The Chaiwalla Test

Nope. It's not about who you think it is about :) Even though the timing is suspect, I can assure you that it's a story worth introspecting about.

One of the large media companies in India engaged with an agency for their marketing and ad campaigns. The CEO of the media company looked at some of the banners created and wasn't impressed. He called the responsible person from the agency and suggested involving a good freelancer he personally knew. The person from the agency did some probing to find out which specific campaign the CEO was referring to. When he was able to get to the specifics, he asked the CEO - did you know that this was our 8th iteration? And the marketing team shot down the first 7 designs. And the CEO asked to see the designs. And he liked the ones that were created before. So he asked the agency person which design he liked, and was told that it was the first design that would be most effective. And the CEO agreed. Now the CEO called the marketing head and asked or an explanation. Sure enough, the marketing head gave reasons as to why the team was looking for a design that had more mass appeal. Which is when the the CEO laid out all 8 designs and called the - yeah - chaiwalla (tea seller) of the company. He asked the chaiwalla which design impressed him and whadyaknow, he picked the first design!

What do you learn from this story? Who is your Chaiwalla? Have you tested your assumptions with your Chaiwalla? (Maybe the Chaiwalla is a better bet. Wink, wink!)

This entire story can be heard (along with some more insightful lessons) from the Sponge podcast series from IVM. Definitely worth listening to.