This week's idea
From a Senior Brand Planner friend of mine:
"Thinking dollars are worth more than doing dollars."
It's so simple and seemingly obvious, but for me it has quietly changed how I look at work - especially today with the rise of AI. Most of the industry is trained to prove their value through output. But the real value usually sits one layer above that.
Where people get this wrong
Most people read "thinking dollars" and feel guilty. They've spent a short time advising, offering judgement, and not producing anything tangible, so they overcorrect. They fall into scope creep and churn out more deliverables to compensate.
That's not the lesson.
The lesson is about holding the high ground and owning the thinking that determines what work should exist in the first place. There's a difference between producing outputs and shaping direction.
One is activity.
The other is leverage.
Storytime
In my first proper advertising job in London, I worked on a large global account. The kind where dozens of people across different teams were all contributing to the work, all over the globe.
My instinct back then was simple: "be incredibly fucking useful."
So I jumped into everything. I'd proactively help senior staff, share competitor analysis, flag articles the team might find useful, even do the odd job nobody else wanted. If there was work to be done, I did it.
I thought that's what made someone incredibly fucking useful.
Despite working harder than most people around me, I wasn't being pulled into the important conversations. The key strategic meetings. The new business pitch work.
I was being looped in once decisions had already been made…as a handler.
It was my job to a degree, but I knew I had more to offer.
One afternoon an Aussie Senior Planner gave me some blunt feedback after a meeting.
"Mate. You're great. But you look fucked doing all this busywork."
I pushed back. Told him how much work needed doing across the account.
He nodded, smiled, and said something I've never forgotten.
"You're focusing on doing dollars. The real value is in thinking dollars."
I realised that by constantly jumping into task-based work, I'd accidentally trained everyone to see me as someone who implements ideas rather than someone who leads.
So I changed my behaviour.
Instead of immediately producing work, I started diagnosing the real problem behind every brief. I'd challenge my own thinking before building anything. Write the narrative before touching the output.
I suddenly looked less busy. But my work and my impact improved dramatically. Clients trusted my judgement more, not just because I was getting things done, but because I was helping decide what was worth doing at all.
That's when it finally clicked.
"Thinking dollars are worth more than doing dollars."
Thanks for reading, and see you next week!
-Murph