Few work marriages in corporate America are as intimate and complicated as the one shared between an art director and copywriter. This partnership is based on the pairing of talent to create a dynamic blend of elevated thinking unachievable by an individual. A successful marriage requires chemistry, and creating that chemistry takes time. The more time you spend together, the more ideas you share, the more you begin to think as one, resulting in better, more impactful work. That at least, is the theory. But investing so much time and energy into someone can unleash deep seated emotions when the break up finally occurs.
Nobody wants to be part of a failed marriage. In a creative department, where people go on hot streaks and cold streaks, a team that breaks up because they aren’t selling work, can get a lot of side eyes. Bad mojo can scare off a lot of people. More plainly, nobody wants to be partnered with a loser. Public perception means everything when your livelihood depends on being attractive enough as a creative to keep a talented partner. So it’s not uncommon for people to point fingers, and soil the reputation of former partners after things don’t work out. This kind of drama plays out in games of passive aggressive chess, and master level micro-aggressions. I’ve seen people who were once connected at the hip for years, stop speaking altogether. I know about it all too well, because that’s exactly what happened with me and a former partner.
We were partners for about a year and a half or so. He was a good dude. He had the ethos of a small town Marshall in a western movie, simple, loyal and easy going. He got along well with people and I appreciated his dedication to his parents, his girl and his dog. He showed the kind of high character traits that make you trust someone. But creatively, we just weren’t gelling. Base hits are not home runs. And the more the pressure mounted to produce a home run, the more he began to fall apart.
“The search for a scapegoat is the easiest of all hunting expeditions.” - Dwight D. Eisenhower
Self-aware creatives keep an imaginary timer in their heads. The timer keeps track of how long you can go without a significant win before the bosses begin to consider you a bad investment. It’s pressure, but being in tune with your timer can keep you focused. Feeling my timer was running low, I begin to collect wins outside of our partnership. I wrote radio spots. Wins. I helped out other teams with headlines and copy. Wins. I offered up scripts for projects I wasn’t working on. Wins. I started working later hours and tossing out ideas to my boss about any and everything going on in the agency. Before long, my talents were not only being recognized, they were being valued. Our cold streak was no longer attributed to a lack of talent on my part, but rather, bad chemistry with the wrong partner. In this scenario, I wasn’t the odd man out, he was. It also didn’t help that he had dropped the ball on a few of his art director responsibilities. Everything came to a head one weekend when he disappeared while we were on deadline. Fed up, my boss took him off a project we were both working on.
My partner had an aversion to dealing with management, so he didn’t. Rather than get marching orders from our boss directly, he preferred to get them from me. His fear turned me into the middle man. So when I had to break it to him that he was no longer on the project, he questioned me angrily. “What’s going on? Why was I taken off the project?” I walked up to him and spoke as deliberately as I could. “If you really want to know, go talk to your boss.” He stared at me for the first time ever with a stern look of mistrust. He mumbled, packed up his bag, and walked away. But he never went to talk to his boss.
Two days later, we were no longer partners. Our boss made an executive decision to break us up. The marriage was over. It felt like a promotion for me. Meanwhile, he felt he was being punished. He was. He abruptly stopped speaking to me. When he did, it was in short work related phrases. I tried to talk things through, but he wasn’t having it. And I was completely blindsided when a mutual friend told me he thought I “sabotaged” him. The anger that rumbled in my belly upon hearing that could only be extinguished with silence. So, I never spoke to him again. I walked past him and looked through him for months, until his timer, ultimately ticked out.
The lesson? Advertising is a competitive field, and sometimes work marriages don’t end well. Regardless of the partnership, you are the only person responsible for managing your career. When things aren’t working, it’s up to you to communicate with your partner, your managers, and find a solution. It’s up to you to find new ways to establish your talents and show off your value. And it’s always up to you to be in tune with the ticking clock. If you can’t hit a home run, figure out a way to get a bunt and steal three bases. A work marriage is a union designed to help you to succeed. But never let it, or a partner you aren’t gelling with, be the cause of your demise. One luv.
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