You might be thinking neither, one of these or possibly even both! But, if you take this question beyond its literal meaning then you’re likely to find you’re one or the other.
In a recent Marketing Academy Lunch and Learn group mentoring session with Chris Weston, CEO of British Gas, he said this is something he asks himself. It reveals how you feel about something – if you’re a smoker you’re addicted and it’s the thing you’re really into.
And if you’re a scuba diver you dip in and out. Thinking about it you could be a scuba diver across many different things! I don’t think either is right or wrong – it’s just a good test of how much you’re into something and/or different things and what works for you.
We all have superpowers
Whether you’re a smoker or a scuba diver, my Marketing Academy coach recently told me that we can consider ourselves as superheroes in one guise or another! Or to put it another way, our strengths are like superpowers – they can be used for good or evil and if we let our strengths get out of control they can have a negative effect even though we might not mean them to or might not even realise we’re doing it!
– Great attention to detail could become perfectionism and seem like nitpicking
– And brilliant organisational skills could come across as being too direct or even bossy
– Or super stakeholder management might become overbearing
I don’t think that we should all pull out the marketing superhero capes to try and stop becoming bad versions of ourselves, but we could look out for the times when our strengths go into overdrive and we’re coming across to other people as more bad egg than good egg!
There’s a bit of a theme here
It seems it’s all about the letter S – at a recent training day with Brand Learning I was introduced to the concept of The 4S Marketers which are:
Scientists – love data, MI and spreadsheets
Strategists – they’re all about the big picture
Storybuilders – develop messaging and stories
Socialisers – engage with others and are ideas people
You can take the quiz to identify the type of marketer you are (it’s not massively scientific, but is a bit of fun that will get you thinking) and there’s even a white paper if you want to go into more detail: bit.ly/XoREFt
Even though we’ll mainly be one type of marketer – it’s also a little more complex than this. Given that marketing is being increasingly driven by data and MI, we’ll all need to tap into our inner scientist (even though we’re unlikely to be smoking scientists who are completely addicted to it)!
And as marketers are looking to become more content focused, being part scuba diving socialiser (who is looking to bring ideas to life and start conversations with their target audience) is going to be important!
Don’t make it harder than it needs to be
I could’ve pulled together a complex matrix that looks at being a smoker versus a scuba diver in relation to The 4S Marketers, which could then be considered with how you can use your superpowers for good (without the need to wear a cape)!
But, in the spirit of not overcomplicating things, I think the ideas work best when they have chance to bounce around in your head for a while and come to the surface when something relevant comes up.
You might be thinking that none of this is rocket science – as I am too at times, but the best way I’ve heard it described was on the Bootcamp that kicked off this scholarship when our tutor from the Living Leader programme said “It’s common sense, but not common practice!”.
