How to Build Remote Marketing Teams that Perform

Managing and building B2B marketing teams that are motivated, engaged, and deliver good results are crucial in any organization, but this comes with a different set of challenges when that team is remote and working almost entirely online. In this week’s episode, we talk to marketing expert Briannah Fisher (Marketing Director, Moola Inc.) about how she has addressed these challenges and what it takes to build a strong remote marketing team. She also discusses the importance of having the right systems and processes in place, why checking in with team members regularly is crucial, and how embracing and implementing the right digital tools is vital to ensure efficiency.

https://youtu.be/Hoj-ILy4Rwo

Topics discussed in this episode:

• Briannah shared some of the challenges she faced in managing a remote marketing team and how she has overcome them [5:41]
  
• How to stay focused when work and life is combined. [23:49]
  
• Briannah explains why she disagrees with the idea that professionals don’t need management [27:11]
  
• Briannah’s advice: stop focusing on growth at all cost [30:44] and start having more meetings with purpose [31:08]
  

Companies & links mentioned in this episode:

• Briannah Fisher on LinkedIn 
  
• Moola Inc.
  
• Fellow
  

Click here to access the episode key takeaways.

SPEAKERS

Christian Klepp, Briannah Fisher

Christian Klepp  00:00

Welcome to B2B Marketers on a Mission, a podcast for B2B marketers that helps you to question the conventional, think differently, disrupt your industry, and take your marketing to new heights. Each week, we talk to B2B marketing experts who share inspirational stories, discuss their thoughts and trending topics, and provide useful marketing tips and recommendations. And now, here’s your host and co-founder of EINBLICK Consulting, Christian Klepp. All right, welcome, everyone, to this episode of the B2B Marketers on a Mission Podcast, where you get your weekly dose of B2B marketing insights. This is your host Christian Klepp. And today, I am joined by a special guest, who is on a critical mission to build effective remote marketing teams that are empowered, motivated, engaged, and who strive to deliver better results amidst a complex digital landscape. So coming to us from Vancouver, Canada, Briannah Fisher, welcome to the show.

Briannah Fisher  00:54

Thanks so much for having me, Christian. I’m so stoked to be here.

Christian Klepp  00:58

Yeah, no, it’s great to, as always, to be connected and have a conversation with you. So let’s just take it one notch up this time, right? All right. So off we go. Um, you know, Brianna, you’re currently the marketing director at a company called Moola Inc. And that’s a money saving app, among other things. And in this role, you are managing a team for both the B2B and B2C brands in the product portfolio across all levels of marketing strategy, operations, and the customer lifecycle. But for the sake of today’s discussion, and in the interest of time, let’s zero in on a specific topic that you’ve been spending clearly a lot of time and energy on – that’s managing and building marketing teams that perform and deliver good results. Isn’t that nice? So talk to us about the importance of building a strong and motivated team that is remote and mostly working online. And that is by no means a small feat.

Briannah Fisher  01:53

No, no, it sure isn’t. And I think that really, teams around the world, obviously, through the, you know, the pandemic and whatnot have had varying degrees of success, ultimately, and in creating, or pivoting, perhaps an in person, you know, in house team into a dispersed workforce, ultimately, that could be located from anywhere, so the importance of building resilience and motivation in in online teams is really paramount. Because you can spend, like, you can spend your lifetime thinking about the best strategies or the best tactics to, to build audiences and to move you like to tell your brand story. But ultimately, you need people to make it happen. And you need those people to be on the same page, and you need them to be motivated to do a great job. And so that is why I’m most passionate about the management of marketing teams,  more than necessarily, that the processes and the policies and the strategies for making things happen, because it’s um, you know, without people, you can’t get good things to happen.

Christian Klepp  03:08

Yeah, no, absolutely. Absolutely. And, you know, so here’s an interesting thought for you, Brianna, like, as the world has, probably in the past year or so, a vast majority of companies have shifted online. And you know, you keep hearing these, these buzzwords, digitalization and remote teams come on, let’s, let’s say by you know, by faith and hopefully through our own perseverance, so we finally get past this pandemic and it subsides, do you think that companies are, you know, like yours… Do you think you’re gonna revert back to normal and everyone’s gonna go back to an office? Or do you believe that remote, working remotely and online rather, is here to stay?

Briannah Fisher  03:49

I think it’s certainly here to stay, I wouldn’t say that that’s probably the method for a lot of companies, because ultimately, managing an online or remote workforce is fundamentally different to managing an in person, team, you know, it does require that you know, a number of things like that you’re able to trust your employees and colleagues to do what they say they’re going to do and be accountable to those things, as well as its, you know, like being able to ensure this sort of day to day running and the evolution of culture, and your team and in your company, as well. All of these things are impacted in some way, shape or form by having a remote team and not spending that face time together, which is that sort of natural kind of human connection moments, you know. But that said, though, there’s so many ways of engineering for one of a better term engineering, these sort of human connections and moments with online teams. But yeah, I think, you know, for us, we won’t probably be going back into the office on a full time basis, our working model will probably be some sort of hybrid approach or depending on what works best, and what, you know, how we can maximize everybody’s productivity, which is like the key, ultimately. And why we’re here.

Christian Klepp  05:11

Yeah, no, absolutely. And, you know, you touched on something, which is in the past couple of minutes, which is a great segue into the next question, because, you know, clearly, managing remote teams and managing the team in person, you know, there are, there are differences to that. And, you know, working remotely and working online is also fraught with challenges. So talk to us about some of these challenges that you faced in managing a remote marketing team and how you’ve overcome them.

Briannah Fisher  05:41

Yeah, you know, it’s, well, it’s a, it’s a learning process, right? Like, I’ve been managing remote teams for a long time before COVID. So I’ve been, you know, lucky to, in some senses already had some degree of understanding of what people do and what works best. But in terms of challenges, I think ultimately, the biggest challenge is for myself, as it has been for everybody else, you know, has been finding a work life balance has been one big challenge. And that’s something that really gets impacted by remote work is because now we’re working from home, like provided you’re working from home when you work out of the office. But that then, the impact of that is that people then have this blurring right between your personal life and your work life. And that in turn means your personal self, like who you are outside of work, and who you are at work, it all, like, you know, coalesces together. And that can be a really interesting challenge, not only for, you know, how it impacts your work, and, but also how it impacts yourself. And for me, you know, like, being a manager of teams, and someone who’s really interested in their performance, you can’t ignore that, that people are people, and that people live people lives, and they do work things people do. And you know, like, when you’re working from home, so you know, like, you have to use different tactics and practices and different ways of thinking and working and managing that accommodate and build empathy and understanding for people and meet them where they are.

Christian Klepp  07:18

That was a great answer. And, you know, clearly, you’ve seen some of this before, it’s no easy feat, it was going back to something I said earlier, about keeping employees engaged and motivated, despite not being able to see each other in person, right? So there’s that communication aspect of it, like you said, checking on each other regularly and whatnot.

Briannah Fisher  07:37

Yeah, absolutely, you have to. You have to engineer those moments, too. Because it’s not only like this, I’m gonna say the standard, like team meetings, and all of those things where you’re, you see each other, and sometimes people might have their cameras on, or sometimes they might have them off. Or you might have a policy where you require people in your workplace to have their cameras on while they’re in meetings, or, you know, like, all of these sort of things. And it certainly does like, it takes time understanding and commitment ultimately to, to accept and embrace and help people work through so that they can bring their best selves to work. And ultimately, you know, like, not feel like the stress and burden where it can be avoided.

Christian Klepp  08:28

Absolutely, absolutely. And I think this is something that we discussed at the last roundtable about the great resignation. And that’s something we’re gonna get back to in a minute. But before we do, let’s focus on the topic of, well, let’s just put it this way, you can’t really talk about remote marketing teams without bringing up technology, right? And they kind of go hand in hand. So you know, for the for the benefit of the audience. Let’s go and open up Brianna’s toolbox. Right? And can you talk to us about some of your go-to tech tools, you know, for managing your team and for implementing and managing all these respective marketing activities that you’re responsible for?

Briannah Fisher  09:08

Yeah, for sure. So in terms of my tech tool toolbox, because I am a fan of using not only technology but also sort of analog, like the standard sort of like pen and paper and just getting in there, post-it notes and, and all of those sort of things. So but ultimately, like Asana, like project management, and keeping communication lines open, I have a team that is dispersed not only in location, but also in time zones. So not only within Canada, but also internationally. So that you know, like Asana and making sure that we’re managing projects and keeping on top of what’s happening and where we’re at with things, as well as who’s doing what is um, is important not only for communication, but also to make meetings more efficient. Because I am not a fan of information sharing meetings. So I like to, to be able to have my team just update me in a sound going and check it out, see where we’re at, and then ask questions and explore problems and so on in our meetings, rather than just do the standard, like, Hey, give me an update type thing on where you’re at with this. The other ones, uh, you know, the standard, you know, Microsoft Teams, those sort of, you know, Zoom slash anything, and Google meet, like everything, and everything else. And then, yeah, the last one, the last one, I’ve tried a whole heap of meeting efficiency tools, and one of them was fellow, which I have really enjoyed. more so because it integrates with my calendar so that your to do list can kind of, you know, scooch on in there. Keep everything up to date. But yeah, that’s about… those are sort of my three kind of go-to’s, which isn’t, it’s not very fun. It’s not a very sexy toolbox. It’s just like a mundane one.

Christian Klepp  11:06

No, I mean, look, you know, the objective of the exercise here is not to have an exhaustive laundry list of technology. Right? And, you know, I’ve interviewed a couple of guests who are tech experts, and they all say the same thing. It’s not about the technology, really, per se. I mean, that certainly helps. But it’s also about the systems and processes you have in place, right? Because otherwise, if you don’t have that, you, you can, as they like to call it, you can add stuff to the pile, it’s still not gonna help you become better. In fact, it will add to the burden, right?

Briannah Fisher  11:36

Absolutely, absolutely. And there’s a ton of people that do get caught in that trap, you know, building out a tech stack, whether it’s for marketing operations, or whether it’s for a team management or anything else, you can end up having, like you basically, like you’re stacking laundry on top of each other, in some senses to use that sort of mommy like to sort of go to term, like, we’re just like creating a laundry chair type situation. And unless it’s folded and neat, and works well together, and you know, like, you can put it where it goes, then you’re you know, you’re otherwise just gonna have a mess.

Christian Klepp  12:09

Yeah, no, absolutely. Absolutely.

Hey, it’s Christian Klepp here. We’ll get back to the episode in a second. But first, is your brand struggling to cut through the noise? Are you trying to find more effective ways to reach your target audience and boost sales? Are you trying to pivot your business? If so, book a call with EINBLICK Consulting, our experienced consultants will work with you to help your B2B business to succeed and scale. Go to www.einblick.co for more information.  

You touched on a few of these already in the past couple of minutes. But I’d like to, I’d say gentleman a little bit further, if you will. So it’s, um, it was an article and there are many out there. But there’s an article that was published by HubSpot, and it provides several recommendations for building a remote marketing team. So just again, in the interest of time, I, let’s just talk about five key points. Right. And so the first one is creating an effective remote hiring and onboarding process. I think that one is probably paramount. Right. And to your point, scheduling and running effective, I think the key word in that sentence is effective virtual team meeting. So it’s not like what you know, the format that you mentioned before about like, Okay, give me an update that kind of reminds me of the old days in the agency where everybody comes with their brief and submits it to traffic and so forth, right?

Briannah Fisher  13:30

Yeah, yeah, yeah, 100%

Christian Klepp  13:33

Exactly. And the third one, which you also touched on, which is extremely important, not necessarily just from a professional perspective, but also from a more personal one, but checking in with your team members on a regular basis, right. So don’t wait until that monthly, you know, team meeting or that or that weekly team meeting, you know, you check in on them when you can, right. And embracing and implementing digital productivity tools. But you know, in this case, it’s not like, you know, get as many tools in there as you can. Get the get the ones that work for you. And that will that will help alleviate some of the, you know, some of the workload, right. And the other point that you also mentioned, being mindful of time zones, remote employee boundaries, and to a certain extent, especially if you’re dealing with team members in different geographies, there could be some cultural and linguistic differences as well.

Briannah Fisher  14:25

Yeah. yeah absolutely.

Christian Klepp  14:27

Yeah. So thoughts on the above anything that you’d like to add?

Briannah Fisher  14:31

I think, well, I agree. Like I have to say, I can’t not agree with them effective being the key word for running meetings. Like, I think, also that, you know, I agree with the power of checking in on people. I think that the fascinating impact of technology is that we can become removed from one another as humans, even though you right now are literally sitting in my lounge room. It’s interesting that, that we have this sort of disconnection right now that’s going on between each other, you know, between us all as professionals and that transcends and impacts us all in different ways. You know, we I’ve got staff members who have been, you know, managing children at home while at the same time of as working. They’ve been, you know, they’ve also had their partners beside them also working on totally different things, you know, because it’s really it would be an understatement to say that we don’t we haven’t been experiencing this sort of really dynamic time.

Christian Klepp  15:31

Are you talking about what’s going on in my house? (laugh)

Briannah Fisher  15:35

Not at all. Not at all. It’s just saying like I, I am that person, like, I think that has been a blessing and a curse, right? There’s people who we’ve seen that it’s starting with that wonderful clip of the BBC reporter who’s alive and his kids come into the room, you know, and they’re like, oh, you know, I made something, you know, we’ve all been there. You know, we’ve all done that now and…

Christian Klepp  16:00

The trivago CEO. Did you see that one?

Briannah Fisher  16:03

Yeah, and it’s just so it. In some, in some ways, it’s such a marvelous thing. Like, I think it’s ultimately such a marvelous thing, especially as a working mom, to have that sort of that element of acceptance, I want to say in a different way, like, I’m lucky that I work for an organization that is pretty open, like is open and welcoming of families. And I’ve never felt like, I needed to feel weird or awkward or, you know, apologize. So my children who often do come home in the middle of a meeting from school, and you know, like, all that sort of stuff like. And so there’s all of that sort of stuff, which is, I think, really again, what I would add to that HubSpot article is, is being prepared to meet people where they are, it’s not only a checking in thing, which is great. But I like I like to check in with my team members on like, one on ones every week, not only to ask them how they’re doing, but what was their highlight and their low light of the work week, you know, what, what’s the project that our team is working on, that they might like to be more involved in? Or what’s one that they’d like to do less of, you know, are they finding their work day? Is, is making their heart sing? Or is there something that we can do to optimize it for them, you know, like, so you know, that’s, I want to Asterix that to say that it’s not about opting out of things that are uncomfortable or difficult, it’s more about trying to make sure that we can build a system and a process and work together to support one another’s superpowers at work, rather than be like, I guess, have this expectation that that just because you’re not sitting in the office that you shouldn’t be delivering, or your you should be performing in a in a in the same way that you would be when you’re, when you’re sitting there, you know, surrounded by all your colleagues and, you know, doing the doing.

Christian Klepp  18:03

Yeah, absolutely. And I think, you know, some of the things that you’ve mentioned the past couple of minutes, I mean, they all obviously resonated with me, but I think it’s about like, leading with empathy, right? And you’ve seen them all over social media, but you know, these little cartoons about the difference between a boss and the leader. So how do you be more of the leader? And less of the boss? Right?

Briannah Fisher  18:23

It’s, it’s really interesting, because I think it starts with knowing yourself, right? Like, you know, I, when I first started in as a manager, like, when I was whatever, I don’t know, I think I might have been like, 19, or something, right. And, you know, I looked around me, and I thought that leadership meant to be the same as how the other managers were around me. And so I would behave the same, I would talk to my staff in the same way, and I would set tasks and manage people in the same way they were. Now they were really very authoritarian style leaders. And that didn’t mesh well with me. And I, subsequently wasn’t great at my job. Because I was, I didn’t know what fit for me. And I also didn’t listen to my own self and say, like, well, how can I be as the most effective? What can I do to make sure my team can be most effective, I was instead focusing on the task at hand, and what needed to be ticked off the list. And so I think ultimately, leading with empathy is about leading more from a people oriented approach. And that’s not to say that tasks don’t need to be done. But it’s to sort of take a look and understand where people are at what they’re doing. And again, like reorienting your leader, like your management or leadership style, depending on where you’re at and yourself and, and changing to be most effective for the people who you’re leading, rather than necessarily, you know, like for yourself in your own objectives. So that some people call that servant leadership, others, you know, can call it authentic leadership. And there’s a whole heap of different sort of leadership theories that come along with this. But ultimately, that’s what I’ve grown to become. Because that works best for me. And it works best for my teams. And I think it genuinely empowers people to perform at the best they can and then enable me to then be able to coach them hopefully beyond that. And just you know, like to make sure that they can do the best that they can for the organization and for our brand community.

Christian Klepp  20:28

Yeah, no, absolutely you, I think you did a great job of unpacking that so beautifully. But I have to, I feel I’m inclined to throw another question out at you. You know, speaking of having the right mindset, and, you know, especially when it comes to leadership, and also, it goes back to like, what’s the culture of the organization like, is there any company out there, you know, you would look at them and say that that’s a, that’s a role model? That’s somebody that you, that’s an organization that you are inspired by, and the way that they manage their teams and their people. And,

Briannah Fisher  21:05

Yeah, you know, I think it’s really interesting, because there’s always this… a bit like people, you know, like, there’s… brands that fundamentally operate in the same way, you know, like, there’s this external face that is projected out to the world. And it’s often, you know, very curated. And it takes a very brave brand to be really interested in a true  cocreation approach where they are like listening and responding to their audience and shaping who they are and what they do as a result of that. But then there’s the internal side. So to your point there about, you know, a company, you know, I feel like I’d want to say that a company like Patagonia would be sort of my kind of Pinnacle, for so many different reasons. But I’m really…

Christian Klepp  21:50

You are definitely not the first one to say that,

Briannah Fisher  21:54

Yeah. I bet! That’s the thing. I’m like, Oh, I wish I could come up with one that’s, like, obscure and somehow different. But no, you know, like, I think that, where there are market leaders who who hold true to their values, and who express those values, not only throughout their organization, but also externally to their brand community. That’s a really brave thing. I think in the world, even though we all say in marketing, of course, and we all know that, you know, you’ve got to speak to somebody, otherwise, you’re speaking to nobody. And you know, you’ve got to find your target audience. And I’m 100% believer in that. But it does still take a brave brand to double down on that, and to say, you know, I really own that space. And so, you know what, this is what we’re going to do, and this is what we’re going to stick to and in Patagonia’s case, you know, they’re 1% for the planet and all of these wonderful programs that they have that reinforce their brand values, to me that’s superb. But you know, that said, though, I have equally never heard of somebody within Patagonia go, Oh, my God, this is the worst organization I’ve ever worked with, or, you know, bullying is rife, or anything like that, because I certainly haven’t, you know, so to that extent, you know, they obviously, do a great job of not only building a sustainable brand in the environmental sense, but a sustainable brand in the people sense too, which is just as important, in my view that, you know, it’s not only people environment, but also culture that really creates a great organization.

Christian Klepp  23:28

Yeah, no, that’s absolutely right. That’s absolutely right. You, you’ve alluded to it earlier in the conversation, but what is one of the biggest challenges you know, from your perspective, that your area of expertise, so managing remote marketing teams, what’s one of the biggest challenges you think people like yourself are facing today?

Briannah Fisher  23:49

Yeah, you know, well, there’s a lot I think, ultimately, everyone has a lot, ya know, public enemy number one is really focus. I think ultimately, and I mean that in a lot of different ways, it’s not only you know, we live in an environment now where our work and our life like our work selves, and our personal selves are really kind of combined, which is great from a sustainability perspective and being able to do your best work when it suits you and when you’re feeling most productive. But you know, focus though is a really interesting thing because it’s not only like as a manager of a marketing team, what I when I think about focus what I think about is managing up ultimately and being able to protect your team from you know, I’m going to say like the random thought bubbles of somebody who like today they’ve rolled out of bed and they decided that we need a let’s say an ABM strategy or something when yesterday we were working on you know, a one to you know, like some sort of like one to many style approach or we were doing a mass market type situation and now we’re just going to pivot on a dime to to something entirely new and different. And so for me, that’s what focus, the importance of focus really comes down to is being able to say, you know, say as many or I guess many more NO’s than what you’d say yes to which, you know, that is a superpower in itself. I think my VP has a funny analogy that she uses. And she says that, like marketing teams are like driving around a big pickup truck. And it’s her job to throw as many things out as, as my job is to throw them in. Yeah.

Christian Klepp  25:32

That’s a good one.

Briannah Fisher  25:35

Yeah, you know, I think it’s fantastic. And I often think about it, you know, and certainly, in managing a remote team, you know, you only have this connection through a screen as we’ve already spoken about, right. So, you know, we’re all driving a pickup truck, but instead, what we’re kind of doing right now is dumping all the stuff at the pickup truck out at in people’s homes, right, and your employees homes and in your own home, and like, all of this stuff, and so that’s where you know, like focus and, and building in your own systems and processes to manage your work and find your focus and find where you can be most effective is what I’m what I think is really important.

Christian Klepp  26:15

Find your inner strength as they say.

Briannah Fisher  26:19

Yeah. You know, there’s so many people who love the idea of, say, going for a walk around the block before they start work just as a, let’s say, a makeshift commute, just for the purpose of being able to, you know, clear their mind and get into the workday sort of mindset, and, and so yeah, you know, it is very much find your focus, find your fit.

Christian Klepp  26:43

Fantastic, fantastic. Okay, this is where I’m gonna ask you to, like, get up on your soapbox a little bit, not that you’re gonna have a problem with that. (laugh) Okay, so here we go, um, a commonly held belief or a status quo? Do you have one in your area of expertise? And if yes, talk about it, and why you passionately disagree with it.

Briannah Fisher  27:11

Yeah, so a commonly held belief. Hmm, I think, you know, one of the things I think about most often is that, you know, again, that difference between a manager and a leader, and that’s something that I reflect on often, but there’s a few things that I that I think that get broken down in that that so a commonly held belief is ultimately that a manager is great when they get tasks done, when they achieve things, whereas a leader is someone who’s focused more on people. I, I think that that’s fantastic. And I agree with that. But what I also what I disagree with, though, is the idea that professionals don’t need management. And it’s, you know, we’ve all been in situations where, you know, to some extent, and I’ve been this, this manager, myself, throughout my career, as I’ve learned and grown, but where we’ve had a manager who hasn’t told us or provided some sort of barriers or expectations of what is required of you. And, you know, ultimately, we all need that to grow. Like, it’s no different to we need, you know, like the best creativity comes through constraints and working around that sort of stuff that as is innovation too, you know, we need to have, and understand thoroughly what we need to do to achieve, like… Sorry, what we need to achieve, we need to know what success looks like, and we need to have the tools to make that happen. And so, you know, like leaders and managers can, you know, sort of push against the idea and some even label it… can go as far as labeling it as like micromanagement to give some sort of boundary and guidance to your employees, but, or your colleagues. But ultimately, I think that’s, that’s part of creating a successful and high performing team.

Christian Klepp  29:04

Oh, absolutely. And I think, you know, to your point, you know, we’ve all had my micromanagers at some point, and then it goes back to like, asking yourself, why are they micromanaging you? And a big part of it is lack of trust, right? A lack of trust, a lack of the ability to empower the team, and you know, to be able to say, Okay, I will show you, I will coach you, but I’m not going to go and do the work for you. Right?

Briannah Fisher  29:31

Yeah, absolutely. There’s a whole heap of like, you know, when micromanaging gets really ingrained, and really, you know, intense, then it’s, it becomes a different thing, right, that’s then you know, it’s generally a symptom of a broader issue around, you know, this toxic work environment where not only is there a lack of trust in your team, but also in the organization. And there’s some sort of like, challenge or question about stability of your maybe your position or, you know, like there’s bigger issues at play, right. So that you feel like not only you can’t trust people, but that, that you can’t be yourself. So yeah, you know, I think there’s a few things there, right, like, around these things and creating optimum environments for people to to succeed.

Christian Klepp  30:19

That’s right. That’s absolutely right. OK, And just as a piece of advice you’d give to, I guess, other B2B marketers out there who are running remote marketing teams much like yourself, what is the one thing that you think they should start? And for goodness sakes, the one thing you should stop doing? (laugh)

Briannah Fisher  30:39

You know that come up with heaps for this Christian, I think that…

Christian Klepp  30:21

Just one.

Briannah Fisher  30:44

Just one, the one thing that I think people should stop doing is, is to really focus on growth at all costs, I think, you know, I have this real problem with organizations that think that you can just keep 10x -ing growth infinitely, without ensuring that you’re taking care of your people, and you’re, and you’re building the processes and systems within your organization to support ongoing, you know, to support growth and, and in a sustainable fashion. And then one thing I get, you know, get people to start doing this, maybe this is my own personal barrier to push, I don’t know, but it’s just to have more meetings with purpose, like to think about, the reason why you’re bringing people together. And generally, in the remote work day, you know, there’s a lot of reasons that you could bring people together, but you’ve got to find that balance between flow time, you know, I call flow states and enabling people to have focus time and all of that, and also the go time part where you’re trying to, you know, advance ideas or get planning done and, and brainstorm and do that. So thing that that naturally is important to bring people together for so yeah, you know, meeting focus, meeting purpose is really great. And I just would add one little thing to that is that if you do you have meetings in person, it’s awesome to start them try to start them like five minutes earlier so that people can have those opportunities to socialize in the remote environment because we all miss you know, I don’t know about you, I missed the old like kind of water cooler chat, seeing how people are going, like what’s happening with their families, you know, what, how is their study going like all of those subtle little things. And because we’re, you know, if you’re in a situation where you’re going from zoom meeting to zoom meeting, you’re going to miss out on all of that. And that’s ultimately what I think it means to be a professional, but also to be a human right? And that’s what we all are, at the end of the day.

Christian Klepp  32:51

Yeah, no, absolutely, absolutely. No, the one thing I miss is not the water cooler sessions, but I used to call them the prolonged coffee refilling rituals, or it just took a little bit longer to refill the coffee mug this time, alright. And that’s because, you know, like, you’re catching up with people, having conversations.

Briannah Fisher  33:10

That’s it. And you know, it’s funny, because from those sorts of things, and, and finding the willingness to take a break, which can be a big issue, you know, again, work life balance is a real challenge; can be a real challenge for people in the remote work environment. So and they can feel guilty. And all of these things are like doing the things that you would otherwise be doing if you’re in an office, right? Like, you can go and you would take, let’s say, you know, 15, 20 minutes, maybe even half an hour to do your coffee run, not only to reset yourself, but also for a lot of people like that’s where that best ideas can just happen to materialize. There’s a reason why shower thoughts are a thing you know (laugh), you know, you have to give yourself the space and the downtime too and that is all still part of the work day, even when you’re not sitting in you know, when you’re not sitting in an office in the city or something.

Christian Klepp  34:09

Yeah, no, that’s absolutely right. That’s absolutely right. Briannah, as expected, this is an incredible conversation so thank you so much for coming on. And please do us the honor and tell us a little bit about yourself and I’m going to be stating the obvious here but that is not a Vancouver accent. (laugh)

Briannah Fisher  34:29

No It sure isn’t. I do seek a stick out like to use an Australian saying I do stick out like a sore thumb here. I’m Australian. I come from just south of the Gold Coast a little tiny town called Burringbar which is you know, so hi do anyone from Burringbar, but you know who’ll be listening…are my mom and dad. (laugh) But I moved to Vancouver in March last year. So I’m one of those crazy people. I am a person who takes clear eyed risks. And, and so yeah, I moved to Vancouver in the start of the pandemic. And yeah, you know, it’s been a wild ride but I thoroughly enjoy the Canadian lifestyle and certainly living in Vancouver. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a place that has more natural beauty, so I’m very lucky to call here home now. So yeah, that’s… I otherwise I’m a mom of four and marketing director at a FinTech company. So things are pretty good here, but also pretty busy. So…

Christian Klepp  35:37

Busy is good, busy is good. And how do people out there, you know, how can they connect with you?

Briannah Fisher  35:43

Yeah, for sure. You know, feel free to reach out to me on LinkedIn, I always love to connect with people, the marketing community has always brought me such blessings. And also when I am I’m such a fan of having conversations with people. I love to hear what people are, you know, what, what you’re doing, what your ideas are, and what you think the future is for our industry. Because there’s nothing like a good conversation to sort of spark an idea or to, to think put you on a new trajectory. And so yeah, you know, absolutely reach out. I’d love to hear from you.

Christian Klepp  36:20

Fantastic. I mean, that’s what we’re all about here at this show, right? We’re trying to change the way people think about B2B marketing one conversation at a time. Right.

Briannah Fisher  36:21

That’s it.

Christian Klepp  36:30

Briannah thank you so much for coming on. And you know, it was a it was a really great session and I hope the listeners get a lot of value out of it. Take care, be safe, and um, talk to you soon.

Briannah Fisher  36:41

Yeah, awesome. Thanks so much again, Christian. Thanks.

Christian Klepp  36:43

Take care. Bye for now.

Thank you for joining us on this episode of the B2B Marketers on a Mission podcast. To learn more about what we do here at EINBLICK, please visit our website at www.einblick.co and be sure to subscribe to the show on iTunes or your favorite podcast player.