Hi, I’m Dan – the new guy at Idenna.
As the word team’s latest recruit and a total newcomer to the business world, over my first couple of weeks here with the team I’ve had to do a lot of learning in not a lot of time – the art of the business pitch, quick proposal turnarounds and how to craft the perfect business email. But, none have influenced my day-to-day work as much as the notion of the triple bottom line.
For those as unfamiliar as I was, the triple bottom line is the concept that businesses should prioritise social, environmental and financial goals entirely equally. Measuring your progress in each department is the best way to make progress happen. In the modern world, it’s not enough for a business just to be out to make money. With the range of options available to any one client at any one time, plus the increasing awareness surrounding social and environmental campaigns, if you’re not going the extra mile then you may as well not enter the race.
Basically, you have to actually care about the service you’re providing. People are no longer just interested in what businesses do, they’re interested in why businesses do what they do. Thus, the three P’s of profit, people and planet are a core set of values you’ll see in any prospering business today. Here at Idenna, that’s certainly what we’re aiming to be, but what makes us tick?
Don’t worry, I’m not going to bore you with a financial breakdown of how we try to limit spending on Simon’s cherry tomato addiction in the office – it’s not really my area to begin with, and as long as Tim walks through the door with a smile on his face I consider everything to be dandy in that department. Similarly, a lot of our Stories for Change projects touch on our environmental practices, so go check them out once you’re done here. Instead, I’d rather focus on our social bottom line; the people who give us purpose.
One of the things that drew me to the vacant copywriting position in the first place was the sense of character that came through both from the job advert itself and the very site you’re on now. You can tell that everyone working in this office has a real passion for what they do. The words team cry laughing over internal e-mails about the perfect adjective order, the film team share inspiring photo shoots during the weekly Wednesday meeting and the room is often filled with graphic design chatter that goes way over my head.
From here, collaboration between the teams brings out the best of the office as a whole – feeling your individual skillset grow alongside the progression of the office to bigger and better things brings immense satisfaction. Of course though, Idenna is bigger than just these four walls and the people gathered within them. Our clients make it possible for us to do what we do in the first place – they’re a huge motivator in this push to improve.
Somewhat ironically, it’s so easy to get caught up in the numbers of a copywriting job. How many people did this post reach? How many interacted with it? How many likes did the page get as a result? So on and so on, until you ultimately forget that your work is actually being seen by the people behind the phones, having a real world effect on the businesses you produce content for.
So, we literally go the extra mile. Trips out of the office are a daily occurrence, to keep our schedules ticking along, to allow us to form genuine connections with the people we email all day and to help us fully comprehend the range of amazing clients we work with. From those that encourage us to fully embrace our Cornish roots, impacting the culture of the South West that surrounds us, to those that operate nationwide and require us to really flex our creative muscles. No matter the scale, we all have a genuine investment in their prosperity and revel in seeing them succeed.
I’m going to wrap things up here, as I can tell that the post has already spiralled into the wide-eyed ramblings of a new recruit. Essentially, our sense of purpose is deeply rooted in telling stories creatively. Whether they’re our own or those of our clients, we love putting our content out into the world and saying “what do you think of this, eh?” Even seeing this page gradually fill up has brought a smile to my face and (pun fully intended), that’s the bottom line to it all.