Thinkerbell is a bit of a moving target. So to make sure I’m still the right fit and actually capable of delivering the impact the business deserves, I have to be brutally honest about my own utility. It’s a harrowing way to spend a Tuesday.
Years ago, the answer was easy. “Sure. I know how to craft a campaign, I can manage a room, and I’ve got enough awards in the cupboard to prove I’m not a complete fraud.”
But over the past few years, the discussion in my head has lasted a little longer. Because the job description for chief creative tinker at Thinkerbell changes. Not because we rewrite it, but because the world does.
We’re eight years into the Thinkerbell experiment. When it started, we were the “anything but traditional” shop. Today, that continues, but even the traditional agencies have moved on from tradition. I watch the holding companies, our older, heavier cousins, and it’s like watching a controlled demolition. They’re tearing down decades of structure to rebuild something “agile” from the rubble. It looks painful, but there’s no choice.
At Thinkerbell, being independent and leaning into our own model has allowed us to avoid the explosives. We don’t need to detonate, but we have committed to a framework that needs to constantly evolve. To continue the metaphor, we’re more like a garden than a skyscraper. We grow organically, messily, and constantly. But that means I have to grow with it.
Twenty years in this game usually gets you a title and a comfortable sense of “been there, done that.” But these days, “been there” is a graveyard.
The skillset I spent the first fifteen years honing — the anthemic TVC, the clever headline, the award-winning radio spot — is now just the entry fee. It’s a tiny sliver of today’s job description. Today, a creative leader at Thinkerbell needs to be part journalist, behaviour change expert, brand architect, comms planner, producer, media strategist, tech-support, social listener, and bookkeeper.
So, what is my value? Why should I hire Tom Wenborn?
Before I answer that, I have to acknowledge the room. It’s heavy out there. I see brilliant people, the ones who literally shaped this industry, finding themselves on the outer.
There’s a collective breath-holding happening. Some are stepping away because they’ve lost the yearn for the churn. Some are in limbo, waiting for a “normal” that isn’t coming back. Others are reskilling, learning prompts, while their hearts are still in hand-lettering.
It’s a hard time. If you’re feeling like the walls are moving in, you’re not alone. Those old silos are melting. The borders between creative, strategy, PR, media, and production have quickly dissolved into a puddle, and the ideas in that puddle are moving faster than ever.
But for me, I think that high-speed melting is where the magic lives.
That’s why my strategy for reapplying for my job this year seems horribly counterintuitive: try to keep up as slowly as I can. Aim to be the person who pauses for a split second longer than instincts are telling me to.
If everything is organic, if the silos are gone, then the job is no longer about directing or controlling. It’s about curating. And making sure that in our rush to be relevant, we don’t forget to be interesting and brand-led.
And maybe my best attribute isn’t going to be my 20-year portfolio. It’ll be my mindset.
The best years of my life have always been the ones where I felt like a total amateur, the years of discovery, experimentation, and the epiphanies that come with finding out I was oh so wrong. Right now, the world is offering us the biggest laboratory we’ve ever had. So I’m going to continue to be comfortable in the chaos.
So, would I hire Tom Wenborn today?
I think so. Not because he has all the answers, he definitely doesn’t, but because he understands that the questions are the most interesting part of the job, and they lead to doing the job the best. He’s a bit weathered, but he’s never been more motivated to learn. And in an industry that’s currently being rebuilt in real-time, maybe a ‘chief creative tinker’ who wants to tinker is what we need.
I truly do hope I’m not the only candidate who feels this way.