
to eight weeks, ideally sort ofbenefit of the doubt after that,
(31:00):
because I've done everythingthat we need to be doing.
I think if there's, if they'restill not delivering to a
certain level or they're stillmaking certain mistakes after
that, then that's when I supposeit becomes an issue because
you've done everything you canas an agency.
Hopefully because you've doneall that, you should then get
the best out of your, your team.
Harv Nagra (31:15):
Absolutely.
And, and I think, you know,bringing it back to that point
of retention, it really sets thetone, a good onboarding and it
kind of demonstrates to theperson that they're, they're
showing up at a really grown upplace of work and you're, you're
right a lot of agencies don'thave such a rigorous onboarding
process.
So I think that's reallyimportant.
Before we get back to that pointabout kind of off boarding.
(31:37):
I wanted to quickly just ask youin terms of like probation
periods, do you, do you look atthat as a three month or a six
month thing?
Do you have a point of view onthat?
Sarah Brougham (31:45):
Yes.
So, interestingly, we havechanged this in the last year or
so.
And we've, we do a six monthprobation period.
Again, positives and negativesto it, because this is also for
us as the employer, we want tomake sure that someone has had
enough time to be able tointegrate themselves into the
agency, to be able to startexecuting to a specific standard
that we want them to.
And then you know that they'reactually someone who you're
(32:06):
going to keep in the agency longterm.
And I suppose on the flip side,it also gives the employee the
opportunity to do the job andstill have a good six months to
understand, is this the rightposition for me?
Do I want to stay around here?
So we did try a lot to behonest.
It's probably something I mightlook at reducing because I've
actually found that maybe someof the negatives to that is, I
think you already knowinstinctively as, as a, an
(32:26):
agency, if someone is goodenough or not after I'd say
three to four months time.
And ultimately, what I found isthen, if you leave it up to six
months, someone might be greatbut they've decided maybe they
want to move on or they've hadanother job opportunity come up
and all of a sudden they'releaving the agency pretty quick
when they've become quite a, acore person to you as an agency
within that four or five months.
So I've tried and tested a fewthings essentially and I feel
(32:49):
like the, the, the sweet spot isaround the three to four month
mark when it comes toprobations.
Harv Nagra (32:54):
So bringing it back to kind of somebody handing in
their notice and what that wholekind of process looks like and
the retention element that comesinto play there.
Sarah Brougham (33:04):
Yeah, for me, so it's when someone hands in the
notice, it's the first thing forme is I look at the value of the
persons.
So if they've, they've sent youthe email or they've spoken to
you or whatever it might be andyou know, they want to leave, I
will first look at, okay, Isthis someone who is actually so
core, so key to the agency thatthey add so much value you do
not want them to go anywhere andthat is, is, is the case a lot
(33:25):
of the time, otherwise theyusually wouldn't be in your
agency.
Or I suppose sometimes it mightbe people who've been here for
years got a bit too comfortable,if you look at the role they're
doing now, and maybe otherpeople in the industry, you
probably could replace thatperson and get a lot more value
out of that role than maybe thecurrent person that's in there.
Or you just look at them andsay, you know what, it's
probably the right time and itmakes sense.
(33:46):
Let's do it.
So it's the evaluation for mefirst is to, okay, value, where
are we in there?
And then from there, then youcan make the decision as to, do
you want to make the steps toretain that person or not?
And are they, are they in theright headspace to want to stay
in the agency?
Do we think that they have theright attitudes to stay in the
agency at this point?
Or have they, I don't know, gotin this headspace where they are
(34:07):
quite negative about things orthey're maybe they're just
switched off and they've just,they want to change essentially
in terms of environment orcareer or whatever it might be.
So if that's the case from aretention perspective, if we
want to, I just usually have afrank conversation because I
think we're all humans at theend of the day.
And I think rather than try anddo this formal back and forth on
email, I would just rather as afirst step, just pick up the
phone and get on a call and alsojust see their body language.
(34:30):
Like how are they responding tothings?
Why are they leaving?
And just have a bit of an openconversation just to be, you
know, supportive if that's theright thing that they want to do
but also have a just uh have theability to to try and maybe
persuade them to stay because ofthe opportunities with you and
you can do that a lot more ifyou're On the phones or you're
on a virtual meeting or you'rein person with someone.
It's much easier.
So let's have that frankconversation.
(34:51):
And then there's options to thenpotentially change their role
slightly if it's just a tweak inresponsibilities they want;
maybe it's moreresponsibilities.
Maybe just it's just a change inthe day to day and then
ultimately a lot of the time itcomes down to actual the package
that they're on.
Is it the salary?
Is it the bonuses that they'regetting?
What is it someone else hasoffered them?
Like why, why did theyultimately go and did they go
and look elsewhere?
(35:11):
And what was the reason behindthat?
Or has someone come to them withan offer and just because it was
so attractive they've thoughtI've got to go for it, but they
were still really in it with usas an agency and then we can
look at maybe just negotiatingsomething which makes sense for
them to to leave the otheropportunity and stay with us.
So that's kind of step two interms of retention.
Then step three, I suppose, ifthey're not aligned, and they
(35:32):
don't want to stay in the agencyis when you start to do
everything from an adminperspective, you draw up the
letter with all the details andthe dates they're going to leave
all of the, the terms andconditions they need to abide
by, the IP, what they need todo, all of that type of stuff.
And I usually do an exitinterview with people who I
don't do with everyone.
Usually, you know, if they'vebeen here for a couple of months
and we know it's just, you know,they've made the decision, it is
(35:52):
what it is.
With people who've been here fora significant amount of time or
they've passed the probationperiods and they're with us,
then I will do an exitinterview, mainly just to delve
in a little bit more around whyand get someone who's probably
been less involved, I suppose,so they feel like they can speak
a bit more freely to them sothat we can understand the, if
there is any deeper reasons, butfor us also just get
recommendations.
So the next person that comesin, was there maybe a skillset
(36:15):
that person felt they didn'thave, that if they did, they
would have been able to do therole better.
Was there maybe things that theyfeel if was improved in the
agency, they maybe would havestayed or anything like that
that we feel could maybe benefitus in the long term in terms of
retaining staff.
And then we give them a handovertemplate.
So we give them, these are thethings that you need to provide
to us versus just saying tothem, write a handover and send
(36:35):
it to us.
Otherwise we don't have thecontrol.
And I know before people leavethe agency, sometimes it's like,
Oh shit, there's only, there'sfive bullet points on this, or
they've only given us certaininformation about certain
clients.
And then they leave the agencyand you're trying to chase them
or track them down, which hasdefinitely happened in the early
days.
So, we control what the handoverlooks like before they start to
draft it.
And then step five isultimately, yeah, removal.
(36:55):
Last day, remove from softwares,get the equipment off them and
everything else that I'm sureeveryone does when people
eventually leave the agency.
So yeah, that's it.
I'll try and just end on apositive note where we can
essentially just becauseIndustries are small for one and
you want to make sure thateveryone who does leave is
leaving with that Positiveoutlook about the agency and
they've had a great time withyou.
(37:16):
And also for you as an agency,you know, you've built that
relationship with them, They'vedone great things for you And
also you don't want them to theninstill any negativity in the
rest of the team just becausethey're leaving the agency.
So I think it's all around justmakes sense for everyone to try
and end things on a positivenote regardless of how you're
parting ways.
Harv Nagra (37:32):
Amazing.
the consideration throughoutabout whether you want to keep
this person and see if there'sanything that you can do.
And, also ending on thatpositive note, I think really,
really important.
So really appreciate that.
in terms of what you're mostproud of as an Ops leader, what
comes to mind?
Sarah Brougham (37:49):
I mean, there's lots of things I would actually
mention the actual, theoperations in terms of the
systems you put in, becausewithout it, we wouldn't be able
to operate at the level that wedo, manage the clients we do,
sign the clients we do.
So I think that is definitelysort of number one.
cause it's also made us so muchmore profitable from like an,
team perspective and an outputperspective.
But also I think being able towork quite closely with people
so that you can, yes, you cancoach people.
(38:11):
And I think for me, it's beingable to, to bring people in the
business and to, to have peoplenow who are super senior in the
business, but joined us aspretty junior.
I like to do like a, a threemonth intensive when I have
someone join, especially sort ofunder one of my departments that
actually lead to, to really showthem how to do the job and to
coach them on how to do the job.
And then from there, I'd saythree months onward, let people
(38:32):
really go.
And, and then have that freedomto just to just execute.
And I think that approach for mehas actually led to some amazing
people in the business.
One, because they're amazingpeople anyway, but without
actually having that actual, thesystem and working quite closely
with these people, I wouldn't beable to even step back from what
I've been doing day to day tothen work on the bigger
projects, Agency 8x, which I'vementioned to you in terms of
(38:53):
other coaching things that we'redoing as a business.
Sign new clients.
I focus a lot now on theacquisition side of the business
and who we want to bring onboard and doing the pitching
myself so without having really,really just mentors a lot of
people in the business to, toreally, to give them the same
sort of understanding and, uh,motivation and show them the
sort of the path that they cango on to be able to, to build
(39:15):
their own career.
and then, Obviously at the endof it also add value to us as an
agency which is what has allowedus to continue to grow because
we have great people.
because yeah, I love being apeople person.
I love being able to solveproblems and I think both of
them are sort of together hasreally allowed us to build a
really strong team.
That's probably one of the, oneof the main things that comes to
mind.
Harv Nagra (39:32):
That sounds amazing.
You, you brought up Agency 8Xand, that, that's a good
opportunity for us to talk aboutthat.
So this is, is this kind of likean agency community?
Tell us a bit about what it is.
Sarah Brougham (39:44):
It is, yeah.
So it's a two prong.
So there's the, the educationalside of things.
So it is a, it's an onlinecourse, essentially, where we
have, myself, James Salby, who'sthe chief brand officer, and
then Sean, the CEO, havedeveloped this, this course,
which gives, agencies who aredoing at least sort of the six
figure mark.
So they're already establishedin some sort of way.
(40:07):
They have clients, they've gotservices, they've got some sort
of success, but they want to getto that sort of eight figure
mark.
It's given them everything thatwe have learned over the last
six, seven, eight years as to,from Sian's perspective,
strategy, clients, how to be aCEO, build a leadership team,
from myself in terms ofeverything from, from hiring and
operations and, and deliveringthe work and putting sorts of
(40:29):
OKR frameworks in place and, andwho to hire, when to hire them.
and then from, from James'sperspective, everything around
sorts of the, the clientmanagement, the business
strategy, client strategy,growth, et cetera.
So it's, it's basicallyeverything we wished that we had
five years ago and we probablywould have avoided a lot of the
mistakes that we have over thelast five or six years if we had
something like this.
(40:50):
So I think we've seen anopportunity in the market from
like an online educationperspective we've seen the
demand in the market for it andbecause we've done it I think it
we sort of it's something thatwe we wanted to be able to share
to build this this communitybecause it's It's not something
we sort of could see or findonline that we were able to join
to give us that sort of network,essentially.
and there are a lot, a hell ofresources basically as well that
(41:10):
are in there that we can, we canshare with agency owners to, to
use and implement in theiragency.
So, so yeah, it's an educationplatform, it's an online course,
and then it's a, it's acommunity essentially.
So we have a, we, we use Slackfor our community, and yeah,
there's a lot of differentfounders from all over the
world.
So.
UK, US, Germany, quite a fewpeople in Europe, and, India, et
(41:30):
cetera, with small agencies whoare, who are just growing
essentially.
And they we're supporting them,but then now there's this great
network of people who aresupporting each other with, you
know, anything that comes up.
Someone's got a pissed offclient and they come in, guys,
this has happened, any sorts ofadvice on this, or someone's
changed their outreach strategyand they sort of, they want to
test it and, and, and put it inthe group and people feed back
on it.
So it's amazing if I wish we hadsomething like this really a few
(41:53):
years back just to be able tobounce off people who are, who
were going through the samethings that we were.
Yeah.
Harv Nagra (41:58):
Absolutely.
That sounds fantastic.
so Sarah, we're coming to theend of our session, but I guess
one of my questions is, beforewe wrap up, if someone's looking
to kind of get into agencyoperations, what would be your
advice to them?
Sarah Brougham (42:14):
My advice, would be, I suppose one thing to say
is I think from an outsider'sperspective, operations sounds
like the least sexiest job youcan get out there because
operations is, you know, there'sa lot, it just sounds like a lot
of running around or justorganizing people, but I think
it's, it's understanding whatoperations looks like in
different agencies, becausethere's definitely, there's not
(42:34):
like a one size fits all interms of operation managers.
what my job as a VP ofoperations could look completely
different to someone else as aVP of operations in a different
agency in terms of what youmanage, what you measure, what
your output should be, what youown, who you report to.
It's just, it can be sodifferent.
So I think, I think if you aresomeone who likes variety, I
think, cause that's the mainthing for me.
(42:55):
And I think why I love it somuch, because when I was in the
client management side ofthings, you're always on
different.
You know, a different shoes orworking with a different client
or whatever it might be.
I think Operations, you need tolove being able to get up in the
morning and every day looksdifferent.
I think you need to be a littlebit of a self motivator and you
want it.
You need to be motivated by theresults that you drive.
Because a lot about operationsis about getting your head in
(43:18):
the sand, doing the work.
But you know, then you see theresults and it might take 3
months, 6 time.
But it's definitely somethingthat, if that's something that
motivates you, I get a lot ofsatisfaction out of.
and it's also a great way tojust continue to learn.
I think if you want to besomeone who's not always just
stuck in one box, you can reallycarve your own career.
If you go into operations, likewith me, you know, I, I can sort
(43:38):
of work on one part of thebusiness.
And as we see a need or a, anopportunity for a new service in
the business, I can pivot andstart to work on something else.
So I think it's, it sounds quiteboring.
I would say from an outsider'sperspective, when you say
operations, if I'm being honest,but actually when you get into
the nooks of it, if you're inthe right agency and you, you
work with the right people,operations can actually be a
pretty exciting role.
That's very varied.
(43:58):
Yeah.
And it's really satisfyingbecause you can see the actual,
the, the results from yourteams, your team's motivation to
the, the actual, the revenuethat's driven through the agency
itself.
Harv Nagra (44:09):
Definitely.
Definitely.
That's, that's an amazinganswer.
somewhat related, you know, ifsomeone's at an agency that's
looking to scale any kind of topof mind advice comes up based on
what you've kind of gone throughand your lessons.
Sarah Brougham (44:22):
I think in terms of scaling this, I mean, there's
a long list that we couldprobably go through.
Yeah.
But I think, one is making surethat systems is the main thing
without them, you're, you'regoing to have people taking
longer to actually execute.
You don't have control over thequalities and our control over
the output.
And then from a clientperspective, I would say, don't
be scared to, don't be scared tolet go of clients.
I think is probably one of themain things, cause that was one
(44:42):
of the key things hinderinggrowth for us.
And it sounds strange when youthink, okay, start to remove
clients, but actually thatunlocked so much more time
essentially for us and energythat we could start to then
focus on the right clients orstart to focus more energy on
the current clients to get moreout of them.
And I think we, you know, forthe first three, four years,
there was, it was like, if assoon as we, we dropped a client
or if a client left, it was theend of the world.
(45:04):
And I think now it's like, it'sokay.
You know, it's, it's for areason, like whether it's,
they're not happy and they, theyhaven't got the motivation and
the drive to keep going.
So it's not going to make sense.
Or from our perspective, they'venot got the right attitudes and
they're not got the passion andthey're not driving the results.
So I think, I think at thebeginning, it's all about, okay,
you need more clients.
You need more clients, but whenyou get to a certain point to
unlock that growth potential, Ithink you need to be able to let
(45:26):
go of that and be okay withlosing clients and you
proactively letting clients goto, to, to give you that space
and ability to, to grow.
Harv Nagra (45:33):
Really good answer.
So Sarah, if anyone's looking toconnect with you, where can they
go find you?
You post some amazing stuff onLinkedIn that I...
Sarah Brougham (45:41):
Thank you.
Harv Nagra (45:41):
always love reading about.
So tell us where we
Sarah Brougham (45:44):
You can find me on LinkedIn.
Yes.
Sarah Brougham.
I actually don't know what myhandle is on LinkedIn to be
completely honest.
Harv Nagra (45:50):
Okay.
We'll
Sarah Brougham (45:51):
You can post a link.
Harv Nagra (45:52):
episode notes as well.
And if anyone wants to learnmore about agency 8x,
Sarah Brougham (45:57):
sorry, yeah, if anyone wants to learn, anything
more about Agency 8X, you can goto agency8x.com.
Harv Nagra (46:02):
Excellent.
But Sarah, it's been an absolutepleasure talking to you today
really inspiring some of yourkind of stories and lessons and
stuff that we can take away andapply at our own places of work.
So thank you for being heretoday.
Sarah Brougham (46:14):
No worries.
Yeah, all good.
Thank you for having me.
Harv Nagra (46:17):
Hey all, I hope you enjoyed that.
You can tell how passionateSarah is about what she does
through her stories.
And I think it was really greatadvice as well when she mentions
learning to let go ofunprofitable clients so you can
focus on winning the ones thatare a better fit.
Probably my favorite part of theconversation though was her
advice on the hiring process.
That's something I'm going to bemaking notes on for future
(46:38):
reference.
You'll know by now that if yousign up for The Handbook
Newsletter, we send you a cheatsheet with all the key takeaways
from our interviews every otherweek.
Now before I go, here's what Iwould love you to do.
Please share this podcastepisode with a friend or
colleague and tell them what youloved about it.
I'll let you click share as soonas I stop talking.
(46:58):
I'll see you back here in acouple of weeks.
Thanks very much.
Thanks for listening to TheHandbook, the agency operations
(00:02):
podcast.
This podcast is brought to youby Scoro.
As an ops director, somethingthat was super important to me
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I mean, I've witnessed peoplecopying and pasting each other's
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When I brought in Scoro at myagency, I loved that I was able
to create a library of mix andmatch quote templates that
(00:23):
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demo call, tell them Harv sentyou.
Now, back to the episode.
Harv Nagra (01:27):
Hey all, welcome back to the handbook.
As Ops leaders, something thatwe're often responsible for is
shaping and overseeing hiring,onboarding, and offboarding in
our agencies.
But doing these things wellisn't always easy.
Hiring is incredibly timeconsuming and costly.
I've used recruiters with mixedresults.
Let's just say that 20 percentrecruitment fee really stings
(01:50):
when a hire doesn't work out.
I've also tried the direct routevia LinkedIn and ended up buried
in CVs.
Screening processes and toolshelp a bit.
I've used VideoAsk as anautomated first stage interview
tool to see who's motivatedenough to participate and ensure
that we're only interviewing themost suitable respondents from
that pool.
None of this has been a silverbullet.
(02:11):
Onboarding, however, issomething that I am very proud
of.
I've built onboarding programsthat start off new hires on the
right foot.
A structured week of businessexposure, team intros through
pre recorded presentations, andtraining and practice
opportunities for key systems.
I've had rave reviews from newhires saying they love knowing
exactly what they're meant to beworking on in their first week
(02:31):
and that they're moving intotheir day to day with some great
exposure on how the organizationworks.
Today's guest has done some evenmore impressive work around
hiring, onboarding, and offboarding, amongst other things.
This is part of a new sub serieson the podcast that we're
calling The Big Agency Club,where we talk to people that
work at agencies that are ahundred plus in terms of
(02:51):
headcount and see what we canlearn.
Our guest today is SarahBrougham.
She began her career back in2012 in the talent management
space, working with BBC radio,DJs, reality stars, and
musicians.
Years later, she joined contentgiants, Unilad to head up their
new talent management agency,building the agency from the
ground up.
Fast forward a few years, andshe joined GenFlow where she's
(03:14):
now the VP of Ops.
In the six years that Sarah'sbeen there, the agency has seen
a huge amount of growth andsuccess, and she's had a big
role to play.
Since she's joined, they'veincreased revenues by 5 X and
grown 16 X in terms of headcountand things are only looking up.
Let's get into the conversationand see what we can learn from
Sarah.
(03:35):
Sarah, welcome to the podcast.
Thank you so much for beinghere.
Sarah Brougham (03:38):
Thank you for having me.
Harv Nagra (03:39):
I'm quite keen to hear about how people get into
operations; it's not the mostnatural career path so how did
you get into the space?
Sarah Brougham (03:45):
Do you know what?
It's not.
And I think, getting intooperations, I think when I
started my career was probablythe, the last thing I actually
thought I would be doing when Istarted my career, I actually
started out in more of the, theentertainment world.
So, working a record label, thenin the talent management space
with, you know, Radio DJs,reality stars, et cetera.
(04:06):
And then, and then moved intothe, the creator economy.
So managing YouTubers,influencers essentially, from
sort of 2015 onwards, was alwaysreally involved in the, the
management day to day strategy,sales, et cetera.
and then I think just becausethen I, I joined a company where
I'm at now, now GenFlow and itwas at its infancy and I was
(04:27):
there when we really built thiscore team.
and we, we grew so fast andthere was such a big opportunity
and me and the rest of the teamjust worked really hard to, to
really sustain that growth andget to where we were.
I think it just, it was anatural progression into an
operations role because I'd doneso many things within the
agency.
I knew how so many differentdepartments ran that it was like
a, a natural next step to thenjust take over the day to day
(04:50):
side of things versus juststicking in, in one sort of
department in that way.
Harv Nagra (04:55):
Right.
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
And that resonates with me aswell.
You kind of get your hands dirtyacross an agency in a lot of
different roles and then it justseems like a natural fit that
when you know how to do a bit ofeverything that you can kind of
take control of it.
Sarah Brougham (05:07):
Yeah, yeah, no, a hundred percent.
Harv Nagra (05:09):
So there's been a couple of agencies where you
have been on the ground floor,right when things are starting
to come together, was thatintentional or is that kind of a
challenge you looked forward toand you kind of threw yourself
into?
Sarah Brougham (05:20):
I think I do, I love the ability to work quite
closely with people and to, Mm Ithink also when you work quite
closely with the people who runan agency or found an agency and
you are so aligned with theirvision and the potential of the
agency, then I think I lovebeing able to be that hands on
and see the actual, the impactthat you can have and the growth
and being really involved inthat.
I think sometimes if it's, Ican't see myself in more of a
(05:42):
bigger, more corporate businessessentially, just because I feel
like I'd, I'd probably feel morelike a number than anything
else.
Like, and personally, that's notfor me in terms of going in and
maybe just doing a nine to fiveand then, and switching off
essentially.
So, so yeah, I don't think itwas a conscious decision.
I think it's been where I'velanded initially, and then I've
enjoyed working in that way somuch that I've continued to, to,
(06:03):
to work in those sorts ofagencies.
Harv Nagra (06:06):
Absolutely.
And, a question that pops intomind is like, when you are in
these very young agencies it'salmost like a blank slate in
terms of how to do things.
So that can be exciting.
That can also mean a bit offumbling along the way.
And we'll be hearing some ofyour stories today as well,
about things that have workedreally well and maybe some
(06:27):
things that haven't, where doyou get that best practice
awareness from in that kind ofcase and that kind of confidence
to move forward with something?
Sarah Brougham (06:36):
I think the first thing is, you know, when
it insides out more than anyone.
So I think you need to be ableto, to do any core job in an
agency before you start to buildthe, you know, the building
blocks and the processes and theSOPs and everything around it.
And I think that's doing thatfirst, I suppose, has then given
me the confidence to then beable to go and build them.
I think the first thing when I,before I'd done anything to do
(06:58):
with operations and we, but wewere at a point where we needed
to build it.
The word process would just makeme like, it's like, what is a
process?
How do you build it?
What's the format you do it in?
Why do you need it?
Like, it was just people inoperations can say process a
hundred times a day, but it'sjust, it's the physical, like,
how do you do this?
What's the template to do inthat?
And there's so much that you canfind online, but not all of it
(07:19):
will always resonate with youand your agency, the services
you're trying to give and howyou want your teams to operate.
So I think it probably took mesix to 12 months to then be
quite confident in like, okay,this is how I'm going to build
it.
This is what works for thisagency.
this is how I want to roll itout.
And I want the team to be ableto execute these different parts
of the actual services that wedeliver in an agency.
So I think, I think it'sdefinitely a confidence thing.
(07:41):
Not when you move intooperations, it's not something I
personally thought was, was anatural thing for me to do.
It's, it's been a, it's been alearning curve I'd say over the
last sort of six years or so.
Harv Nagra (07:53):
Mm so from what you've told me previously,
there's been a lot of changeover the six years you've been
at GenFlow.
One thing that I saw wassomething around headcount.
You started from six employeesand now you're over a hundred.
So tell us about that.
Sarah Brougham (08:09):
It has definitely been a journey and
there's been sort of peaks andtroughs in terms of number of
employees and how we operate andeverything else.
And I think, so when I firstjoined GenFlow, yes, there was
sort of six of us in a Londonoffice.
had about 25 clients or so, andjust really hustling to sign new
clients, launch new brands, andjust increase the revenue that
(08:31):
we were making for the creatorsthat we were, we had signed to
the agency.
I think as well we were quiteearly in the game.
Sean, the CEO, actually startedthe business, in around 2015,
2016.
and he's seen the opportunity inthe market for creators to
actually monetize their audiencewhen it wasn't really a, you
know, mainstream thing.
and for us, because we were soearly, actually.
(08:52):
In terms of having skin in thegame, and then this is where it
really started to take off.
Then we started to see some realsuccess sort of 2019, 2020, and
we, we started then to build theteam slowly, and I think we got
to around 20, by sort of 2019,early 2020.
We then went through a fundinground in 2020, towards the end
(09:12):
of 2020 and raised$11 millionfrom BGF, which is the British
Growth Fund.
And from there, because we hadthe money in the door and a lot
of that was to, okay, here's theopportunity.
Here's the revenue we've made.
Here's how profitable we are.
It was like, okay, now let's goand build this team.
Cause the more people we have,the more clients we'll be able
to manage, the more brands we'llbe able to build, et cetera, et
cetera.
And I think we went soaggressive, especially because
(09:35):
2020, was for us, which wasfortunate for us, obviously
unfortunate for a lot of brandsand everything else, because
obviously marketing budgets werebeing cut, there was COVID,
there was everything else, butthere was a, an opportunity for
creators now to launch their ownbusinesses because they could
have control of their ownaudience and monetize their own
audience.
So that's when we seen this realspike essentially in revenue
(09:59):
demands.
And then also in creatorsactually looking at, okay, I
could actually build somethingof my own cause I can't rely on
brand deals coming through thedoor all the time.
So, we signed about 80 newclients within about 2021
because the funding had justcome in and we hired around 65
people in 2021.
Harv Nagra (10:15):
Wow.
Sarah Brougham (10:16):
because the money was there, it was in the
door and we thought, okay, if wehave all of these amazing new
people, we'll be able to do waymore.
So we did that.
and which was great, but I thinkwe also then learned very
quickly that we were going theninto 2022, having to make some
more difficult decisions when wewere going off the top line
revenue.
And then when we were looking atwhat the market wants, if we
(10:36):
were ever to go for a secondround of funding, actually we
need the profit to be at theforefront.
So we need to focus on thebottom line.
and also we need to be a littlebit more, we need to be a little
bit more selective, I would sayabout clients.
We were just thinking quantityin terms of the clients that we
were signing.
and I think we were in aposition now where we'd matured
a lot.
We had the great reputation andwe had some really exciting
(10:59):
clients that we were workingwith that we didn't have to just
have, you know, over a hundredclients on the books to be able
to sustain what we were doing.
And we realized that we werespending too much time actually
just servicing clients that werenot profitable for us.
So.
Harv Nagra (11:12):
Right.
It's
Sarah Brougham (11:13):
probably one of the first times that we'd
stopped and looked at, okay, whoshould we remove from the
business?
and then from there, I think weremoved around 30 to 40
different clients within thespace of eight months, so that
we could then become moreprofitable.
And then from a teamperspective, we removed, we
removed around, 35 percent ofthe actual headcount so that we
could look at, okay, how do wereduce our, our overheads
(11:34):
essentially, and then work onthe cogs underneath and the
operations and the systems andeverything so that we could be
more effective as a team and getmore out of the team, give them
more of the tools, more of theeducation, everything they
needed to do the job, or do thebest in their job, essentially,
so that we could then continueto increase the source of
revenue per headcount.
And then we were on more of a, asteady path, essentially upwards
(11:56):
in terms of profit as abusiness.
So, so that's kind of a paththat we took in terms of, I
suppose, teams and revenue andclients over the first say four
years.
So we're now just hit over ahundred really in the last
couple of months.
but there has been a massivechange in terms of the way the
team are based.
So when we first had the agency,it was, you know, it was
(12:17):
predominantly UK based.
They were London based.
It was people coming into theoffice.
And as with every agency, Ithink over the last few years,
we've now become a lot moreremote and we've got teams who
are all over the world from,yes, in the US, in the UK, in
Europe, but also in the likesof, Mauritius and Jamaica, and
Nigeria and Ghana.
And there's huge talent poolswho are over in these other
parts of the world.
(12:37):
and it also allows us to servicedifferent clients and even we,
we handle customer service forour, some of our creators, for
their brands, their businesses.
So having people who are basedin these different time zones
also allows us to manage thecustomer service in different
time zones.
So we've been able to justengineer the, the team and the
way we operate in a much moresort of cost effective, but also
(12:59):
like impactful way now.
Harv Nagra (13:02):
Some really good lessons there in terms of
growing too fast and then havingto do a bit of a reset with a
focus on profitability.
But I wanted to focus on thatpoint around team expansion and
hiring, you know, finding theright people, finding people
that are the right fit.
What have you learned in thatregard?
Sarah Brougham (13:19):
I think making sure people are aligned with the
culture that we have at GenFlowbecause we're quite an
aggressive agency in terms ofgrowth and, hiring the right
people has definitely been achallenge.
We've hired a lot of greatpeople.
Don't get me wrong, but peoplewho've just not been the right
fit for GenFlow as an agency.
And, And I think the learning onthat, you know, we've probably
wasted hundreds of thousands ofpounds on, on employees who have
(13:43):
been great on paper and may begood for other agencies, but for
us, we're just not the right fitwhatsoever.
Harv Nagra (13:49):
hmm.
Sarah Brougham (13:49):
I think originally I, when I first
started hiring, I'd never reallyhired before, before coming to
GenFlow and we used to, I wouldlook at a flashy CV and think,
wow, this person's been at thisbrand and that brand, you know,
obviously they're going to comein and they're going to fix our
problems because they know howit works.
These big brands who were doingamazingly well.
and it didn't just wasn't how itworked for us.
(14:10):
They come in and they, they usedto work in a certain way or for
a bigger agency.
And it's just, it didn't workfor us because we were, we were
working with real people,creators for one, they're not
just B2B clients.
You need to manage them in avery specific way, you know,
from personality to the way youreport to them, to the way you
communicate with them.
and then also just their, theiroutlook on, on what pace should
look like internally and, youknow, what growth should look
(14:34):
like and, and everything else.
So I think that was one majorlearning curve.
And then we've had to adapt howwe hire and the, I suppose what
we, what we check in that hiringprocess to make sure people are
actually aligned with us andwhere we're going and, and the
why for me now in therecruitment process is so
important.
Not just like delving into theCV and making sure that, okay,
yes, they actually, they havedone X, Y, Z, and you can test
(14:55):
them on that in the interview.
It's like, why, why are youdoing this?
Like, where do you want to,where do you want to be?
Like, what is the, what, whatgets you up in the morning in a
way?
Because for us, you need to havethat personal drive and you need
to want to do something foryourself.
Not just to, to want to get upand get paid and, and tick a
box.
Because if you don't want toconstantly learn, I think, and
that's what I've, I've learnedis like a, now building the
(15:17):
team, if someone joins the teamand they don't want to develop
personally, they don't want tocontinue to evolve and they
don't want to know what, youknow, new trends are, or they
don't want to keep up with theindustry.
They're not like consuming whatthey're doing day to day, just
generally, and they're notpassionate about it.
They're not going to be someonethat's going to going to work
for us as a, as an agency, justbecause we are all so passionate
about what we do and we want tobe the best in everything that
(15:38):
we do as an agency.
so I think that was a, one ofthe biggest challenges and most
expensive lessons, I think welearned as a, as an agency.
yeah.
And then from a cultureperspective, obviously you can
write it out, you can have yourvalues, you can have everything.
So people know what you want todo from a, from a culture
perspective, but just, Isuppose, lead them by example,
(16:00):
that being sort of the mainthing that we actually do now,
because I think I thought youcan write these values down.
You can sort of instill them inpeople and people would
understand and then just crackon and just believe in it and
probably start to just to liveit day to day because we because
we do, but I think yeah beingsort of having people have that
mindset to really to want to bea winner to do it for themself
and to to really just to deliverthe best source of quality of
(16:23):
work I think is as beingprobably the the most difficult
thing.
But now we had that core teamwho you know, the six of us at
the beginning and the firstother people who come through
the door because they were ableto sort of learn our culture and
we were all able to build such atight knit team, essentially.
It's, it's now become a loteasier for us to just drip that
into the team and for us to justtry and lead by example.
Harv Nagra (16:44):
That's excellent.
Yeah.
I think values can very easilyend up just being words on a
page.
If they're not kind ofreinforced.
Sarah Brougham (16:51):
Yeah.
Harv Nagra (16:52):
it just becomes something people read during
onboarding week and then youkind of forget it.
And also, like you're saying, itneeds to be lived and
demonstrated by the leadershipteam, and linking back to it so
people remember that this is areflection of that, I think is
super key.
I want to go back to that, thatpoint about hiring.
I know a lot of agencies havethis issue and it's so painful.
(17:13):
Hiring is just such a pain inthe butt and you know, whether
it's the recruitment fees or youmanage it yourself, it's a
nightmare either way.
And you know, there is thisawkward thing where people might
look really great on paper ormight even do really well in the
interview, but it ends up notpanning out.
So is it like, you know, a lotof those questions that you're
(17:33):
asking now, is it more aboutthis kind of culture fit kind of
stuff that you're asking abouttheir passion and their drive?
I was trying to glean whatyou've changed in terms of your
hiring process.
Sarah Brougham (17:43):
That's part of it.
But I, I sort of break it downinto, into a, a three stage
phase, basically in terms ofrecruitment now.
What we used to do is we'd putsomething on LinkedIn or we used
agencies really early in thedays.
you know, and you'd have, youknow, especially with LinkedIn,
you have hundreds of CVs comingin and you spend hours sitting
there.
I'm sure we've all done in thepast, just reading CVs and
reading people's profiles,shortlisting and then sort of
(18:04):
moving them on.
And then we do, we do oneinterview to sort of get to know
them, talk about the response tooverall job responsibilities,
then we'd hire really from thereto be completely honest.
So we made, we made a lot ofmistakes.
So now we're, I've put it intothese three different phases.
So the sort of the attract phaseis what I call the first phase,
which is how do we attract theright people into the role?
And that starts with the actualjob ad itself.
(18:25):
Like I look at a job ad as in, Iwant at least 50 percent of
people to look at that jobadvert and go, it's not for me
because I want to be so specificthat it's, they know exactly
what they're getting.
And if it is for them or not,whether it's, I don't know if
it's a client manager, you know,the, the requirements or the
overview of the job to say, youknow, to be able to manage eight
(18:47):
clients across five differenttime zones or something like the
specifics of the job that I knowwill probably put some people
off, but it will also excitesome other people because
they're like, wow, okay, I'mgoing to be working with big
creators who are based in NewYork and Dubai and LA.
And the right person's going tocome in and find that as a
motivation.
And the wrong person's going tocome in and say, I just want to
be an account manager and, youknow, and I'll manage clients,
but hold on a minute.
(19:07):
If you put a meeting in my diaryat 6 PM, like there's absolutely
no way I'm going to turn up toit.
So I think that's the firstthing, making sure that we're
attracting the right peoplethrough the way we advertise a
job.
the application side of thingsis now a lot more, It's like, I
like to build like a form, likeI use Typeform for example, so
that I can understand wherethey're located, how many years
of experience they have, and Ican ask a couple of questions
(19:28):
that just vets out people whomaybe have not done the role
before, like if you use certainjargon that If you've not done
this role, you're likely notgoing to be able to answer it in
a certain way.
Or I don't know if it's a, youknow, if an ads manager, I'll
ask them some of their, theirbiggest, to tell us some of
their biggest wins or the ROASthat they've got on sort of
certain clients or the budgetthat they've managed.
So I can just sort of get to agood understanding of what level
(19:49):
is this person at, regardless ofthem saying I've managed ad
campaigns for this huge brandwhich looks great on a CV.
Just get the detail a little bitmore there.
and then, notice periods, etcetera, so that you've got
enough information in thatactual application side of
things before you start wastingtheir time as well as yours.
Then bringing them to sort of aninterview stage or a task phase.
and then I move on to what Icall a test phase, which is
(20:09):
phase two, which is then where Istart a test, three things.
Their ability, the credibilityand the culture being the third
thing.
So the ability is where then Iwill set some form of task.
So it will get some sort of sortof task where I can actually see
their ability to execute thejob.
If it's a I don't know anoutreach executive, for example
I'll ask them to give me threecreators they would actually
(20:30):
think we should sign and why,maybe draft an email to a
specific creator so I can justsee their thought process and
the communication and how theythink, you know, and just
basically come up with some sortof task that just allows you to
see can they actually do the jobessentially?
then from there, I will move onto interview one.
These can swap around dependingon how senior the job role is.
(20:50):
If it's super senior and we knowsomeone, you know, they're not
going to do a task and it makessense to meet that person first,
then you can swap these twoaround.
But there's the credibility sideof things, which is the first
interview which is where the,the person who's going to be
managing that person will go inand actually interview them
along with sometimes our HRmanager.
And they will really just delveinto the day to day experience.
(21:11):
That is really for me justdrilling down into where I, what
I get a lot in interviews andI've, I've got, I've done
hundreds of interviews.
Like is, you know, we, peoplesaying we in interviews, it's
just really frustrating for me.
And it's like, you know, we didthis or, you know, I asked them
about some to talk me throughchallenges they've had or wins
they've had.
And it's all we, we, we, and I'mlike, okay, great.
But what did you do?
(21:31):
Like, what was your input inthat, in that actual, the
campaign that you ran or, theshoot that happens or whatever
it is, just really just sort ofdrill down into their day to day
so that you can understand thecredibility of the CV and what
they did and their, theirexperience essentially.
If then they've passed that,they then go on to the final
one, which is the culture test.
So that is where then either,myself or the CEO or the chief
(21:53):
brands officer or the personleading the department will join
that final interview.
And just ask some morechallenging questions, I
suppose.
and then if there's anything wefeel like we've left out in the
credibility interview, we can reask them.
And I also like to givescenarios.
So this is where, from a cultureperspective, I can ask them
things and how they would handleit to say, okay, would that be
aligned with how we wouldactually handle the, the
(22:13):
scenario themselves.
if it was a HR manager, I'd givethem maybe something that's
actually happened in the past.
You know, you've got someone, asenior management team member
who's been with us for a longtime, but you know, they're not
delivering, and what's happenedand how would you handle it and
just say, okay, do we agree withthat?
Is that what we do?
and yeah, you can come up withdifferent scenarios for
different roles, but at leastthen you kind of get to
understand the person and theirmindset and sort of how they
(22:35):
think essentially.
and also like to ask them, whatare you expecting from your next
role?
So before you start to tell themwhat to expect, always ask them
what they expect, because assoon as you let the cat out the
bag, they're obviously justgoing to repeat back to you
what, what you're giving them.
So, so that if someone issaying, you know, I want to be
part of a team, that's got agreat social culture and it's
got, loads of personaldevelopment opportunities and
(22:57):
training and et cetera.
And if you offer that great, ifyou don't offer that and you
know, maybe you're not someonewho's got socials every two
weeks as an agency, it's likethis person's going to get a bit
bored and you can just start to,you know, so they expect to come
into a free breakfast and a yogaclass every week.
Like when you're just not whatyou're about.
So I think, yeah, if that's justthen for me, you know, whether
someone's going to stay with youfor a long time or not, even
regardless of the actualexperience that they've got.
(23:19):
and then, yeah, obviously thefinal phase for me is secure
phase and you do everything elsein terms of going to sell modes
at the end of that interview toactually get them through the
door if you want them, offercontracts, et cetera.
So that's like my three phaseapproach now to hire and to make
sure that we're getting theright people basically for the
role.
And we're not spending a hell ofa lot of time looking at CVs.
Yeah.
Harv Nagra (23:38):
Yeah, I love that.
It's so thorough.
And it just sounds like you'vereally kind of nailed all the
pain points you were havingpreviously.
Sarah Brougham (23:44):
Yeah.
Harv Nagra (23:44):
So have you have you noticed, and hopefully you have
like a big difference in termsof having to have fewer of these
kind of concerning conversationsor having to let people go.
Sarah Brougham (23:53):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Retention internally hasincreased by 23 percent in the
last two years now.
and, just the speed to hire nowwe've got sort of approximately
around the source of six weekmark, whereas it used to be, you
know, sometimes three monthsplus, or we'd, or we'd get to
sort of maybe, the finalinterview.
Yeah.
And you'd have to sort of thenstart again.
So, so yeah, massive, massiveimprovement for us over the last
(24:16):
source of, yeah, three to fouryears or so.
Harv Nagra (24:19):
Amazing.
How do you find when you havesuch dispersed team in terms of
getting people aligned in yourways of working, how does that
all work when you're based hereand everyone's in 16
Sarah Brougham (24:30):
Yeah,
Harv Nagra (24:31):
or whatever it might
Sarah Brougham (24:32):
be?
Um, it's not the easiest job.
I think you've probably comeacross this when it comes to
operations.
Generally, I think trying to getpeople into a way of working is
probably one of the biggestchallenges I've faced as a VP of
Operations because you're tryingto change people's mindsets as
well, you know, the way theywork day to day is just like
habit basically.
And you're trying to change thatand make them understand the
(24:53):
why.
So I suppose in terms of theteam that we already had, that
was probably one of the firstchallenges.
And then, yes, as we continue tohire new people who are based
all over the world, it's nowhaving the right structure in
place so that there is a solidonboarding process in terms of
them understanding who we are asan agency, what our vision is as
an agency, the sort of the rolethey will play in our long term
(25:14):
vision and our long termbusiness goals, and then giving
them the actual, the handbooks,the tools, the systems, et
cetera.
with a solid sort of two weekonboarding process where they
meet key people in the team,they have to digest certain
things, certain documents,certain templates, certain
processes, and then we work withthem to make sure that they've
understood everything beforethen they really get into the
day to day, really.
(25:35):
so there's a solid sort ofstructure there.
and then it's just about stayingon top of it and making sure
that it's actually working dayto day.
Harv Nagra (25:41):
That, that sounds really fantastic about that
onboarding program.
So you mentioned two weeks iskind of your full induction.
Is that all like a lot of thatself led or how, how does that
work?
Sarah Brougham (25:50):
I do that, it's quite a regimented way now.
Where every time people join,they're given a clear setup,
which for us is a project inAsana.
It can be a task list in Notionor whatever software that you,
you use as an agency.
So I break it down by one,giving them client education and
services.
So, a list of all the clients,the key links to their websites,
(26:12):
and understanding of theservices that we're doing for
them so that they have anunderstanding of who they're
going to be working with andwhat the agency actually
provides for them, whetherthat's marketing services,
content, whatever your agency isactually doing.
Then I give them a list ofprocesses and handbooks.
So the key processes andhandbooks that are relevant to
them.
So, so that they know what theyneed to follow.
(26:32):
They can read through thepolicies and they're armed with
everything they need to thencrack on to do the job properly.
Then I will give them exampledocuments.
So, again, specific to theirrole.
Are they reporting documents?
So if they're going to bereporting to a client at the end
of a week, end of a month,here's the exact format.
Here's an example of what's beengiven to a client in the last
few months.
Is it a pitch deck if they'regoing to be on the acquisition
(26:53):
team?
Here's how you pitch to aclient, how you talk about the
agency, how you talk about ourservices.
Um, social calendars, contracts,whatever, depending on the role,
give them real example documentsso they can see example of work
that's been executed that you'rehappy with within that role.
Then a list of intro meetings,which is for me is really
important because a lot of thetime you're put in an agency and
(27:13):
then you're, you're told to goand work with a shed loads of
people, but you don't know who'sJohn in finance or whoever
anyone is.
You just got to figure it out.
And I think it just helps you,one, from a social perspective,
and also you are in a remoteenvironment especially, people
are just names on a screen, andunless you've physically been on
a call with someone and got toknow the person behind the name
and the personality, and alsowhat they do and what their
(27:36):
department does, It's difficultto sort of build the rapport and
also just build the speed inexecution day to day.
So I give everyone a list ofpeople they need to meet and
then they can go and set thosemeetings up and then they do
that within the first week thatthey're here.
And then finally is just a listof specific tasks that I want
them to do within the first fewweeks Whether that's to go and
set up obviously all the adminside of things their emails,
(27:56):
their slack, Go and set thoseintro meetings up, Go and review
specific example documents, doany sorts of research tasks or
any then specific executionwithin that job so it's very
varied, but it's basicallygiving them everything that they
need to know about pastexecution and templates,
playbooks and processes they'llneed to follow, and then the
people that they need to meet toget the context as to who they
are, what they do, and how theagency runs day to day,
(28:18):
essentially.
Harv Nagra (28:19):
Amazing.
I love that.
I, I, I think it's verysatisfying as an ops person to
get to that point in youragency's maturity where you have
all that documentation ready andit, it can just be deployed when
somebody new starts.
You know, all this kind of adhoc making stuff up as you go is
well in the past.
So that sounds fantastic.
So, really.
Really well done.
(28:39):
All right.
So we've talked about your bestpractice around hiring and also
what you do with onboarding.
I was looking at something youposted on LinkedIn the other
day, and I found it reallyinspiring.
You were talking about yourprocess, the process you trigger
when somebody hands in theirnotice.
And I have to admit, when itcomes to offboarding, I usually
look at it in terms of kind ofpayroll related tasks and
(29:01):
systems offboarding, andequipment and stuff like that.
What I love about what you weresaying is that retention has a
part to play in that.
So if you could just talk usthrough your thinking around the
offboarding process and yourbest practice so we can see what
you do.
Sarah Brougham (29:14):
Yeah, no, for sure.
I think there's a couple ofthings and I, I'd want to sort
of briefly touch on onboardingbecause I think in terms of
retention, that is so importantbefore you then get to the off
boarding process as to, youknow, reasons why people leave,
how you can retain staff, etc.
and avoid people actuallyleaving the agency.
Because yeah, from an onboardingperspective, I've worked in a
(29:34):
few different agencies now, andI think we've all probably had
that experience start to anagency where you're, you're
thrown a laptop, you're puttinga corner and it's like, just,
just crack on with it basically.
And whether it's like figure itout for yourself or just
actually just start to executethe job that you've been given,
which can be a little bit sortof deer in the headlights vibe.
And great in some instances,yes, then you're in it, then
you're getting in the trenchespretty quick, but not great, I
(29:57):
don't think, in terms ofretention, potentially, because
you're not given the team, thetools they need, the knowledge
around the agency, the educationaround the clients, and mainly
for me, the confidence to do thejob, because I think you have
people that will thrive in thatenvironment, but you have other
people who might actually be thebest people for the job, but
they, they feel like becausethey've not had the best
(30:17):
onboarding and they don't feellike you're bringing out the
best of them.
You're getting the skills fromthem that you're actually
needed, or expected to when theyjoined the agency.
So for me, onboarding is superimportant.
So anyone who actually joins theagency has that, okay, I know
exactly what I'm doing.
I know I have the understandingof who the clients are.
I know who I'm going to beworking with.
(30:38):
I understand the sorts ofhierarchy in the agency and
who's who.
So once you've done that, Ithink you as a, an agency owner
or whoever it is that's managingthat onboarding, has done
everything that you can in my,in my eyes to give them the best
leg up to then do the job anddeliver to the best of their
ability.
So I give usually people betweensorts of up to eight weeks, six
to eight weeks, ideally sort ofbenefit of the doubt after that,
(31:00):
because I've done everythingthat we need to be doing.
I think if there's, if they'restill not delivering to a
certain level or they're stillmaking certain mistakes after
that, then that's when I supposeit becomes an issue because
you've done everything you canas an agency.
Hopefully because you've doneall that, you should then get
the best out of your, your team.
Harv Nagra (31:15):
Absolutely.
And, and I think, you know,bringing it back to that point
of retention, it really sets thetone, a good onboarding and it
kind of demonstrates to theperson that they're, they're
showing up at a really grown upplace of work and you're, you're
right a lot of agencies don'thave such a rigorous onboarding
process.
So I think that's reallyimportant.
Before we get back to that pointabout kind of off boarding.
(31:37):
I wanted to quickly just ask youin terms of like probation
periods, do you, do you look atthat as a three month or a six
month thing?
Do you have a point of view onthat?
Sarah Brougham (31:45):
Yes.
So, interestingly, we havechanged this in the last year or
so.
And we've, we do a six monthprobation period.
Again, positives and negativesto it, because this is also for
us as the employer, we want tomake sure that someone has had
enough time to be able tointegrate themselves into the
agency, to be able to startexecuting to a specific standard
that we want them to.
And then you know that they'reactually someone who you're
(32:06):
going to keep in the agency longterm.
And I suppose on the flip side,it also gives the employee the
opportunity to do the job andstill have a good six months to
understand, is this the rightposition for me?
Do I want to stay around here?
So we did try a lot to behonest.
It's probably something I mightlook at reducing because I've
actually found that maybe someof the negatives to that is, I
think you already knowinstinctively as, as a, an
(32:26):
agency, if someone is goodenough or not after I'd say
three to four months time.
And ultimately, what I found isthen, if you leave it up to six
months, someone might be greatbut they've decided maybe they
want to move on or they've hadanother job opportunity come up
and all of a sudden they'releaving the agency pretty quick
when they've become quite a, acore person to you as an agency
within that four or five months.
So I've tried and tested a fewthings essentially and I feel
(32:49):
like the, the, the sweet spot isaround the three to four month
mark when it comes toprobations.
Harv Nagra (32:54):
So bringing it back to kind of somebody handing in
their notice and what that wholekind of process looks like and
the retention element that comesinto play there.
Sarah Brougham (33:04):
Yeah, for me, so it's when someone hands in the
notice, it's the first thing forme is I look at the value of the
persons.
So if they've, they've sent youthe email or they've spoken to
you or whatever it might be andyou know, they want to leave, I
will first look at, okay, Isthis someone who is actually so
core, so key to the agency thatthey add so much value you do
not want them to go anywhere andthat is, is, is the case a lot
(33:25):
of the time, otherwise theyusually wouldn't be in your
agency.
Or I suppose sometimes it mightbe people who've been here for
years got a bit too comfortable,if you look at the role they're
doing now, and maybe otherpeople in the industry, you
probably could replace thatperson and get a lot more value
out of that role than maybe thecurrent person that's in there.
Or you just look at them andsay, you know what, it's
probably the right time and itmakes sense.
(33:46):
Let's do it.
So it's the evaluation for mefirst is to, okay, value, where
are we in there?
And then from there, then youcan make the decision as to, do
you want to make the steps toretain that person or not?
And are they, are they in theright headspace to want to stay
in the agency?
Do we think that they have theright attitudes to stay in the
agency at this point?
Or have they, I don't know, gotin this headspace where they are
(34:07):
quite negative about things orthey're maybe they're just
switched off and they've just,they want to change essentially
in terms of environment orcareer or whatever it might be.
So if that's the case from aretention perspective, if we
want to, I just usually have afrank conversation because I
think we're all humans at theend of the day.
And I think rather than try anddo this formal back and forth on
email, I would just rather as afirst step, just pick up the
phone and get on a call and alsojust see their body language.
(34:30):
Like how are they responding tothings?
Why are they leaving?
And just have a bit of an openconversation just to be, you
know, supportive if that's theright thing that they want to do
but also have a just uh have theability to to try and maybe
persuade them to stay because ofthe opportunities with you and
you can do that a lot more ifyou're On the phones or you're
on a virtual meeting or you'rein person with someone.
It's much easier.
So let's have that frankconversation.
(34:51):
And then there's options to thenpotentially change their role
slightly if it's just a tweak inresponsibilities they want;
maybe it's moreresponsibilities.
Maybe just it's just a change inthe day to day and then
ultimately a lot of the time itcomes down to actual the package
that they're on.
Is it the salary?
Is it the bonuses that they'regetting?
What is it someone else hasoffered them?
Like why, why did theyultimately go and did they go
and look elsewhere?
(35:11):
And what was the reason behindthat?
Or has someone come to them withan offer and just because it was
so attractive they've thoughtI've got to go for it, but they
were still really in it with usas an agency and then we can
look at maybe just negotiatingsomething which makes sense for
them to to leave the otheropportunity and stay with us.
So that's kind of step two interms of retention.
Then step three, I suppose, ifthey're not aligned, and they
(35:32):
don't want to stay in the agencyis when you start to do
everything from an adminperspective, you draw up the
letter with all the details andthe dates they're going to leave
all of the, the terms andconditions they need to abide
by, the IP, what they need todo, all of that type of stuff.
And I usually do an exitinterview with people who I
don't do with everyone.
Usually, you know, if they'vebeen here for a couple of months
and we know it's just, you know,they've made the decision, it is
(35:52):
what it is.
With people who've been here fora significant amount of time or
they've passed the probationperiods and they're with us,
then I will do an exitinterview, mainly just to delve
in a little bit more around whyand get someone who's probably
been less involved, I suppose,so they feel like they can speak
a bit more freely to them sothat we can understand the, if
there is any deeper reasons, butfor us also just get
recommendations.
So the next person that comesin, was there maybe a skillset
(36:15):
that person felt they didn'thave, that if they did, they
would have been able to do therole better.
Was there maybe things that theyfeel if was improved in the
agency, they maybe would havestayed or anything like that
that we feel could maybe benefitus in the long term in terms of
retaining staff.
And then we give them a handovertemplate.
So we give them, these are thethings that you need to provide
to us versus just saying tothem, write a handover and send
(36:35):
it to us.
Otherwise we don't have thecontrol.
And I know before people leavethe agency, sometimes it's like,
Oh shit, there's only, there'sfive bullet points on this, or
they've only given us certaininformation about certain
clients.
And then they leave the agencyand you're trying to chase them
or track them down, which hasdefinitely happened in the early
days.
So, we control what the handoverlooks like before they start to
draft it.
And then step five isultimately, yeah, removal.
(36:55):
Last day, remove from softwares,get the equipment off them and
everything else that I'm sureeveryone does when people
eventually leave the agency.
So yeah, that's it.
I'll try and just end on apositive note where we can
essentially just becauseIndustries are small for one and
you want to make sure thateveryone who does leave is
leaving with that Positiveoutlook about the agency and
they've had a great time withyou.
(37:16):
And also for you as an agency,you know, you've built that
relationship with them, They'vedone great things for you And
also you don't want them to theninstill any negativity in the
rest of the team just becausethey're leaving the agency.
So I think it's all around justmakes sense for everyone to try
and end things on a positivenote regardless of how you're
parting ways.
Harv Nagra (37:32):
Amazing.
the consideration throughoutabout whether you want to keep
this person and see if there'sanything that you can do.
And, also ending on thatpositive note, I think really,
really important.
So really appreciate that.
in terms of what you're mostproud of as an Ops leader, what
comes to mind?
Sarah Brougham (37:49):
I mean, there's lots of things I would actually
mention the actual, theoperations in terms of the
systems you put in, becausewithout it, we wouldn't be able
to operate at the level that wedo, manage the clients we do,
sign the clients we do.
So I think that is definitelysort of number one.
cause it's also made us so muchmore profitable from like an,
team perspective and an outputperspective.
But also I think being able towork quite closely with people
so that you can, yes, you cancoach people.
(38:11):
And I think for me, it's beingable to, to bring people in the
business and to, to have peoplenow who are super senior in the
business, but joined us aspretty junior.
I like to do like a, a threemonth intensive when I have
someone join, especially sort ofunder one of my departments that
actually lead to, to really showthem how to do the job and to
coach them on how to do the job.
And then from there, I'd saythree months onward, let people
(38:32):
really go.
And, and then have that freedomto just to just execute.
And I think that approach for mehas actually led to some amazing
people in the business.
One, because they're amazingpeople anyway, but without
actually having that actual, thesystem and working quite closely
with these people, I wouldn't beable to even step back from what
I've been doing day to day tothen work on the bigger
projects, Agency 8x, which I'vementioned to you in terms of
(38:53):
other coaching things that we'redoing as a business.
Sign new clients.
I focus a lot now on theacquisition side of the business
and who we want to bring onboard and doing the pitching
myself so without having really,really just mentors a lot of
people in the business to, toreally, to give them the same
sort of understanding and, uh,motivation and show them the
sort of the path that they cango on to be able to, to build
(39:15):
their own career.
and then, Obviously at the endof it also add value to us as an
agency which is what has allowedus to continue to grow because
we have great people.
because yeah, I love being apeople person.
I love being able to solveproblems and I think both of
them are sort of together hasreally allowed us to build a
really strong team.
That's probably one of the, oneof the main things that comes to
mind.
Harv Nagra (39:32):
That sounds amazing.
You, you brought up Agency 8Xand, that, that's a good
opportunity for us to talk aboutthat.
So this is, is this kind of likean agency community?
Tell us a bit about what it is.
Sarah Brougham (39:44):
It is, yeah.
So it's a two prong.
So there's the, the educationalside of things.
So it is a, it's an onlinecourse, essentially, where we
have, myself, James Salby, who'sthe chief brand officer, and
then Sean, the CEO, havedeveloped this, this course,
which gives, agencies who aredoing at least sort of the six
figure mark.
So they're already establishedin some sort of way.
(40:07):
They have clients, they've gotservices, they've got some sort
of success, but they want to getto that sort of eight figure
mark.
It's given them everything thatwe have learned over the last
six, seven, eight years as to,from Sian's perspective,
strategy, clients, how to be aCEO, build a leadership team,
from myself in terms ofeverything from, from hiring and
operations and, and deliveringthe work and putting sorts of
(40:29):
OKR frameworks in place and, andwho to hire, when to hire them.
and then from, from James'sperspective, everything around
sorts of the, the clientmanagement, the business
strategy, client strategy,growth, et cetera.
So it's, it's basicallyeverything we wished that we had
five years ago and we probablywould have avoided a lot of the
mistakes that we have over thelast five or six years if we had
something like this.
(40:50):
So I think we've seen anopportunity in the market from
like an online educationperspective we've seen the
demand in the market for it andbecause we've done it I think it
we sort of it's something thatwe we wanted to be able to share
to build this this communitybecause it's It's not something
we sort of could see or findonline that we were able to join
to give us that sort of network,essentially.
and there are a lot, a hell ofresources basically as well that
(41:10):
are in there that we can, we canshare with agency owners to, to
use and implement in theiragency.
So, so yeah, it's an educationplatform, it's an online course,
and then it's a, it's acommunity essentially.
So we have a, we, we use Slackfor our community, and yeah,
there's a lot of differentfounders from all over the
world.
So.
UK, US, Germany, quite a fewpeople in Europe, and, India, et
(41:30):
cetera, with small agencies whoare, who are just growing
essentially.
And they we're supporting them,but then now there's this great
network of people who aresupporting each other with, you
know, anything that comes up.
Someone's got a pissed offclient and they come in, guys,
this has happened, any sorts ofadvice on this, or someone's
changed their outreach strategyand they sort of, they want to
test it and, and, and put it inthe group and people feed back
on it.
So it's amazing if I wish we hadsomething like this really a few
(41:53):
years back just to be able tobounce off people who are, who
were going through the samethings that we were.
Yeah.
Harv Nagra (41:58):
Absolutely.
That sounds fantastic.
so Sarah, we're coming to theend of our session, but I guess
one of my questions is, beforewe wrap up, if someone's looking
to kind of get into agencyoperations, what would be your
advice to them?
Sarah Brougham (42:14):
My advice, would be, I suppose one thing to say
is I think from an outsider'sperspective, operations sounds
like the least sexiest job youcan get out there because
operations is, you know, there'sa lot, it just sounds like a lot
of running around or justorganizing people, but I think
it's, it's understanding whatoperations looks like in
different agencies, becausethere's definitely, there's not
(42:34):
like a one size fits all interms of operation managers.
what my job as a VP ofoperations could look completely
different to someone else as aVP of operations in a different
agency in terms of what youmanage, what you measure, what
your output should be, what youown, who you report to.
It's just, it can be sodifferent.
So I think, I think if you aresomeone who likes variety, I
think, cause that's the mainthing for me.
(42:55):
And I think why I love it somuch, because when I was in the
client management side ofthings, you're always on
different.
You know, a different shoes orworking with a different client
or whatever it might be.
I think Operations, you need tolove being able to get up in the
morning and every day looksdifferent.
I think you need to be a littlebit of a self motivator and you
want it.
You need to be motivated by theresults that you drive.
Because a lot about operationsis about getting your head in
(43:18):
the sand, doing the work.
But you know, then you see theresults and it might take 3
months, 6 time.
But it's definitely somethingthat, if that's something that
motivates you, I get a lot ofsatisfaction out of.
and it's also a great way tojust continue to learn.
I think if you want to besomeone who's not always just
stuck in one box, you can reallycarve your own career.
If you go into operations, likewith me, you know, I, I can sort
(43:38):
of work on one part of thebusiness.
And as we see a need or a, anopportunity for a new service in
the business, I can pivot andstart to work on something else.
So I think it's, it sounds quiteboring.
I would say from an outsider'sperspective, when you say
operations, if I'm being honest,but actually when you get into
the nooks of it, if you're inthe right agency and you, you
work with the right people,operations can actually be a
pretty exciting role.
That's very varied.
(43:58):
Yeah.
And it's really satisfyingbecause you can see the actual,
the, the results from yourteams, your team's motivation to
the, the actual, the revenuethat's driven through the agency
itself.
Harv Nagra (44:09):
Definitely.
Definitely.
That's, that's an amazinganswer.
somewhat related, you know, ifsomeone's at an agency that's
looking to scale any kind of topof mind advice comes up based on
what you've kind of gone throughand your lessons.
Sarah Brougham (44:22):
I think in terms of scaling this, I mean, there's
a long list that we couldprobably go through.
Yeah.
But I think, one is making surethat systems is the main thing
without them, you're, you'regoing to have people taking
longer to actually execute.
You don't have control over thequalities and our control over
the output.
And then from a clientperspective, I would say, don't
be scared to, don't be scared tolet go of clients.
I think is probably one of themain things, cause that was one
(44:42):
of the key things hinderinggrowth for us.
And it sounds strange when youthink, okay, start to remove
clients, but actually thatunlocked so much more time
essentially for us and energythat we could start to then
focus on the right clients orstart to focus more energy on
the current clients to get moreout of them.
And I think we, you know, forthe first three, four years,
there was, it was like, if assoon as we, we dropped a client
or if a client left, it was theend of the world.
(45:04):
And I think now it's like, it'sokay.
You know, it's, it's for areason, like whether it's,
they're not happy and they, theyhaven't got the motivation and
the drive to keep going.
So it's not going to make sense.
Or from our perspective, they'venot got the right attitudes and
they're not got the passion andthey're not driving the results.
So I think, I think at thebeginning, it's all about, okay,
you need more clients.
You need more clients, but whenyou get to a certain point to
unlock that growth potential, Ithink you need to be able to let
(45:26):
go of that and be okay withlosing clients and you
proactively letting clients goto, to, to give you that space
and ability to, to grow.
Harv Nagra (45:33):
Really good answer.
So Sarah, if anyone's looking toconnect with you, where can they
go find you?
You post some amazing stuff onLinkedIn that I...
Sarah Brougham (45:41):
Thank you.
Harv Nagra (45:41):
always love reading about.
So tell us where we
Sarah Brougham (45:44):
You can find me on LinkedIn.
Yes.
Sarah Brougham.
I actually don't know what myhandle is on LinkedIn to be
completely honest.
Harv Nagra (45:50):
Okay.
We'll
Sarah Brougham (45:51):
You can post a link.
Harv Nagra (45:52):
episode notes as well.
And if anyone wants to learnmore about agency 8x,
Sarah Brougham (45:57):
sorry, yeah, if anyone wants to learn, anything
more about Agency 8X, you can goto agency8x.com.
Harv Nagra (46:02):
Excellent.
But Sarah, it's been an absolutepleasure talking to you today
really inspiring some of yourkind of stories and lessons and
stuff that we can take away andapply at our own places of work.
So thank you for being heretoday.
Sarah Brougham (46:14):
No worries.
Yeah, all good.
Thank you for having me.
Harv Nagra (46:17):
Hey all, I hope you enjoyed that.
You can tell how passionateSarah is about what she does
through her stories.
And I think it was really greatadvice as well when she mentions
learning to let go ofunprofitable clients so you can
focus on winning the ones thatare a better fit.
Probably my favorite part of theconversation though was her
advice on the hiring process.
That's something I'm going to bemaking notes on for future
(46:38):
reference.
You'll know by now that if yousign up for The Handbook
Newsletter, we send you a cheatsheet with all the key takeaways
from our interviews every otherweek.
Now before I go, here's what Iwould love you to do.
Please share this podcastepisode with a friend or
colleague and tell them what youloved about it.
I'll let you click share as soonas I stop talking.
(46:58):
I'll see you back here in acouple of weeks.
Thanks very much.
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