Strands of Genius: Age of Average, WFH Regulations, Principles of Campaigning

plus, our thoughts on reality TV

Mar 21, 2023

WORKING ON | a creative evaluation tool for a large team

LOOKING AHEAD

March 21-30 | Beersheba Springs, TN
March 30-April 3 | TBD (Chattanooga?)
April 3-9 | Beersheba Springs, TN
April 9-11 | Dallas, TX
April 11-26 | Beersheba Springs, TN
May 1- June 9 | Seattle, WA

:: WHAT’S NEW & WEEKLY GRATITUDE ::

Hiiiii there! Rosie here, again! First of all, I wanted to thank all of y’all who wrote back to me about my shoulder pain. I got more than 30 responses, and my team and I were all blown away by the thoughtfulness and specificity in each and every one of them.

Based on what I heard, most people think I should see a physical therapist. Some of you said that I should see a specialist first, because your injuries were compounded by physical therapy aggravating the existing injury.

I’m happy to say that I have an appointment tomorrow at a sports medicine institute, and they’re going to provide me with some recommendations for a plan of attack after my initial visit. They offer X-Rays, MRIs, and physical therapy along with other interventions that may or may not be relevant. I’m making my way through responses to your emails, so please excuse my delay!

Part of the reason I’m running a little behind on correspondence is that I planned a surprise trip to Seattle to visit my little sister, who is having a baby in May! Her friends planned a baby shower, and while initially Faris and I thought we’d be out of the states this month, we are not! So I had one of her friends, Rachel, text my sister to say she was bringing a few things for the baby shower over on Thursday at lunch and that she’d bring lunch too. Except it wasn’t Rachel! It was meeeeeee!

There were hugs and tears and lunches and walks and reality tv show bingeing and affirmation cards and games and sister hangs, and it was just a really special trip, one that I’m so glad that I was able to make.

This week, we’re especially thankful for:

surprise sister hangs, baby showers, great weather, walks in tank tops, good coffee, kimchi breakfast sandwiches, Rachel&Holly&Kat, Marion&Nate, bourbon-barrel aged red wine & YOU.

:: THE LINKS ::

THE AGE OF AVERAGE

I love this article from Alex Murrell, not just because there are so many examples of how things tend to look the same in so many areas of life — but also because he points out that this is an opportunity for brands!! “When every supermarket aisle looks like a sea of sameness, when every category abides by the same conventions, when every industry has converged on its own singular style, bold brands and courageous companies have the chance to chart a different course. To be different, distinctive and disruptive.” (Alex Murrell)

WORK FROM HOME REGULATIONS ARE COMING

In the last three years, we’ve spoken to a whole lot of leaders in organizations of all shapes and sizes about remote work, hybrid work, and the often dreaded return-to-office. Many leaders want their teams back in the offices, while many employees are happy to keep working from home. The challenges that are often brought up are the same: productivity, company culture, boundaries between work and home life… and regulatory bodies governing remote work are another big consideration. When we were living through peak pandemic, there was liminality for the growing remote workers — but what about when it becomes permanent? There’s been new legislation around the right to disconnect, taxes, and even accidents and insurance for remote employees. (From the article: “In December, in a potentially precedent-setting case in Germany, a court ruled that when a remote-working employee slipped on his way from his bed to his home office, it qualified as a workplace accident.” (MIT Sloan)

PHILIP GOULD'S PRINCIPLES OF CAMPAIGNING

I don’t know anything about Philip Gould: He’s not someone I had heard of before, so please don’t take this as a political endorsement. Instead, I came across this post from Justin Lines, which recaps some of Gould’s principles, pointing out how they are relevant to brands. I really enjoyed the visuals accompanying this article, too! (Justin Lines)

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:: WHAT WE’RE THINKING ABOUT: REALITY TV ::

I wasn’t into reality TV until the pandemic hit. I watched Love is Blind, and I was HOOKED. I loved it, y’all. But even since then, I have a hard time expressing my love of reality TV show programs without extensive caveats.

(I’ll give you the one floating around in my head right now — that my friend Rachel had to explain to me that VPR was not Vermont Public Radio on Saturday, ha. And then she gave me the full download on VanderPump Rules, and wow, it’s crazy, y’all. )

Anywhoooo, when I went to Seattle last Wednesday, I queued up Perfect Match on Netflix, knowing that this was my chance to binge something that Faris wasn’t interested in. (To be clear, Faris does not control the remote in our household, and we choose what to watch together, but also… there are shows that we watch on our own, too.)

The premise is silly — It’s reality tv show contestants that are given the opportunity to pair up with each other each night to see if they are the perfect match for each other. So, people from Love is Blind, who didn’t get married, but do have a bunch of followers on social media from the show. People from The Mole, Too Hot To Handle, etc. One of the contestants talked about how it was hard to find love because the normies desire clout as much as they desire love, and it’s hard to tell if they truly love you or just want your clout. When everyone has a similar level of clout, that element is removed.

I loved it. I laughed. I shook my fist at the screen. I recorded funny segments that were really maybe even not that funny out of context and saved them to share with Faris when I returned. It’s not that I feel like I have relationships with all of these individuals, but the same way I wanted to know what happened to Emily in Paris, I was curious in the relationships being built in the house. Just because we know certain things aren’t real (wrestling, fictional books), doesn’t always make them less compelling. At least, not to me!

I wrote about reality TV back in June 2021 and had a thought:

I’m also wondering why is reality TV a guilty pleasure? Is it a religious overtone that has policed pleasure? Or is it that women can’t really like anything without being mocked? Do men who are highly skilled at processing social interactions also like reality TV?

It seems like men are sooooo quick to jump on the ‘reality TV is horrible’ bandwagon, and yet these men also like watching people drive expensive cars in circles. I mean, how is that not just as silly as reality TV? But it doesn’t seem to make its way into news conversations or social conversations as often.

I mean don’t get me wrong: I love talking about how silly sports are in general, and I’m constantly singing this song whenever anyone puts sports on…

BUT!

It turns out that it’s not just me who has had this thought, because my friend Aisha shared a video, from one of the contestants on Perfect Match, who points out pretty much the same thing:

@abbey.freeze suffice to say i am over this narrative #reality #tv #perfectmatch #netflix

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So, I’m wondering.
Is reality TV objectively bad?
Why or why not?

Or, is culture allowed to mock it endlessly because it’s something that women gravitate towards?

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It's called Genius Steals because we believe ideas are new combinations and that nothing can come from nothing. But copying is lazy. We believe the best way to innovate is to look at the best of that which came before and combine those elements into new solutions.

Co-Founders Faris & Rosie are award-winning strategists and creative directors, writers, consultants and public speakers who have been living on the road/runway since March 2013, working with companies all over the world. Our Director of Operations is nomadic like us, our accounting team is based in Tennessee where our company is registered, our admin extraordinaire is based in Playa del Carmen, and our collaborators are all over the world. Being nomadic allows us to go wherever clients need us to be, and to be inspired by the world in between.

Hit reply and let’s talk about how we might be able to work together :)

Strands of Genius