Agency Launches Groundbreaking 'Pre-Brief Debrief' to Streamline Uncertainty
Auckland-based creative agency Gush & Grit announced today the rollout of its latest internal innovation: the Pre-Brief Debrief™, a strategic meeting designed to discuss what might potentially be discussed once an actual project brief exists.
Gush & Grit CEO, Blair Waghorn, says the initiative is a direct response to the ever-growing pressure from clients to deliver faster, sooner, and ideally, yesterday. “We realised our team was wasting precious non-billable hours waiting for the brief to arrive. So we thought, why not start spinning our wheels earlier?”
The Pre-Brief Debrief includes a 47-slide deck, a mandatory vibes check, and at least one person saying the word ‘zeitgeist’ out loud. Participants speculate wildly on what the client might want, may never want, or will swear they never said once the work is done. There's also a ritualistic alignment circle where everyone guesses which KPIs will survive to final delivery.
Early testing has shown promising results. One junior strategist described the process as "liberatingly chaotic" and claimed to have manifested an entire campaign for a shoe brand that technically hasn’t launched yet. Gush & Grit plans to standardise the Pre-Brief Debrief across all accounts beginning next quarter. A separate Post-Pre-Brief Debrief is already being tested in beta.
Gush & Grit CEO, Blair Waghorn, says the initiative is a direct response to the ever-growing pressure from clients to deliver faster, sooner, and ideally, yesterday. “We realised our team was wasting precious non-billable hours waiting for the brief to arrive. So we thought, why not start spinning our wheels earlier?”
The Pre-Brief Debrief includes a 47-slide deck, a mandatory vibes check, and at least one person saying the word ‘zeitgeist’ out loud. Participants speculate wildly on what the client might want, may never want, or will swear they never said once the work is done. There's also a ritualistic alignment circle where everyone guesses which KPIs will survive to final delivery.
Early testing has shown promising results. One junior strategist described the process as "liberatingly chaotic" and claimed to have manifested an entire campaign for a shoe brand that technically hasn’t launched yet. Gush & Grit plans to standardise the Pre-Brief Debrief across all accounts beginning next quarter. A separate Post-Pre-Brief Debrief is already being tested in beta.