From our latest agency leadership podcast episode: Digital marketing agencies RocketMill and PMG reveal how their merger strengthened organisational culture and team retention, moving beyond traditional ESG principles and riding the Gartner Hype Cycle of acquisition excitement.

When RocketMill transitioned from an employee-owned trust to joining global agency PMG, they achieved something remarkable, improved employee retention, even after team members received their acquisition payouts.

"We didn't need to do a deal we wanted to, so it wasn't a deal born out of necessity," says Tom. "We were clear with the team that it was about opportunity creation and career enabling, but the notion of career headroom drove the decision."

"For the first six months, I'm not sure we lost anyone." Tom explains. "I think that curiosity played a large part in it. I think an understanding of the shared vision played a large part in it. And I think the fact that genuinely people could see that if you look at the portfolio of clients that PMG have, they represent some of the most iconic brands in the world."

PMG demonstrated their company culture commitment through strategic change management: "The head of people within PMG moved to London for four or five months with her family to be here on the ground with our team, to be with our people so that they understood. To ensure that they were heard, to ensure cultural sensitivity - it was just a very human thing to do."

Discover more insights about successful agency acquisitions on the Happy Teams podcast.

Digital agency StrategIQ earned a spot on the Sunday Times Best Places to Work list. On Happy Teams, CEO Andy revealed their employee engagement strategy, drawing from business principles found in books like "Traction" from Gino Wickman and concepts like Maslow's hierarchy of needs.

"Every business has to have a strong training culture. Every business has to have a wellbeing culture. You have to have a strong leadership team, have to have clear values," he says. But after an unsuccessful application last year, they discovered gaps in their workplace culture: "We hadn't put enough time and effort into things like, the package that's sat around the wellbeing and additional stuff that I think employees expect now."

The agency implements innovative team development through personality profiling and motivational mapping. "It helps us understand how to communicate with people that are opposite to you," Andy explains. "There's no right or wrong. It's just, we are who we are. It doesn't mean to say I'm a good communicator or a bad communicator if I'm red, I'm green or blue or yellow."

This organisational transparency shapes their company culture. "Everyone's profile is visible to everyone in the company in our staff room. We have a massive wall up, all dedicated to insights and everyone's profile is plotted on the wall," Andy says. "The language is really ingrained. Everyone, when they join, gets their own profile."

The employee engagement approach succeeded, StrategIQ achieved their Sunday Times listing. But Andy acknowledges their workplace culture isn't universal: "Being as transparent as we are and being as ambitious as we are, what I guess I think I've realised is there is a certain type of person that can come into the agency and handle this level of transparency, handle this level of intense coaching."

Discover how to build an award-winning company culture on Happy Teams, where Andy shares StrategIQ's complete transformation story.

On this week's business leadership podcast, David shares how digital consultancy Red Badger transformed their workplace culture when the pandemic forced remote work adaptation.

As a remote work case study, Red Badger's team had to reimagine their organisational culture. Here's what David learned about maintaining team engagement and company culture in a hybrid workplace model.

"Pre-pandemic, we were very much about being in person. Pretty much 5 days a week and by and large being on client site with our clients," David says. "Getting the work done was not a problem."

However, the shift to remote working began impacting their employee experience: "We've always been a company that has tried to listen to what our employees want and what they think is valuable. We were going into the lockdown, we were thankfully pretty well prepared. We very quickly basically said to everyone, go and buy whatever you need to get set up at home... which is actually something we've kept now - if you join us, you get a thousand pounds working from your home budget to make sure that you've got a really good ergonomic setup at home."

Drawing inspiration from Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, Dan Pink's research-based book on motivation in creative industries, David explains the importance of purpose, autonomy and mastery for driving productivity, rather than traditional carrot-and-stick approaches.

Red Badger responded by implementing a hybrid work model through workplace transformation and employee feedback. "We got together as a company and reflected on what we want the culture to be now? And how do we achieve that?" David explains. "That wasn't for everybody. We definitely had a bit of churn in implementing that. But I've always believed in saying, let's make a decision for what's right for the business."

Discover more remote work strategies and company culture insights on the Happy Teams podcast.