In Hong Kong, one of the major challenges facing marketing operations—beyond vague briefings—is the high turnover rate of personnel. It’s not uncommon for marketing managers to leave their roles within six months to a year. As a result, institutional knowledge and strategic learning are rarely retained, forcing teams to essentially start from scratch with each new project. This leads to repeated missteps and recurring issues. The lack of continuity also makes it difficult to build long-term trust and cooperative systems between companies and their agencies.
📋 Overcoming this challenge requires strong management practices. However, in reality, many organizations lack clear internal guidelines or structured knowledge management systems. Without these foundations, it becomes difficult to establish a productive, consistent working relationship between client and agency. It’s not unusual to see projects pivot drastically mid-course or for strategies to be reset entirely when a new staff member takes over—leading to fragmented marketing execution and diluted outcomes.
✨ That said, there are companies in Hong Kong that excel at briefing their agencies and maintaining effective collaboration. In many cases, this success is driven by strong leadership from a capable CMO who sets a clear strategic vision. In others, it stems from a company culture that views marketing not just as advertising, but as a fundamental process of building brand value. These organizations often foster a system-wide approach to marketing, aligning departments under a unified direction.
So, what does an ideal briefing look like? In our next issue, we’ll explore concrete examples of effective briefing practices. (To be continued)