ITV

Tag: Planimus

  • Your Number is up!

    The Media Review – Most men have a problem comprehending figures (except those of the female form). Figures intimidate men and take them back to memories of how euphoric they felt when they made it to college and it dawned on them that mathematics was optional. These men spend the best part of their lives ignoring any numbers thrown their way. On the other hand there are those (select few) whose very world is around numerals. For whom creating pie charts, bar graphs and any other vulgar representations of data, is like chicken soup for the soul. The media review is the forum where these two opposing philosophies meet.

    ‘One-two-three-four, lord I can’t take figures no more’ the fake American drawl failed to mask the heavy Chinese accent, as Chai-La (the mystical Chinese canteen boy) delivered his nursery rhyme sounding pearl of wisdom plus the customary tea cup to Ram Shankar, before vanishing into the footnote of a pie chart.

    The agency and the client teams had gathered for the annual media review, taking place in the agency conference room. It was meant to be a very important assessment of where the client was spending his budgets and how efficiently the agency was buying for him.

    The agency President had begun the meeting by saying, “Planimus, our media head, has put together a presentation that frankly made no sense to me. But hopefully will be seen in a better light by all of you. Can we have more lights please?” he finished with a thunderous laugh, meant to awaken the dead and generally frighten some of the numbers on the presentation that were eager to come out.

    Planimus, who was a person who did his media plans with almost gladiatorial passion (hence the sobriquet, his real name was lost in the annals of time) was hardly cheered by that remark of the President. He quickly shot a glance at Vikas (the account head and Ram’s boss) urging him to open with something more sensible.

    “Thank you sir,” started Vikas, patronizingly patting the President’s hand to calm him down, “We are gathered here because Planimus has worked out a past assessment and more importantly a future implication of our media plans and budgets. So lets absorb what he has to say and then make our budgetary decisions in a more evolved and scientific manner. After all it’s all about spending money more wisely.”

    Ram knew that while that was a good opening, Vikas’s knowledge and interest in media ended there.

    Mr Bose, the client marketing head, spoke up, “Why don’t we call in PP (the creative director) he should also be a part of this.”
    An uncomfortably silent five minutes later PP entered like his name was just short listed for the train to Auschwitz

    “Ok, let’s begin with a GRP analysis, region wise, and see how these met with our set objectives,” started Planimus with almost lusty enthusiasm and then without warning displayed a slide that had a table on it, on which the figures looked as if they would be much happier elsewhere.

    There was a collective inward groan from most people in the room.

    “Why are you showing so many figures? What’s the story behind them?” asked a visibly dazed Vikas.

    “The story, my young fellow,” began Planimus in a tone that Vikas instantly hated, “is how we are doing across the country against what we had set to do.”

    “Then why don’t you just say it in a line?” PP enquired

    “It can be, but this is an analytical process and we would lead to that, also don’t you think that the client deserves to be walked through every step, especially when monetary considerations are involved?”

    “I don’t think you should dwell on this too much,” interrupted the President resurfacing briefly after he had instantly popped off to sleep just about the time Planimus had stood up to present.

    “Ok,” said Planimus with a huff and jumped 19 slides in the presentation, though clearly working under protest.

    “Why are we falling short of our GRP’s?” enquired Mr.Bose.

    “Don’t worry about these things,” boomed the President, “These are just figures, I don’t even think there is much scientific basis to them,” Planimus clearly miffed by that point raised an outraged eyebrow, which the President glossed over with the casual flick of the wrist, “but maybe if the GRP’s are down you need to spend more.” He concluded with a wicked twinkle in his eyes.

    “Why don’t we try and isolate the pattern that is emerging?” asked Bose in a tone that he hoped would make his IQ level shoot twenty points.

    “Well, we started with bar graphs, then we graduated to pie charts, soon Planimus will be plucking numbers from the very fabric of the cosmos,” concluded the President again finishing with that thunderclap of a laugh that shook a few numbers out of their reverie.

    “What’s the point of these numbers? I never see our commercials on TV?” queried PP.
    “You are in office till midnight everyday, you don’t even watch TV, plus you aren’t the target audience,” retorted Planimus.

    “PP has a point though,” began Mr Bose, as the face of Planimus began changing colors with the speed of an agitated chameleon. “Why don’t we see the commercials, even the chairman complains that his wife never sees them?”

    Planimus was tempted to say something unconstitutional about the Chairman’s wife, but years of wisdom prevailed.

    “We judge media on the basis of how well our target is being exposed to the message. Our target as we all know is the lower middle class, what use is it, even if the chairman’s wife sees our ad, for groin itching creams? We have only that much money to spend.”

    “Are you saying that you want more money?” asked Bose in a rather bellicose tone.

    “Yes, of course we always need more money,” chimed in the President and was instantly knocked out when Planimus exposed him to a slide with 144 matrix cells.

    “What I am saying is that we have to balance the fine line between those who will give us sales versus those whom we just have to pamper and as you know the latter is a statistically insignificant number,” said a defiant Planimus

    “Why don’t we just look at the larger picture and make our conclusions thereof?” interjected Vikas, doing his ‘servicing bit’ to preserve the tender equilibrium of the meeting. There was a marked rise in the temperature in the room, beyond the scope of work of the air conditioner.

    “We can, but things will only make sense if you people change your attitude towards numbers and stop being so intimidated by them.”

    “Who is intimidated?” nothing intimidates me, said the President awakening fresher.

    “We all understand numbers Planimus, numbers are the very basis of our functioning,” added Mr Bose, though cold sweat beads began to form on his forehead as the ‘144 matrix cells’ slide had not been changed over the last ten minutes.

    “Please,” gasped Vikas, “Change that slide, its beginning to suffocate me.”

    Planimus, with a sardonic smile, pushed the page down button to reveal a new adversary, four pie charts that had all the colors of the rainbow on them. PP dashed out of the room covering his mouth. Planimus felt that he had registered a moral victory of some sort.

    “I think Planimus you just type out a mail summarizing the entire presentation, and don’t use any numbers in it. Please also indicate that we will need more budgets.”
    “And analyze each and every number to its logical conclusion, Ram will help you do that, he is good at that and will bring in an account management perspective,” uttered Vikas, adjusting his tie in his reflection on Mr. Bose’s spectacles.

    Ram groaned with disgust, fear and boredom all rolled into one. He dreaded talking to Planimus about numbers, that man was numerically insane.

    “Where did more budgets come from? I never concluded that?”

    “Don’t worry Bose, that’s the sum and substance of the presentation, now let’s go and have a good lunch. Planimus you can come along as long as you don’t start asking for break ups on the bill and drawing bar graphs on the napkins.”

    So the President, Mr Bose, Planimus and Vikas checked out of the room like they had to catch a flight, pie charts still lying appetizingly unattended to on the screen.

    “Media review meetings are very short, because people who attend then have a long history with numbers,” the hushed Chinese accent, the express delivery of the tea cup and Chai-La disintegrated into a Fibonacci sequence of numbers.

    Ram wearily started to go through the first ten slides of the presentation, when almost at once he began to feel that his eyelids were being pulled down by forces beyond his control, he was overcome with the same feeling of nausea one gets when seeing the Indian batting line up perform abroad.

    Then his world went 100 percent black.

  • Dead men walking!

    The prologue to an agency review – an agency review is ideally an open minded exercise that is meant to evaluate the performance of the advertising agency over the past year, in as fair and unbiased manner, as is humanly possible. However, since this is about as achievable as having an advertising awards show without at least one self respecting agency deciding to boycott on ‘philosophical’ grounds, what it’s very announcement leads to is unmitigated stress, panic and confusion all round.

    “News of an impending review always fuels the need for warm brew.” The hushed oriental accent, the slight flutter of mach speed induced turbulence and Chai-La (the mystical Chinese canteen tea boy) had delivered the customary tea cup and opening barb to Ram Shankar. It was Monday morning and Ram had not yet got his bits and bytes together when Vikas (his boss) beckoned him, in a manner that meant business.

    “Mr Bose has told me this morning that we are going to have an agency review,” started Vikas, adjusting his tie in his reflection in Ram’s glasses.

    “Do you think the account is in danger?” asked Vikas in a hushed tone.

    “I wouldn’t know,” began Ram and was cut in mid sentence by PP (the creative director of the exaggerated mustache fame) bursting into Vikas’s chambers like Ronaldo in the penalty box.

    “Why are we having an agency review man? Are we going to lose the account?” boomed PP in his customary high decibel style, causing weak hearted account executives to instantly sign up for medical insurance policies.

    “Relax PP, its nothing new,” replied Vikas, in his most soothing tone, trying to function for once like the head on the business, but after he remembered that it was the first time that this was happening in five years, his morale fell faster than the credibility of ‘breaking news’ after the last pest control visit of the BMC had been aired live.

    “This hasn’t happened with us in a very long time,” echoed Planimus, the media head, in his routinely philosophically platonic tone, “I smell trouble brewing.”

    Almost on cue Dharti, the ravishingly radiant account planner walked in, “Hey the security guard told me that the account was up for review, what’s happening guys?”

    “Lets just meet in the conference room, we need to figure out a strategy,” suggested Vikas, and for once all the necessary evils were in agreement.

    The scene shifted to the conference room. Vikas, following his perfunctorily servicing impulse of staying on top of things, walked purposefully to the board, marker pen in hand straight from the ‘have whiteboard will scribble’ school of thought.

    “Let’s see what we have here,” furiously constructing geometric shapes, like he had a personal vendetta against parabolas (he didn’t draw any, just in case you assumed).
    He finished with three circles – client, agency and external forces and had somehow managed to link all three with arrows that looked like having directional issues.

    “What does all this mean?” asked an irritated PP. “Why must you complicate simple things? I bet that’s why the review is happening.”

    “If you had shown more interest in the account after finishing with the film, maybe we wouldn’t be here, client’s dislike creative who just do the glamorous jobs.”

    “It’s not my job to write calendars, I am never good with dates,” retorted PP.

    “Given the numerous angry women waiting in the reception for you daily, for once I would agree,” replied Vikas, relishing the opportunity to kick the old foe in the more delicate, unmentionable parts.

    Before PP could venture into his nuclear explosion, Dharti patted a firm hand on his shoulder, fortified with a smile that spoke waist downwards.

    “Must we be fighting like this? Let’s try and figure this out,” she purred, instantly sending goose pimples down Ram’s spine.

    However years of crunching and rounding figures had made Planimus oblivious to the wiles of women, and he still had some ax to grind.

    “Madam, you knocked us all out the last time we discussed strategy, I think the client is still nursing the bump on his head from your last interaction. In my time strategy used to be simple, over and done with in ten minutes.” He finished with a sardonic smile.

    “This isn’t your time Planimus,” cooed back Dharti, in an interesting tone that bordered between spite and contempt.

    “To lose the war, put four generals together in a room and ask them to arrive at a decision-Old Chinese army saying.” Chai-La popped in and out of Ram’s subconscious mind, leaving behind the sacred brew nestled in his fingers.

    Ram waited for the mayhem to subside before deciding to make his point. A valuable tip he had picked from Planimus, about advertising when clutter was low for more impact.

    “Could it just be that given the new personnel at the clients end, they want to look at everything in a fair and unbiased manner? You know like bringing a newer perspective to the table so that the communication that we create could actually get better and more focused? Are we making too much of our fear of losing the account?”

    All the participants in the room starred at Ram in rapt silence, like people would have when Moses was reciting the commandments. Then the conference room erupted with laughter.

    “Fair and unbiased,” choked Vikas, as he hung onto PP’s shoulder for support in a rare ‘Kodak moment of camaraderie’.

    “Should we be scared of losing the business?” stuttered Planimus as he kept banging the table in an almost tribal ritual.

    Dharti sat composed, dignified and silent through it all.

    Ram felt he had at least one supporter. All the others turned to look at her.

    “Bringing a new perspective so that we can create better communication,” she said and burst out into laughter, further fuelling the mirth factor in the room.

    Ten minutes later all attention was back to the whiteboard, though not strictly at the seismographic visuals Vikas had crafted earlier.

    “We need to figure this one out. You know how the boss panics when he hears these things, we will end up creating 42 campaigns for everything,” mulled Vikas.

    “Why 42?” Dharti queried innocently.

    “That’s because the boss is a Douglass Adam fan and you know the bit about 42 being the answer to life, the universe and everything. The chief applies it everywhere.”

    “Well I don’t mind writing a 42 slide presentation,” cooed Dharti.

    “What about the creative trying to churn out 42 campaigns, are we going mad?”

    “Well statistically 42 is an interesting number,” started Planimus and was instantly rebooted by the chilling glares that were shot in his direction.

    “Why don’t we just call Bose, maybe he will help us,” asked Dharti.

    “After the way I keep taking his case in meetings,” said PP, “I think he is having this because he wants to settle scores with me. I expect to be the target.”

    “Tchah!” interjected Vikas, “He hates it that I’m not involved on a day to day basis,” not wanting PP to steal the limelight even in such issues.

    “Why don’t we just call him?” implored Dharti

    “Who should?”
    Furtive glances were exchanged across the room.

    “He hates me.”

    “He is intimidated by me.”

    “I can’t stand the creep.”

    All eyes rested on Ram Shankar.

    “Call him chief,” chirped Vikas, relieved that the onus of this ‘stress call’ was off him. “Make it seem natural, start like you were just inquiring when it is.”

    All the others offered encouraging glances by way of support.

    Ram’s hand was trembling as he began dialing the number, somewhere deep down he felt that he was a bit too junior to be making that call, but Vikas’s quick fingers zipped across the number pad and the phone was buzzing at the other end before Ram could even think of formulating an escape plan.

    “Mr Bose, I was just calling to inquire when the review meeting would be?” he began in his most earnest voice, all eyes in the room transfixed on him.

    There was silence as Bose’s voice cackled its usual cacophonic tone for a bit. Ram put down the phone, his hand still shaking. “He says it was just a misunderstanding. The Chairman had told his assistant, ‘Get the agency to Hotel Sea-View to meet me.’ That fellow apparently has a hearing problem and so he spread the word about the agency review.”

    “I knew it!”

    “How can they dislike our work?”

    “Or our planning.”

    “Or strategy.”

    And before he knew it the other four had cleared the room and zipped off for a lavish lunch, the voucher of which Ram would have to clear later (with much explaining).

    “Tale of the review woe is useful to keep agency on toe,” the ancient Chinese rhyme (for better or verse), the express delivery of the tea cup and Chai-La had vanished into one of the circles on the whiteboard.