In April 2022, when Gautam Regunath and PG Aditiya setup indie creative shop Talented, the duo told Storyboard18 that the world doesn’t need another advertising agency. According to them, what is needed is a serious re-imagination of the agency experience—both for clients and particularly for the talent working in advertising. “Working in advertising can and must feel better than it does now for a lot of us,” said Regunath.
Cut to July 2023. The agency is putting into practice whatever they said, believed, and wanted. Here’s how. Talented has released an open-sourced handbook which has work norms that are unheard of in ad agencies. In a press note, the agency stated that the handbook is the result of months of research, thoughtful debate, and serious introspection among 30 plus members of Talented’s founding team.
Regunath and Aditiya, the co-founders of Talented said, “The handbook is a user manual for anyone working at Talented. Why do we exist? What’s our role in the market? How do we work with others and with each other? How do we engage with the community? How do we give each other and the clients and partners who work with us the best agency experience of their lives? It’s also a nod to further our early ambitions to maximise transparency in how we work, lending to why we’ve decided to make this document public. We know that everything on here might not be perfect, but we believe it’s a great place to start. It’ll evolve as we go along. Expect a lot of vulnerability and a few stutters as we try all sorts of stuff while trying to get it right.”
“The handbook became a great way to share core values and help us build a workplace we can all be proud of,” added Priyanka Borah and Binaifer Dulani, spokespeople representing the contributing team at Talented. “While it is intended for anyone who joins Talented, we believe it can also be a guide for anyone who works in the creative field, or might be interested in but not know how to navigate the ways of this business. We encourage everyone in creative industries to borrow, critique and help us continue to build this playbook. After all, when has the creative industry not benefited from revisiting the basics?”
The indie agency’s open-sourced playbook has chapters featuring their best practices, including paid tests during interviews, no follow-ups culture, 3-day full and final settlement policy, 8 hours work rule, and more.