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Robert Berkeley  0:06  

Welcome to Inside Jobs jobs, the podcast for an about annabell creative leaders brought to you by IHAF I have the forum for In House Agency in house agency professionals and express KCS, the production agency who execute agencies creative ideas quickly across all media on brand on time. And offshore is the end of summer here and I can sense things are starting to ramp up. In the next few months, we'll have the inside out awards in London, if you're a UK In House Agency in house agency, do make sure you check them out as it's a great place to celebrate your work and that of your peers. Right after that is the Henry Stewart conference over in San Diego, California, where I'll be taking part in a panel discussion before heading on to Boston for the big one, the IHAF AI half conference and awards more about this in the next episode. But let's introduce our next Inside Jobs inside jobs guest Chris Batchik bachik. How you doing, Chris? Hello, Robert. It's great to be here. Nice to have you on the show. Thank you very much for joining us. And Chris, I know the answer to this, but just tell the listeners where you're working and what you're doing right now?.

 

Chris Batchik  1:05  

I work for Charles Schwab at the analysis agency we have and been here close to nine years. Building what we have for supporting our clients is thinking Charles Schwab and making sure we have great customer experiences.

 

Robert Berkeley  1:18  

So you've been there nine years now. Where are you located with Charles Schwab?

 

Chris Batchik  1:22  

I'm in Austin, Texas. And I've been in Austin close to 15 years now from moved out from the greater Detroit area.

 

Robert Berkeley  1:29  

Okay, too fancy to change climate, did you?

 

Chris Batchik  1:31  

you? Well, it was that and I was in Detroit, at almost the bottom when auto auto companies were going bankrupt. And agencies were a little bit struggling with some of the work.

 

Robert Berkeley  1:40  

soso but when Charles Schwab is in San Fran, isn't it isn't it based there?

 

Chris Batchik  1:45  

Our headquarters is San Francisco and the financial district. But we've been employing a real estate strategy over the last, say seven or eight years where we've been creating more office space in different cities throughout the US. And so we're pretty big in Austin. Now. We've got a big campus going in up in Dallas, and then Phoenix and Denver are also big areas for us.

 

Robert Berkeley  2:06  

So yeah, real investment in Austin, six, eight years ago, that was probably a good idea. I should think.,

 

Chris Batchik  2:11  

Yyeah, it was a good idea. We had a company that Schwab had purchased the 401k company, and we built off of that, starting probably eight or nine years ago is when that all started.

 

Robert Berkeley  2:21  

Okay, so you're so you're running the In House Agency in house agency for Charles Schwab right now? Yeah,

 

Chris Batchik  2:26  

yes. Managing 150 employees across all the different different skill sets you have in an agency and we have people in San Francisco and in Richfield, Ohio, which is a little suburb outside of Cleveland, and then majority of us are in Austin. Okay. All right. So that's quite a spread

 

Robert Berkeley  2:43  

Okay. All right. So that's quite a spread and quite a responsibility. So I guess we need to find out how you got there. So let's, let's go back, Chris, if we may. And you say you're from you're from Detroit, originally, are you?I

 

Chris Batchik  2:53  

yeah. I have Born and raised a fourth generation Detroit or suffered with the Detroit Lions. They've won one playoff football game since I've been alive, which is quite a long time

 

Robert Berkeley  3:03  

long time. Okay, so we all commiserate with that. But tell us a bit about your background and upbringing and where your parents involved in the in the in the motor business? And and if so, how and where were you as a kid? What was going on?

 

Chris Batchik  3:15  

Yeah. So start with my grandparents on both sides of my family. My mom's dad was a Ford guy. And my dad's parents were Chrysler. And so they grew up. I grew up, you know, in the shadows of the auto industry, with them working manufacturing and on the line, building cars.

 

Robert Berkeley  3:31  

Wow. Okay, so does this put the family in opposing camps? Is this like Romeo and Juliet kind of thing?

 

Chris Batchik  3:36  

A little bit? Yeah, there's definitely a rivalry there between the manufacturers. And, you know, the my dad's parents would never drive anything. But and same thing for my grandfather on my mom's side.

 

Robert Berkeley  3:46  

So what about you? Did you did you harbour a desire to get into the motor business as well?

 

Chris Batchik  3:51  

You know, I think that if you're in Detroit, in you're going to be connected to the automotive business in some fashion. I wouldn't tell you I was planning on working for General Motors.

 

Robert Berkeley  4:01  

Absolutely. Yeah. So you went to university in Detroit as well? Yeah.

 

Chris Batchik  4:05  

Yeah. I got my MBA from university, Detroit. And I did my undergrad at Northern Michigan University, which you know, is the Harvard of the Midwest.

 

Robert Berkeley  4:12  

So what did you think you were going to do and you were studying for his MBA?,

 

Chris Batchik  4:15  

At the at the time, I was working as an HR professional, or back in the day, we called it personnel. And I had designs on getting into the marketing side of the business, whether it was with General Motors or really anywhere because I did my undergrad, business with a minor in marketing and what attracted you to marketing

 

Robert Berkeley  4:33  

and what attracted you to marketing then what was what was the appeal?

 

Chris Batchik  4:35  

I was interested in consumers, you know, how they think, what choices they make, why they make the choices, that appealed to me a lot, a little bit curious about sales. I wasn't interested in becoming sales per se in the sales side of the business.

 

Robert Berkeley  4:50  

So you'll have to forgive me because obviously I wasn't around in the 80s in Detroit or in the United States in general, but marketing in context of the car industry was that quite a exciting bit Citing thing at the time. Oh, yeah, it Hopre fully, I mean, with what people very aware of how cars were being marketed at the time? Yes, very much. So

 

Chris Batchik  5:07  

Yes, very much. So you know, the the new model launches in the fall, were always a big deal. advertising on television, you know, car companies spent a lot of money, and were begun TV early on in early days and throughout. And so in the 80s, definitely, we would see a lot of work a lot of advertising and your, you know, the consciousness, your awareness of what was happening around the advertising in auto in the auto industry was very high.

 

Robert Berkeley  5:33  

So did you feel as a young man that to get involved with marketing in the motor business was a life of kind of not necessarily glamour, but but certainly excitement and being, you know, culturally in an important place? Was there that element of excitement to it? Or did it? Were you more pragmatic than that, and just felt this was a, you know, direction that generally appealed?

 

Chris Batchik  5:51  

Well, it's, it's definitely both, there's no, there's a glamour side of it that people think about when TV shoots and you know, and you've seen your work in a large public forum, like network TV. And so that's, you know, you get that celebrity sort of angle. But there's also just, you know, knowing that you can impact consumers choices and what they want to buy, and help them understand the products that you're selling. I think that's, you know, that's a big part of it, as well.

 

Robert Berkeley  6:17  

So this was in the 90s, you were working at GM, and this marketing capacity had moved into.

 

Chris Batchik  6:22  

Yeah, so I actually started General Motors, I think I said, as a, you know, as a human resources professional. And what happened was that General Motors decided to debut a credit card or loyalty card, and I was the HR representative managing the staffing of that piece of business. And I was able to parlay that into me getting an opportunity to work for a GM credit card at the time.

 

Robert Berkeley  6:44  

So this is the kind of ducking and diving that you need to do early in your career, right. So when you when you're fine tuning the exact direction that you want to take.

 

Chris Batchik  6:52  

Yeah, it's interesting, because he worked for a big corporation. And I could draw parallels even at Charles Schwab right now. But when you're in a big organisation like that, there's many different skills and there's, you know, different fields that you can get into. And that's just an example of how if you keep your eyes open and look for opportunities, you can, my career is pretty varied, you know, even leading before GM card, I was in manufacturing plant building heavy duty trucks, I was at Buick motor division. And so you know, eventually you get to the marketing side of it, but a lot of different roles prior to that.

 

Robert Berkeley  7:19  

So name some campaigns that most excited you that you were critically involved in along the way.,

 

Chris Batchik  7:25  

Ssome of the stuff we did when I was at. So GM card, you know, fastest growing credit card at the time, at&t I think was the first loyalty card that came out and the GM card, follow that. So there's some pretty huge campaigns that we ran, they're really direct marketing. And so we were doing a lot of model building data modelling and forecasting, working with our bank partner. And you know, I was we were mailing easily 75 to 100 million pieces of mail throughout the course of a year trying to drive credit card applications. And it worked really well.

 

Robert Berkeley  7:55  

Yeah, well, that's, you know, that's kind of interesting, real world engagement for a marketer as well.,

 

Chris Batchik  7:59  

It it is. And I think that big, big educators for me, and you know, building data models and targeting and carry that over to my Buick days. And when I got to Buick, we built the first relational marketing database. And so we're always everything was linear up to that point, we started building a database where we could, you know, target different parts of the customer experience and what they had purchased. But also, it was sort of a precursor to the internet, where we were driving consumers to make choices about the car colour, the model type, rims and wheels. And then we were actually digitally printing and sending those that information back to those customers and trying to drive sales through a direct mail package. And we actually ended up doing a lot of sales are attributing a lot of sales to this programme, which eventually became the model for all General Motors in terms of their marketing and relational databases. How are we going to put it You were a gatekeeper then but General Motors and you you learned the ropes marketing wise, but obviously decided to turn poacher at some point and move across to the agency side in the late 90s?, Late late 90s. I was, that was my Buick days, and McCann Erickson was the agency that I was partnered with MRM partners, if you remember MRM partners back in the day? I did. Yes, absolutely. Yeah. And they wanted to start an office in Detroit. They were servicing us out of the New York office, which is where their headquarters was and the general manager for mechanic already tried twice was finding somebody in Detroit and both were a failure and one day over drinks, you know, she just flippantly threw out, why don't you take the job and one thing led to the next and after much negotiation with General Motors leaders and McCann leaders were able to negotiate so that GM well let me go to the agency because as you can imagine, the auto company that clients don't want the agencies poaching their their staff.

 

Robert Berkeley  9:44  

Yeah, so you made it across and how did you find the pastor on the other side was it was it greener, the grass there or green? Did you did you did you miss the the old? The old times working for the brand itself?

 

Chris Batchik  9:55  

Yeah. The security of the of the mothership General Motors? Well, you know, I think that is different for sure. But greener in the sense that, you know, I had some autonomy, I sort of pretty much ran my own business, if you will, in Detroit is a subsidiary and you know, had a lot of responsibility for, you know, what kind of revenue and we were generating versus expenses. And so that was great. But it really depends on who your client is, you know, some of them are great. And others want what they want when they want it. And there's, you know, there's no sort of there's no conversations that you can have about that. So, so

 

Robert Berkeley  10:24  

again, any particular campaign stick to mind come to mind when you work McCann's because you you weren't creative, I suppose. But you were working with creative people and try a full team of creative skills.

 

Chris Batchik  10:34  

Yeah, had a full team of creative you know, typical all the agency functions. They're in Detroit a big campaign. So we got into a new car launches became our sort of our, our calling card, if you will, and we launched the Buick rendezvous it had Tiger Woods involved in that we bought launched a product called the Bo Grenier, which is an SUV that was a pretty fun campaign because we tied the Mount Rainier is an American icon to the product and ended up getting some really some great endorsers Bruce horns being one of them, there was Hornsby recorded an original piece of music that we sent to customers. First time he had recorded with an orchestra and being on site for that, and watching that happen was pretty incredible experience.

 

Robert Berkeley  11:21  

So it doesn't sound to me, like budgets were much or

 

Chris Batchik  11:24  

probiotics were They they, they were pretty good. You know, I missed the window, being the ad guy where you know, sort of the salad days of three Martini lunches and going, you know, taking clients and all the different places, but we still had pretty good budgets in terms of particularly new car launches, you know, that's an important move for the company. And a lot of time spent building those products before they get to marketing before you're in the marketing or part of the launch.

 

Robert Berkeley  11:49  

But I imagine a fair degree of profligacy by the brand. And by the agency at the time as well, I heard some amazing stories about some other brands, I think someone else had Inside Jobs inside Jobs was talking about how campaigns are run where individual boxes of ornaments were handcrafted and dispatched out to sort of target target clients in their case, and massive amounts of money were spent to make sure the launch happened properly. And I'm sure that sort of thing was going on with you in Detroit back then in the 90s. Right.,

 

Chris Batchik  12:18  

We we sent a lot of cool things to people encouraging them to sign up early, we actually were able to drive people to write checks in advance of the product launch. Cool. I

 

Robert Berkeley  12:29  

Cool. I bet I bet your client was happy about that.

 

Chris Batchik  12:31  

They were and, you know, in typical sort of agency life, I'd say, you know, the TV, you know, sort of leads everything from campaigns, and everyone follows, but then McCann supported Buick from not only TV MRM, there was a promotions partner, there's internet partner, and so we're all sort of fighting for that same total budget. And the more you can attribute, the better you made your clients Look, the more fun you could have. Did you

 

Robert Berkeley  13:00  

Did you think that was a healthy way of working?

 

Chris Batchik  13:03  

Ppros and cons and that I'd say healthy in the sense that you had to have a good business case and, you know, prove what you were doing and why it was successful. But definitely, you know, outside of advertising, I think other parts of organisation were, you know, sort of the the add ons, you know, and they came they came second.

 

Robert Berkeley  13:19  

Yeah, yeah. Okay, interesting. Well, from there, you were there, what, five or six years? I think McCann's and then on to t-three T three., Under and t-three T three and Austin. So. So yes, that’s what brought you to Austin.

 

Chris Batchik  13:31  

That's what brought me to Austin. mechanics in General Motorisms ism, consolidating with agencies is typical. And McCain, Erickson didn't make that cut. And so I was on I was unemployed in Detroit for about, say, seven or eight months, found this job in Austin, which was this incredible, you know, random internet, direct mail, I think magazine job application and started talking to the owners of the agency. And it's probably one of the best experiences a person could have in interviewing, finding a job negotiating, you know, a job and moving down to Austin, that I learned a lot from t-three t three, and particularly owners of that company and sort of how to manage an agency but also how to treat people.

 

Robert Berkeley  14:12  

Okay. All right, interesting. So this was your move down to us and your family, by the way?

 

Chris Batchik  14:16  

I do. My my wife and I are celebrating our 28th wedding anniversary in November. And we have a daughter 20, who's at Tulsa University.

 

Robert Berkeley  14:25  

Right. Okay, so you were bringing your family down as well to Austin. So you're at t-three t three, you learned a lot there and any particular individuals that you kind of mentored you when you got there and gave you this different perspective?

 

Chris Batchik  14:37  

Yeah, both of the owners of t-three T three are there, they're great. And I got to work alongside them pretty tightly. You know, they brought me down and Gary says it Ben is the now son of the original owners. Gay Okay, gay and legatus. Yeah, ungainly were they were fantastic to me, but they're also really good in terms of handling clients and finding new ways to influence, but also new clients. They brought me down to work on Dell. And I recall them saying before I got there because it took a month or so for me to get down and actually join them once the car guy come in. So I was I was known as a car guy for the first six months in my career that

 

Robert Berkeley  15:15  

Was that it? Was that a Poland chain? Or was that a badge of honour? Well, how did that work?

 

Chris Batchik  15:21  

They were impressed by the Bruce Hornsby CD. So I think it went pretty well. Okay.

 

Robert Berkeley  15:25  

Okay. All right. Yeah, me and Bruce and tiger, don't forget. Well, sure. Yeah. You know, you've got all their mobile numbers. So So go on you you were working on Dell, did you have anything to bring from your from your motor experience that perhaps others didn't, didn't have? That was to your benefit?

 

Chris Batchik  15:39  

Well, I was of the relational marketing, you know, database marketing, direct marketing skills that I had built up over time, that really appealed. And that's, that's what we are doing, we're selling computers, we manage the Dell catalogue for both the retail and the business side of their business. And so, yeah, again, you know, more, more printing more trees getting cut down, but definitely use that skill set in terms of, you know, targeting and modelling to, you know, target the right people.,

 

Robert Berkeley  16:06  

Diddid you find it a struggle moving to a completely different industry, when you've been so entrenched in one industry, all the all those years?, it was definitely

 

Chris Batchik  16:12  

It was definitely something about learning, you know, the products speeds and feeds as you know, we say in the in the tech industry, but I think a lot of the principles of how you market and how you manage clients, you know, those are all sort of those all stay intact, but learning the products and learning the clients that definitely hard tells an interesting organisation with their culture. And it was very aggressive culture.

 

Robert Berkeley  16:36  

Yeah, I'm sure absolutely. So that you were familiar with anyway. Right. That was an environment you you were familiar in. Absolutely. Yeah.

 

Chris Batchik  16:42  

Absolutely. Yeah. And the more you make the client look good, the the happier they are and the bigger opportunities you get.

 

Robert Berkeley  16:48  

So what was the difference in your role, though, between McCann's and t-three T three?,

 

Chris Batchik  16:53  

Wwhen it came to t-three t. Three, I was managing the accounts, and product managers, project managers for Dell, I partnered with a creative lead. And so being different when I was McCann's, you know, I mean, I was responsible for both all the different parts of the agency. So

 

Robert Berkeley  17:07  

So McCann's creative was subordinate to you. But at t-three t three, it was your your pair? So did you find that one way was better working than the other?

 

Chris Batchik  17:15  

I did, I felt like I think that the way I worked at t-three t three was a better way, it caused a little more friction about, you know, who's driving. And I think that the creative comes through a little bit stronger in that sense. And so something for me that I learned from that was that it's better to have that friction and make sure you're bringing both elements to the table. If your your pendulum swings too far to process or account management or swings too far too creative, you get a little bit out of balance. And, you know, agency doesn't function as well, employees maybe aren't as engaged.

 

Robert Berkeley  17:47  

So that was a five year stint at at t-three t three, before you took an industry change again. So tell us about that time.

 

Chris Batchik  17:55  

Well, and so it's funny, I've been in in agency consolidation now two times once with McCann's and then when I was at t-three t three, Dell decided to go with the no if you remember the indefatigable model that had I think, WP Sol delaune, consolidating all of the agency work on. Do you remember, there was a big w PP engagement with Dell? I don't remember too much of the detail. Yeah. So they claimed they named it in phatak. I'm not sure why that was, but I know, they had a clever reason for it. And that now, so there's an interesting learning experience for me and about the power to say no, so the owners of t-three T three, you know, we were not going to get the business, we were told that they were, you know, consolidating all that Dell CMO cmo at the time, and offered to broker a deal where t-three t three could have been bought by VPP, there was some interest there. And the owners of t-three T three, you know, made this chose to say no, they don't want to be owned, they want to stay independent, that was an important model for them. And they were convinced that they could replace that Dell work, you know, easily over time. And so, you know, just think that there's something in that about what works for you, what work should you be working on? You know, how do you make those decisions, and then saying knows, it's an important thing. But once that was over, we started pitching new clients and different businesses. So you're very reliant on Dell, or is it just it was was t-three d3 reliant on Dell, or just your bit of t-three T three?, It it was just my my bit of t-three T three. And so that was a big part of the agency. Don't get me wrong, I'd say maybe 20 30% of the revenue base. So that had to be made. But we ended up doing a lot of trying to find new clients. And I ended up getting in back a little bit into the auto, automotive or transportation side of it. I did work project work for Ford and, and we actually picked up conocophillips as a client. And so I was back sort of in the transportation side of it, you know, going back up to Detroit, and my own pair of slippers wasn't Yeah, it was, yeah, pitching projects and working on a project basis, which is kind of where we ended up is. That's a hard that's a hard road in agency, you know, because you're trying to find resources. There's not a full SW you're not fully funded. And so it just becomes very like pulling resources and trying to get things done on the periphery, and it's hard. It's not, you know, until you get that bigger relationship. It's a hard way to to sell. well,

 

Robert Berkeley  20:08  

Well, I hear that the rise of the enhanced agencies has led to far more project based engagements for agencies. But we'll talk a bit more about that.

 

Chris Batchik  20:15  

Yeah, that is true. I'm seeing that from where I sit to

 

Robert Berkeley  20:18  

exactly. But you don't sit in an agency anymore. You made the transition around 2010. So getting on for getting off 10 years ago. Now there, Chris? Yeah. So how did that come about them?

 

Chris Batchik  20:29  

Well, so as a sort of looking around the environment there, what's happening at t-three t three, and you know, trying to find more work we a few of my so at that time, Schwab was opening up their big a bigger office in Austin and moving some rolls from San Francisco to Austin, and a couple of my colleagues fromt-three  t three had gone over to join the In House Agency in house agency at Schwab. And when they first came., they already

 

Robert Berkeley  20:51  

They already had an In House Agency in house agency, this was something that was kind of, you know, going to be part of their plan going forward was to have an In House Agency in house agency, Schwab.

 

Chris Batchik  20:59  

Yeah, in fact, we just celebrated our 40th anniversary as an In House Agency in house agency at Schwab last year.

 

Robert Berkeley  21:04  

Okay. And is this an In House Agency in house agency that you sort of started as documents services and became more creative? Or was it always the case that they were running there, you know, the creative part of the operation into In House Agency in house?

 

Chris Batchik  21:16  

Well, when Chuck started the company, he was running direct response ads, and hey, I think he had paid some, you know, third party agencies to do some work, but at the time, he was an intrapreneur. And so he decided I can do this work. And he was pretty much I think, directing and guiding all the work anyway. And so he started, he started an agency, he added some art directors and writers and some, you know, production types. And he pretty much started from scratch. And so you picked it up when they were 30 years in at that point., Aapproximately. So and then what Rob was doing at the time was there, again, a little bit of a real estate consolidation play, there started moving some of the In House Agency in house agency jobs into Austin mentioned that, you know, Schwab had bought a 401k company. And there was already some creative support there for plan sponsors for education materials, and so they built on that a little bit. But when they moved those started moving jobs and roles to Austin, it was really more from a production only standpoint, you know, the main creatives, the main leadership of the agency was in San Francisco.

 

Robert Berkeley  22:18  

Okay, so now you came in at that point, then and your role was what specifically what were you charged with doing?,

 

Chris Batchik  22:24  

I was hired as Assistant General Manager. And so they needed someone to really establish the Austin office, I continue to build and grow it and but also establish the team in the working protocols and the experience and the engagement.

 

Robert Berkeley  22:38  

So you said it was production in Austin, at that point with creative in San Francisco was that with that, you know, kind of, were they the rules that you had to work with? Or were you required to change that, that balance.,

 

Chris Batchik  22:49  

Therethere was never a requirement to change the balance, but we knew that more of the roles, were going to move to Austin, and we had hired some pretty strong talent on the creative side in Austin. And so it was just assume that over time that the the split of the work would have become a little more 50 50, if you will share it fairly shared between the two locations.

 

Robert Berkeley  23:09  

So you you mentioned right at the beginning, you've got a team of what did you say 110 people?

 

Chris Batchik  23:14  

people Acrossacross 1250, there's about 120 of us or so 130 in Austin, and then another 10 to 20 spread between San Francisco and Richfield.

 

Robert Berkeley  23:23  

So yeah. And you have as associate General Manager, and then ultimately, Vice President at charter of advertising. Have you seen growth there? Or have you been realigning skills? Or what what's what's been the kind of how would you characterise, you know, the past 10 years at Charles Schwab for you?

 

Chris Batchik  23:40  

Well, it's we've with the agency itself has grown, I think when I joined, we were around 90 to 100. And now we're, you know, around 150. So we definitely had experienced growth. We've also really consolidated all the agency operations in Austin. And so that's been a big part of what's going on here is, you know, transitioning roles and moving positions from San Francisco to Austin building agency in Austin for the right types of talent and skills, we need to support the business, but increasing the skills we have and being better at what we do it just make the agency In House Agency in house agency, a bigger strategic arm and go to place for creative problem solving.

 

Robert Berkeley  24:20  

Okay, interesting. So does that mean raising your game a little bit in terms of what you can provide the marketing folks?

 

Chris Batchik  24:26  

Yes, one of the things that we have as an In House Agency in house agency is a very strong creative problem solving culture. But we also have the technical side. So we've had a pretty strong front end and back end development team over all the years that I've been here and even prior to that, and so we can marry the technology, you know, within a large corporation navigating database management and global tech support and things becomes a little bit cumbersome that so we're really good understanding that side of it so that we're implementing creative solutions. If there's a digital aspect that needs to be handled swab comm aspect Yeah, we're really good at understanding that and making that happen and bringing that art and science together.

 

Robert Berkeley  25:04  

And do you have creative strategy as well in house? Or do you work with some form of agency of record, or what might have been termed an agency of record.,

 

Chris Batchik  25:13  

We we have a planning department, we have a planner in the agency. And then we have a very strong content strategy and user experience group. So between those three functions, we're able to add our strategic value to the projects that we're getting. Now one of the things that we always talk aboutIn House Agencies  in house agencies is getting that seat at the table. And you know, that's a constant drumbeat, you have to be on top of that, you have to look for those opportunities, you almost have to demand that seed in some cases, and we're getting better at that. And the more we prove what we can do, and that's that's our, that's our long game, you know, sort of we've had some really strong organic growth. But it's because we've proven what we can do. And the success we've had that our business partners come to us for more things, or they've talked to their other business partners, and they want to show up on our doorstep for more work.

 

Robert Berkeley  25:56  

So it must take a lot of proactive effort on your part. Because to sit at the table, when the tables in San Francisco, when you're in Austin, quite often, you don't even know other people are sitting at the table, right? So how do you make sure you are in play at all times.,

 

Chris Batchik  26:09  

We make we make sure that we're part of the bigger conversations when sort of new product launches are coming or when we're doing these bigger initiatives. We'd like to do regular report outs to the marketing leadership team so that they're aware of what we're working on how much work we've been doing, how our availability looks, you know, all the sort of the metrics that Schwab likes to track. And but we also report into the brand leader, so I don't report directly to marketing leaders, I do work on behalf of them and are different, you know, on the retail side or the acquisition side, but I report to the brand leader, and so he's a great advocate for us as well and make sure that agency is recognised but also given opportunities.

 

Robert Berkeley  26:50  

Right. Okay. So it's, but this is something you have to be lobbying for at all times, right? You can't, you can't, you can't take your eye off this ball. So in order to be the people that marketers and brand managers want to have around, you've got an awful lot of balls to juggle here, you've got you've got quite a large staff. You've got them spread across multiple areas. You've got a very dynamic business. I mean, certainly in any line, this would be dynamic business at Charles Schwab. But in financial services, it's particularly so how do you structure and evolve ways of working to match to meet those challenges? Because, you know, it'd be quite hard to stay sane unless you had some pretty clear ways of working right?

 

Chris Batchik  27:33  

Yes, that's a big, that's a big part of what we're all about, you know, people will complain about process and how it gets cumbersome, but you're not going to do seven or 8000 projects or, you know, creative company communication pieces a year without that structure. And we're always looking for new ways of working, creating efficiencies, when we moved a lot of the roles from San Francisco to Austin. 9, 8-9 years ago, we implemented a new digital project management system. And we've evolved to using workfront. Now as our project management system has been a recent evolution about the last three years, but you know, the more we get into sort of new ways of working, and we talk about agile and design thinking and Schwab's doing something that we call an accelerator approach where we, you know, work on one problem for a very short burst of time with a lot of a lot of people, a lot of hours being spent on it, it's all up to the agency to make sure we understand what's happening. And that was different ways of working, but also how we can incorporate our teams our skills and our way of working to support that.

 

Robert Berkeley  28:32  

Yeah, I can imagine so. So how do you make sure that everyone's aware of what what is meant by these terms, in the context of Charles Schwab, and in context of the goals you're trying to achieve?

 

Chris Batchik  28:43  

Well, our age, the agency see to creative centre, you know, we've gone through a lot of internal training so we can control we can control and then we try to make sure that we are able to influence our other business partners. We've partnered with the University of Texas about a year and a half ago on a design thinking, curriculum. And we spent three days with University of Texas professors, you know, educating the team, and actually some of our business partners are part of that. We're definitely a curious group by nature. And so we're looking for always to go to seminars, learn more about it implement these ways of working, and then we have business partners who are interested in doing it. And so it makes it easier when, you know, we have people that we work with or who we work with that also want to learn new ways and work differently.

 

Robert Berkeley  29:25  

And tapping into educational institutions. I always think is a is always a winning situation for all parts, was it difficult to get their attention and and to get to get to work with them in that way? And have you been able to extend that relationship?

 

Chris Batchik  29:40  

surprisingly not difficult. A University of Texas has implemented a design thinking minor that is, I think, part of the fine art school. And so we learned about that. They actually hired a woman from frog design, who's leading that curriculum. We partnered up with her and So they had a curriculum, and they've been going to businesses, you know, it's sort of in the evening for, you know, one or two hour presentation types of things. And then together, we built a larger curriculum for that three day event that we had on campus at Charles Schwab.

 

Robert Berkeley  30:14  

Okay, so just to just to wrap up this what what challenges have you got immediately ahead of you, and Chris, at the moment that you're looking to address or you're working on addressing right now?,

 

Chris Batchik  30:24  

Oour challenges are still around just accountability and making sure that the team is all pulling in the same direction? You know, we went through some accountability workshops earlier this year, where we set three key goals for the agency. So that's a big part of what we're trying to make sure that it's hard for everybody who sits at their desk, and maybe the designer day to day to figure out well, how can I help, you know, improve Net Promoter Score, you know, I'm doing what I'm doing, you know, how does that impact it? So we're focused on that. But the bigger thing is, we're focused on incorporating these new ways of working into you know, how the agency supports the business. And the more we get into seeing the commitments that are needed, the big challenge for us is going to be the resourcing, you know, we're used to doing a lot of things for a lot of people all the time. And these new ways of working our focus teams where you take, you know, a couple of your players off the board for six or eight, eight week engagement in that means that they're not able to do 20 projects at that point, they can do one, and just, you know, making sure the priorities are set, that everybody understands what you know, what's happening, when how the resources are being deployed, that we have agreement on that, that'll be a big part of managing this.

 

Robert Berkeley  31:28  

Okay. Well, this is all been very interesting. And I've certainly learned a lot about not just Charles Schwab and what you're doing there, but also how to inform your your career by really getting stuck into different segments. I'm sure it wasn't by design, but it certainly clearly has helped. First in the motor industry, then the computer industry and obviously financial services now. So when you're not working, which is all we really talked about on this interview. What are you doing, aside from that, Chris? Are you an accomplished guitar player, for example?

 

Chris Batchik  32:02  

I am. I'm not an accomplished guitar player. I'm a sports i like i like golfing. I'm in a hockey league here in Austin, which you might find incredible when we just had a string of 20 consecutive days of over 100 degrees, but there's a pretty robust hockey community down here have a lot of transplants and so those are the things I like to do in my spare time in addition to family of course.,

 

Robert Berkeley  32:25  

Aabsolutely. So back to Golf. I'm sure that from your in your meeting Tiger so many years ago, he's your regular golfing partner, right?

 

Chris Batchik  32:31  

Yeah, no, he's not that interesting. I did play with currency right back

 

Robert Berkeley  32:34  

Back up to the top of his game. Sorry, go on.

 

Chris Batchik  32:37  

Yeah, I recommended he have a fusion procedure on his back and Oh, look, he won the Masters tenure lay off. Well, there's that Yeah. Mike, my claim to fame in golf is I got to play in a pro am tournament with Curtis strange, who won back to back us opens.

 

Robert Berkeley  32:55  

Right, right. And you told him everything he knew.

 

Chris Batchik  32:57  

And he Well, he was funny, he played with us. But you know, in the programme, he tees off in the back teeth, and we're in the forward tees for the first three or four holes, you know, he was really not engaging with us. But it had really rained harder than that before. And the course is wet and muddy. And at one point, I look at myself, and I'm the amateur and I've got mud splattered on my pants and I'm, you know, it's warm. And I'm kind of, you know, dishevelled. And I look over at Curtis and he's perfect. He's got white pants on and off the cuff. He's got them coffee dough up twice. And he's just, and I look at him and I said, Curtis, look at you. And I look at me and it from that point on he was super engaged and really talked about a lot of like, clothing seem to be important for him. We talked about that for a while. So you reading any books at the moment any good books you'd want to recommend? And of course, our leader Chuck is just wants to new book and so are authored a new book. So we're all worried about what's coming up with that? Well,

 

Robert Berkeley  33:43  

Well, you think you're gonna get named and shamed there, Chris?

 

Chris Batchik  33:45  

I don't think so. No. He did recognise us for our 40th anniversary. So when we when we celebrated that pretty really nicely and Chuck gave us a little recognition on that which is great.

 

Robert Berkeley  33:56  

That's very nice of me obviously approves of what you're doing. If any listeners to Inside Jobs  inside jobs careers want to get in touch with you, what's the best way to do that? your social media guy? Yeah, my LinkedIn, LinkedIn profile be the best way probably. Chris bachik,. I really want to thank you for all that background on your career and Charles Schwab and how you operate there. And look forward to meeting you perhaps in November in Boston again, are you coming to the event there? is Robert.

 

Chris Batchik  34:23  

Yes, Robert, I really appreciate the time today I've been looking forward to talking to you and listening to the podcasts and I find them very interesting and helpful and I will see you in November in Boston. Look forward to

 

Robert Berkeley  34:33  

Look forward to thanks to Chris Batchik for taking part in Inside Jobs inside jobs and also Emily foster of IHAF  I have and my producer Prateek Srivastava prettier have asked her for making all of these things happen. Also Divya Chokra chakra at Express KCS for handling the podcast editing. If you do enjoy this podcast and I assume you do if you're still listening then please do yourself and do me a favour recommend us to a friend or if you get the chance to take a second post a comment and review it on iTunes. And also don't forget, you can find all the previous episodes listed on Inside Jobs inside jobs podcast.org and also there sign up to our exclusive listeners email. Anyway, thanks for listening and see you next time.