A perfect circle – Once achieved cannot be made more perfect. You can work within the parameters of that circle, changing colour, texture or outline, but once you start altering the structure its perfection is lost. Push an edge here or there and it becomes an oval. In eastern culture perfection is admired and the challenge lies in maintaining its purity, in western culture, we try to push it beyond its design, its purpose, its perfection. Exceed expectations, over deliver, give 110%. Greatness lies in consistency of perfection. Lester Wunderman created the circle, individuals add colour and texture and are charged with the responsibility of maintaining its perfection.

Plato (paraphrased) would have said that in the physical world a Perfect Circle can’t exist and is unachievable, as it is only (at best) an approximation of the idealized Form. But is the best, the best you can do; the best that can be done; or simply better than all the rest? If you’re doing it better than all the rest, but it’s not your personal best, have you failed? And if you’re giving it your personal best, but it isn’t better than all the rest, same question. Ultimately, if you don’t give your friends and significant others a certain amount of slack and forgiveness for their flaws, failures and foibles, pretty soon, you won’t need to worry about them giving you back slack and forgiveness for yours.

There is an old Chassidic tale that tells the story of a righteous man who on his death bed becomes frightened of his final judgement. His students try and comfort him -- you were as great, no greater than anyone in your generation; you were as kind and humble as the holy men of the past -- why are you worried? His answer -- While thta might be true my fear is that I am judged on whether or not I was as great as I could have/should have been. Did I meet my potential....

Opening gambit (usually undisclosed): En avant, contre la médiocrité... Main theorem: Any attempt to dislodge or challenge mediocrity needs care and planning - and allies. And as well as knowing I'm on a campaign, I need to know I'm not wrong headed or distracted by emotion or trickery. Corollary: Everyone has objectives, including those who seem to be manouvering in futile or apparently irrational directions. Some of them have survived a long time. Some even can look good in the short term while ultimately doing damage. The solution may be simple, but finding it (and delivering it) usually isn't. The tailor's rule: measure twice, cut once. Tom (more egotistical than usual).

“Some people are born mediocre, some people achieve mediocrity, and some people have mediocrity thrust upon them.” Joseph Heller more than usually cynical -- David

Best (and worst) example of this I recently came across was an FMCG client that wanted us to develop a website for their new 'water' beverage ... when asked 'Why?' (the Objectives) ... she said, 'To be 360'.

The technologies and strategies have evolved, been honed and become more complex. But everyone on the battlefield is using them. This raises the bar for all concerned and makes big results much harder to achieve. No excuse for pursuing glory rather than results. No excuse for not learning from glorious failures. Tom.

Unfortunately, many senior "strategists" get left behind by technology, through lack of knowledge/time or whatever, they pluck out "key words" from some article they have read and push them as strategy without truly understanding the implications for the foot soldiers and consumers. But then again..the world is not perfect, and egos abound in our industry.

Nick unfortunately reveals a sad truth here. Strategists and planners need to be genuine strategists and planners, and "not a few of them" aren't the real thing. If they are only part of a sales operation and don't think about implications, long term objectives and infrastructure, they only succeed by luck and client gullibility. Their days will be numbered. On the other hand, convincing clients to invest in long term data strategies is really challenging because it costs, and needs simplified "painting of pictures" of a rosy future. We still have to sell our best good! I don't care about the gloss, as long as everyone understand that hard work needs to be done to get real results. Everyone also needs to understand that the quant/tech/data side is only part of the story. An integrated story... Tom - sometime "Data Strategist".

Sometimes we are so enamoured by our strategy that we take the outcome for granted – or, God forbid, lose sight of it. Although the outcome is sacrosanct, and therefore to be determined before everything else, sometimes we are unsure if the strategy determines the outcome or the outcome determines which strategy to deploy. I’m reminded of a dialogue between Alice and the Cheshire Cat from Lewis Carroll’s ‘Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland’: “Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?” “That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,” said the Cat. “I don’t much care where…” said Alice. “Then it doesn’t matter which way you go,” said the Cat.

Apparently nobody wants to comment on Celebs or privacy. Privacy for celebs is a lot different from customer privacy. I'll ignore the celeb side too. For customers or prospects, our intended use of their information is about customising an offer, or targeting within a population more appropriately. We marketers are producing "mini-pictures" of customers to make this work better - ideally for the clients and the customers. The "mini-picture" could come from research or analysis of databases, or even both at once. Problem is that the "mini-pictures" may be wrong or distorted, leading to missing good prospects or hitting on bad ones. Other problems are that some cohorts choose to remain private, unknowable, or uncontactable, or that clients want to push the limits of a working relationship and over-reach. Deep down, we're using technology to do what good local store owners and good waiters have done for centuries - personalised interaction. For a consumer, "opting out" has a serious downside of not getting good offers, and having to do your own research. "Opting in" has a downside of getting hit on when they want to be left alone. Sleazy operators should (and do) get whacked at every opportunity. This works in different ways in traditional markets. Consumer backlash, fines, weak campaigns, etc. [But PT Barnum was right, too, as was Churchill]. Observation: the economics of being ethical in marketing works most of the time. It doesn't stop some unethical exploitation of customer information, but most clients put a lot of effort into avoiding it. Tom (rose coloured glasses???).

and here I was hoping that Britney would win the day for me -- Oh well....to yoru point good store owners never spammed -- at least not teh succesful ones. They remembered that you liked blue; never wore a tie and bought suits twice a year. Its really simple. Technology, though, has erased teh insight -- way too often

I think there is a difference between privacy and piracy. Technology certainly makes our personal information accessible. Perhaps it is Moore's law of information access as well. I believe rummaging through my garbage or looking over my shoulder is equally as sinister as hacking a database of social security numbers. The difference today is the amount of information we are required to keep is greater, thus the amount to protect equally as large. What I find interesting is the cottage industry that feeds on privacy fears. Identity theft protection insurance, Key FOB's, WAP encryption, cookies, etc. Access codes and account numbers I didn't even know I needed now need protecting. The wolves are at the gate, and we'd best be armed. I see the issue of privacy as it pertains to personalization more one of preference. We all know the proverb "it has been said that someone's name is the sweetest word that person ever hears, so do whatever it takes to make that sound. You'll do more than impress them. You'll make them feel memorable." The convenience of a FreshDirect shopping list compiled by my previous shopping habits, recommended new Jazz CD's prompted by my purchase of Kind Of Blue even the Gerber baby food coupon handed to me by the cashier with my receipt because I bought diapers for my twins all make my life better, faster and cheaper. Perhaps, it's not what life is all about, but it feels pretty slick. When I was interviewed on 20/20 in their year in review episode, John Stossel shot right to the point- "Stephanie, is there such a thing as too much information?" My reply then, as it is now, "Probably, but not for me."

How do the good store owners get that way? Training? Rewards? Maybe it is the presence of human in the loop, at the point of sale rather than tied to comms and the offer. Maybe the human-ness of the human. Technology as an aid to memory? Tom

How about Humanity at the core of all we do -- Technology is an enhancer -- not a replacement