• Most of us think of ambition as a personality trait – something you either have or don’t. Hugo frames ambition instead as a force that shapes decisions whether we examine it or not.
• Our industry has weathered ups and downs, from recessions to pandemics and near-constant disruption – and that pressure to pick yourself up and go again often means we never stop to ask ‘is this what I really want?’
• Many founders rush to execute before they’ve properly considered what it is they actually want, mistaking momentum for direction.
• Realising your ambition is fleeting: you hit a milestone, feel a brief moment of elation, then disconcertment sets in, and the search for the next target begins almost immediately.
• The value of ambition lies in the journey of getting there, not in the moment of passing through the door – which is why the question of ‘is this what I want’ is hard to consider. Stopping to examine the goal can feel like it threatens the very thing driving you forward.
• A better question is ‘what does better than yesterday actually look like?’ – and, crucially, am I the one driving this, or is a third party (industry norms, peers, inherited expectations) driving it for me?
• It’s worth asking what your goals relate to at this specific stage of your life – both in and outside work – rather than defaulting to whatever the next milestone should be.
• Ambition needs to be managed like endurance, not just fuelled – the marathon parallel is useful for pacing relentless effort rather than burning out chasing it.
• Many of us would have had very different careers had we asked these questions earlier.
• Stop and ask ‘what am I using this drive to create, and will it build a meaningful life for me?’ It’s not to be answered once, but revisited and adjusted continuously as life and work change.
• You can get in touch with Hugo at Magnetic North and buy the book here. 

Our next meeting is on Thursday 17 September at 1.30-3pm BST, and and will incorporate the launch of the DBA In Focus Report 2026 and the DBA’s Annual General Meeting

We’ll be joined by the Chair of the DBA Board, Nicola Tiffany from HMA, for the AGM and then Esther Carder, Partner at Moore Kingston Smith will take us through the key findings from this year’s In Focus Report, the most comprehensive benchmarking report exclusively for DBA Members.

If that sounds familiar, you’re absolutely not alone. But the good news? There’s plenty we can do about it. And the agencies who get this right aren’t doing more. They’re just doing things they can keep doing. That’s a much more achievable bar than it sometimes feels.

I’ll never stop making the point that agency marketing isn’t something you switch on when revenue dips. It’s never too early to begin, and it’s not something that should stop. It needs to be the engine that runs quietly in the background, year-round, identifying new relationships, building awareness, starting conversations, demonstrating your value. It’s how you make sure that when a prospect reaches their point of need, which might be next month, next year, or three years from now, your agency is already on their list.

There’s a related point worth highlighting. The data from the DBA In Focus Report shows the average agency now generates around three-quarters of its income from existing clients. That’s a wonderful testament to the work you do. It’s also a quiet vulnerability. A reliable base built from a small number of relationships is a lovely thing right up until one of those relationships ends. Gentle, consistent marketing activity is how you stay ahead of that risk, by making sure new relationships are always being built somewhere in the background.

And here’s where it gets genuinely exciting. What “sustainable marketing” looks like has shifted in the last few years, and the shift is good news for agencies. The traditional model of the lone agency principal posting opinion pieces into the LinkedIn void is getting harder to cut through. It’s also exhausting, and most of the people I work with quietly admit they hate doing it.

What’s working better, for a lot of agencies, is more collaborative.

Co-created content. Rather than positioning yourself as the lone expert, convene the conversation. Interview the people your prospects respect. Host the discussion your sector isn’t having. Authority by association is a very different thing, and often a more effective one, than authority by assertion.

Partner marketing. Teaming up with adjacent specialists, perhaps a strategy consultancy, a developer, a PR partner, a researcher, to create something useful together. A panel, a piece of research, a guide, a roundtable. You share the audience, share the load, and you both look more credible by association.

And lastly…

Newsletters. “But no-one reads them!” I hear you cry! And yet, as reported in Up To The Light’s ‘What Clients Think’ Report published earlier this year, 70% of clients expect their agency to produce some sort of regular newsletter or update. 

None of this requires you to be the loudest voice in the room. It just requires you to be a useful presence in the rooms that matter to your prospects.

A few things to bear in mind as you think about your own approach.

Be honest about what you’ll actually keep doing. A monthly article you’ll abandon after four months is worth less than a quarterly piece of co-created content you’ll still be producing in two years. Smaller and sustainable beats bigger and burned out, every time.

Measure the right things. Network growth, conversations started, relationships warmed. These are the early indicators that matter. Don’t be too quick to write off an activity just because it didn’t produce a brief in the first month. That’s not what it’s for.

Most of all, try to enjoy it. Looking after the business, and that includes your marketing, isn’t a distraction from the creative work. It’s what protects it, and creates the conditions for it to thrive.

If you’d like some help thinking this through for your own agency, I’m running the DBA’s Marketing your Design Business course online across three 90-minute sessions on 22, 24 & 29 September. We’ll get into the smart, sustainable ways design agencies are building authority and starting the right conversations right now. I’d love to see you there.

For more tips on how to build your pipeline, head here. 

Catapults and Research and Technology Organisations were initially set up to help innovators from universities and private sector SMEs to navigate the pipeline from the first stage of frontier research and invention, through commercialisation and early-stage business development to adoption and diffusion. But Catapults and RTOs have grown to a point where their offer is duplicating existing services that are delivered commercially, at the expense of industrial design consultancies. 

Duplicating this already available market offer at a much higher cost (albeit billed to the taxpayer) and often to an inferior standard, the individual or SME consumer has no other choice than to work with them. Why? Because in the past, SMEs which did not have the budget for product development were able to draw on EU funding or SMART awards to enable them to work with industrial design consultancies. This funding has gone and left the Catapults and RTOs to dominate the space with no choice of provider for the SME.  

The consequence is direct and measurable.

Industrial design consultancies are losing work, not because they cannot compete on quality or expertise, but because they cannot compete with organisations which are having their costs met from public funds. 

Industrial design consultancies are the development layer of R&D, effectively the ‘D’ that turns the ‘R’ into economic output. They help to take outputs from research and translate them into manufacturable, market-ready products through user research, concept development, prototyping, engineering for manufacture, regulatory compliance and route-to-market support. They are the mechanism for translating innovation into commercial and investable activity across business. 

We are not seeking to protect them from competition, we are lobbying for a model that delivers real innovation support for businesses whilst creating the conditions for a sustainable commercial design sector to thrive alongside it. Displacing industrial design consultancies does not strengthen the innovation ecosystem; it hollows out one of its most critical components. 

What is the Global Talent Visa?

• The Global Talent visa is available for talented and promising individuals from the fields of science, engineering, medicine and humanities, digital technology and arts and culture, who wish to continue their professional career in the UK.
• The visa allows you to live and work in the UK for up to five years, and you can extend the visa after this period, or apply for settlement.

There are two routes available for people with different levels of experience. You must choose which of these routes is most appropriate for your current stage of career when you apply:

• Exceptional Talent is for people who have a substantial track record of working regularly as a professional in the last five years, and who are widely recognised as being current leaders or experts in their field.
• Exceptional Promise is for people who have a developing track record of working as a professional in the last five years, and who are recognised as being future leaders or experts in their field.

The Arts Council is the chosen endorsing body for arts and culture applications.

They assess applications from professional artists and arts practitioners who work in the following areas of practice of Combined Arts, Dance, Literature, Music, Theatre and Visual Arts. Please see The Arts Council Guide for Global Talent visa applicants for more details on the above areas of practice.

Those who work in the Film, Television, Animation, Postproduction and Visual Effects industries can also apply, and so can Fashion designers and Architects. From 1 July 2026 individuals working in specific fields of Design can apply – please see the supported disciplines guidance for Design applicants for more details.

The Arts Council is not an expert organisation in these areas, so they ask the following organisations to assess these applications for them:

• Applications from people working in the Design field are assessed by the Design Business Association (DBA)
• Film, Television, Animation, Postproduction and Visual Effects applications are assessed by the Producers’ Alliance for Film and Television (PACT)
• Applications from Fashion designers are assessed by the British Fashion Council (BFC)
• Applications from Architects are assessed by The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA)

How do people working in the Design field apply?

• All applications are submitted to the UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI) service via the UK website, and they send your application to the Arts Council and their recognised expert organisation in Design, the DBA, to assess. 
• Following the assessment, our decision is sent back to UKVI, who will tell you whether your application was successful or not. 
• At all times you will communicate with UKVI about your application, so you do not need to send anything directly to us or contact us for your decision.

Apply on this link: https://www.gov.uk/global-talent

You can find further information on these links:

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/immigration-rules/immigration-rules-appendix-global-talent

https://www.gov.uk/global-talent-arts-culture/design-industry

https://www.artscouncil.org.uk/global-talent-visa/global-talent-visa-guidance#t-in-page-nav-12

• The latest graduate pool is entering a challenging landscape – periods of stagnant economic growth paired with the take-off of AI – is it any wonder there are less openings for juniors in the industry.
• This drop in the number of junior hires has been pronounced since 2022. A recent report from LSE has found that the main reason behind this is likely the propensity of workers in the UK to work from home, rather than the arrival of generative AI in the same period. The report found the timing of the two is coincidental rather than causal.
• This is a good news story, because WFH is a management issue, rather than proof new technology is taking junior jobs. 
• With the share of paid workdays carried out from home now more than three times pre-Covid levels, what can we do as an industry to make sure we’re developing the junior talent that will be the seniors of tomorrow?
• How can we design our working together days to better develop our junior teams?
• This isn’t to say that we want staff back five days a week in the office – flexibility has seen diversity increase, especially among new mothers and disabled workers – but we do need to support juniors learning and absorbing the micro conversations about the work that put that extra shine on what we can do in person vs what we do over Slack. It’s hard to replicate the contextual information that only really passes face to face.
• Before mandating a return to the office, check the small print: what do contracts and any staff handbooks say, and how did the WFH arrangement arise in the first place? Even where hybrid working was never formally agreed, a consistent pattern over time can create an implied contractual right, so treat this as a legal question, not just a management preference.
• Any change needs a clear business rationale, genuine consultation, and express agreement from staff, and whatever policy you land on must be applied consistently across the board to avoid discrimination claims, particularly given the impact flexible working has had on participation among new mothers and disabled employees. For more legal advice, make use of the DBA’s legal helpline with HK law – find out more.
• We must welcome graduates in, keep enthusiasm for the sector alive. 
• More good news is that the fundamental skills of a designer endure: the tools and methods for getting there will keep changing, but knowing how to get there – the judgement, craft, beauty and taste – remains a constant.
• As does the importance of human agency. Use that human grit, charm, hustle – AI can’t replace all of that. Sound advice to those graduating this year. 
• For more from Kevin, check out his LinkedIn.

Our next meeting is on Tuesday 4 August at 1.30-2.30 BST, as our Scottish members have a Bank Holiday on the Monday.

We’ll be joined by author Hugo Brooks as we look at ambition and redefining success for a restless age. This will be of particular interest to those contemplating the next chapter in their already successful careers. 

It’s easy to see why. We have a vibrant media in our own industry. Press such as Creative Review, Creative Bloq, Design Week, or It’s Nice That, podcasts like Design Matters or My Life in Design, conferences like AIGA, OFFF, D&AD, The Design Effect, and awards schemes like the DBA Design Effectiveness, D&AD, and the Clios all offer excellent opportunities for creative agencies to reach new people and grow their reputations within the creative industry.

However, the business media has a far greater reach. Fast Company attracts 7.8 million unique visitors every month. Forbes towers over that with 150 million monthly visitors. Even behind a paywall, the Financial Times commands 1.3 million daily readers. The sheer volume ensures you reach a vast, untapped audience.

But the value goes far beyond numbers. Over 70% of Financial Times readers are business decision-makers, boasting an average household income of over $330,000. When we analysed the social media habits of CMOs at the world’s 250 biggest brands, a clear pattern emerged: they follow top-tier business titles like Fast Company, Forbes, and the FT, alongside the leading trade publications in their specific sectors.

Business media delivers the right audience, but its most profound benefit is the credibility it confers. Only genuine authorities and experts get quoted in those pages. Pitch decks featuring logos and article clippings from these outlets perform better. Clients trust agencies whose leaders are recognised by respected journalists.

Consistently appearing in the business media grows an agency’s reputation, fills its talent and client pipeline and, most importantly, drives value into its brand.

Unsurprisingly, getting featured in these publications is tough. Competition is fierce, and journalists receive hundreds of pitches every day. To stand out, you need to master three key areas.

Stories, Contacts, and Media Skills

First, you must offer stories that journalists actually want to publish. Winning pitches typically share five qualities:

• They are fresh: No journalist wants to publish a rehash of common knowledge. Bring a new perspective, tie into a breaking news event, or challenge an industry norm.

• They are relevant: What will the reader gain? If your story does not introduce a new concept or help them do their jobs better, journalists will pass.

• They are evidence-based: You can say whatever you want on your personal blog, but top-tier publications require hard facts rooted in real-world context. Think about what you can uniquely draw on. Does your agency research and publish sector specific insights? Are you entering evidence-based award schemes such as the DBA Design Effectiveness Awards? Use the data you’ve compiled.

• They are timely: Give the editor a compelling reason to publish the piece right now.

• They are actionable: Do not just explain how the world works. Give readers practical advice on what to do about it.

Second, you need the right contacts. You have to know which journalist covers which beat and how they prefer to receive pitches. As you consistently send high-quality stories, they will start opening your emails. Remember to look beyond the massive mainstream titles. Every industry has a highly respected niche publication. Targeting these sector-specific magazines is often just as valuable as chasing a feature in Forbes.

Third, you must be able to deliver. If a journalist wants to interview you, you need the media training to handle the conversation smoothly. Give them the soundbites they need while seamlessly landing your key messages. If they ask you to write a guest column, you need to know how to structure your argument like a professional business journalist.

The Discoverability Imperative

As we move further into a new era of search, the rules of visibility are changing. Clients increasingly turn to Large Language Models (LLMs) like Claude or ChatGPT for agency recommendations. To win this new game, we must appeal to machines just as much as humans. These AI systems draw their answers from highly trusted sources like widely read, credible media outlets.

Ultimately, earning your place in the business press creates a powerful flywheel. It delivers the massive reach you need to find new audiences, the unquestionable credibility required to win their trust, and the digital footprint necessary to ensure the next generation of AI search engines can find you. Stop talking exclusively to your peers. Step out of the echo chamber, claim your space in the publications that matter, and watch your agency reach its next level of growth.

6 April 2026 came and went. Most agency founders I’ve spoken to since made some changes; updated their contracts, amended a policy or two, ticked a few boxes. What far fewer have done is thought about what actually needs to change in how they manage their people day to day.

That gap is where the risk sits.

I work with a lot of small and medium-sized agencies. The people challenges in this sector are particular. Founders who are also the creative director. Studio managers doubling up as line managers. No dedicated HR function. Good instincts about people, but not always the processes to back those instincts up. The Employment Rights Act changes make that combination more exposed than it used to be.

Here’s what I’d focus on, and why.

Statutory sick pay from day one

The three-day waiting period has gone.

Statutory Sick Pay (SSP) now applies from the first day of absence, and the lower earnings threshold has been removed too.

The cost of SSP itself isn’t usually the issue for agencies. What changes is that absence patterns surface faster and need to be managed differently. Without a clear, consistent approach to return-to-work conversations, documentation, and some structure around what you expect, short-term absence can quietly become a bigger problem. Most agencies handle this by feel. That’s worked reasonably well until now. It’s a riskier approach going forward.

Flexible working as a day-one right

Previously, an employee needed 26 weeks of service before they could make a flexible working request. That qualifying period has gone.

You don’t have to grant every request – there are still legitimate grounds to decline. But you do need a process for considering requests consistently, and that process needs to apply across your whole team. For agencies with studio-based ways of working or genuinely client-facing roles, there are usually good grounds for managing this carefully. What creates exposure is different people being treated differently without a clear rationale. That’s where disputes tend to come from.

Day-one parental rights

Paternity and parental leave rights now apply from the first day of employment. No qualifying period.

For a small team, losing a senior designer or a project lead to parental leave, even briefly and even when planned, has a real impact on delivery. It’s worth thinking about how you’d handle that before you’re in the middle of a project and having to figure it out under pressure.

The probation change that most people haven't fully absorbed

The unfair dismissal qualifying period reduces from two years to six months on 1 January 2027. But the effective date for your business is sooner than that. Anyone you hire from 1 July 2026 will already have six months’ service when the law changes which means the practical deadline isn’t January 2027. It’s now.

I’d ask you to sit with that for a moment.

When this comes in, the window for dealing with a situation informally and without significant legal exposure will be much shorter. By the time someone has been with you for six months, they will have substantially the same employment protections as a long-serving member of your team.

Probation in most small agencies is treated as a formality; a six-month period that passes, a conversation at the end of it, and then things continue. That approach needs to change before January. Not because you need to become bureaucratic, but because if a situation becomes difficult, what protects you is evidence of a fair process. Regular structured check-ins. Expectations set clearly from the start. Feedback documented, not just given verbally. A genuine opportunity to improve if performance isn’t where it needs to be.

In agency culture, the instinct is usually to avoid those conversations until something is already complicated. That’s a much harder position to manage from and a riskier one under the new rules.

Your duty to prevent sexual harassment

Since October 2024, employers have been under a legal duty to take proactive, reasonable steps to prevent sexual harassment in the workplace. This came in under the Worker Protection (Amendment of Equality Act 2010) Act 2023 and it applies to every employer regardless of size.

The shift matters. Previously the law focused on responding to harassment after it happened. Now employers have to actively work to prevent it before it occurs. If an employee makes a successful harassment claim and a tribunal finds you failed in this duty, compensation can be increased by up to 25%. The Equality and Human Rights Commission can also take enforcement action directly.

For agencies there are two things worth attending to. The first is clear internal policies, a genuine process for raising concerns, and manager training that goes beyond a tick-box exercise.

The second is specific to how design agencies work. From October 2026, the duty extends to third-party harassment meaning employers will be liable if a client, visitor or anyone else working with your team harasses a member of your staff and you haven’t taken all reasonable steps to prevent it. For agencies where client relationships are central to how you operate, this is worth thinking about properly. Having a clear protocol for what happens if a client behaves inappropriately toward a member of your team isn’t just good practice, from October 2026 it will be a legal requirement.

If you haven’t reviewed your approach to this since October 2024, now is the time.

Where to focus now

If you’re running a smaller agency without a dedicated HR function, I’d start with three things:

• Check your employment contracts are up to date and reflect the current legal position.
• Look at your probation process honestly and ask whether it would stand up if it was tested.
• And make sure that whoever handles people in your business, even if that’s you, has the language and confidence to have difficult conversations early rather than late.

If you’re a larger agency with an HR function, the priority is consistency. Your managers need to understand what’s changed and what’s now expected of them. Documentation is essential, as well as a consistent approach across teams, otherwise this is where your exposure will be if something goes wrong.

None of this is complicated to get right. It just needs some attention now before you’re dealing with a situation you’d rather not be in.