Lack of Accountability is not a Culture

A bit of a hot-take this week.

Agency culture is different from other businesses.

This has some upside - but a lot of downsides.

I’m Nick Avaria, agency owner, and founder of Agency Acquisitions. Every week I share a client story, insights, and tips into scaling your agency faster, in 300 words or less. Every week I drop a new YouTube Video with real stories of scaling agencies to 7 and 8 figures. Watch the latest videos here.

Backgrounds at agencies are generally diverse - but thinking is not.

I’ve seen under the hood of hundreds of agencies

And I can tell you that the overlap of how similar cultures are is a lot more than anyone would ever think.

This has some great upsides.

But in the last few years as work for agencies became increasingly remote / work from home, it had really specific downsides.

This leads us to the title this week: Not holding people accountable is not a culture.

I call it the agency country club. 

No worries, no cares, for everyone.

Except the owner who is stressed to the max trying to figure out how to navigate this environment. Costs are up, margins are down, and no decisions look easy.

People have become increasingly resistant to critical feedback in a non-office environment.

For the first time in decades, the client is not the hardest thing to manage for most agencies.

For many owners and managers, employees have become the hardest thing to manage. (IF they are holding them accountable properly.)

I’m not here to pinpoint why, although I believe it's many things. 

• Not being in office enough / in person enough

• Rhetoric on social media about the way things should or should not be

Agencies have undergone a lot of change recently, and moving forward will encounter even more. 

Be it from automation, AI, new technologies, etc. We will need to move faster to stay competitive.

Accountability creates alignment; and alignment creates speed.

We need a team that is willing to hold themselves and each other accountable.

Check out this training on accountability and management systems here if you want to know more about this:

So here’s what to do about it:

1. You have to align your leadership team and break the news to them - lack of accountability is not a culture - it's just a country club.

2. Assign 2-5 objectives to each role in the company. Make each objective have a corresponding metric, and assign each metric a KPI.

3. Come to terms with the fact that we are here to put our employees first, as long as they are trying to put their teammates, clients, and agency first.

   1. This means that if people are in it for themselves and no one else - we can't enable this behaviour. They have to be in it for multiple stakeholders.

4. Do proper change management and put these things in front of all staff. It's a new day. One where we are accountable to our numbers, each other, the business, and our clients.

5. Hold the line. It's tough, but people will want the old country club culture back. We can't backslide. 

Here’s the thing - you are not alone. 

The country club culture has infiltrated many agencies. We don't need to be the best. 

We just need to be better than most to survive the changes that will impact our industry in the near future.

Want to get the KPIs in place your agency needs to hold your team accountable? Book a time with me this week to find out how to get started.

Nick