Matt Payne, Account Director
What’s your all-time favourite film quote?
Worrying is like a rocking chair, it gives you something to do, but doesn’t get you anywhere – Van Wilder. Obviously all my Stifmeister quotes are out.
Side story – I got asked who my hero was and why in a job interview when I was 23, the first person to pop in to my head was Stifler. Naturally, I panicked and then reeled off some mythical person who inspired me. No, I didn’t get that job…
How did you find yourself working at ROAST?
Unfortunately I was disadvantaged in the start of my career by being educated in to the world of search by Gareth. So after he departed for pastures new (when he joined digital agency STEAK – steak, pastures, sort of a pun) I managed to drag myself back to a reasonable standard as a search professional and remained in contact with Gaz. I came to Gaz for career advice, clearly not learning from my start in the working world, and he mentioned starting ROAST. I wanted to join a start-up and be part of growing something so when the time came, I met Bish (our CEO, Ollie Bishop), quit my old job and joined the ROAST family.
What’s the luckiest thing that’s ever happened to you?
I don’t think I’m a hugely lucky person, I mean, I’m still waiting on that lottery win – I feel this will be extra lucky as I’ll win without playing, apparently that increases the amount of luck required to win it but hey. Closest I can think of is I did overpay my student loan by 18 months allowing me to get a rebate from the government, nice to get some money back for once, that paid for a holiday to Sri Lanka to surprise my best mate after he had a tough year. I didn’t think I would have been able to afford it and so told him I couldn’t go, then got the money back, booked flights and accommodation and surprised him in resort. Was pretty stoked about that. Don’t know whether that counts as lucky but I feel lucky enough to be able to do stuff like that.
What skills do you need to thrive as an Account Director?
Be a problem solver. Talk solutions, not problems. No matter how much planning you do, something will always change or go wrong. AD’s are middle-people, we have to make the process as smooth as possible to deliver on goals and allow our teams the time to deliver great work.
Also, be able to explain complex things in a simple manner. Most clients employ us to be the experts and part of that is being able to explain complex things clearly and simply for all to understand. I always ask complex topics to be explained in a tweet to me, it distills the point to key elements and is usually straight to the point without anything overly technical.
If you had to quit your job and join a boyband, which boyband would you apply to first, and why?
My obvious answer is the Backstreet Boys based on a Google search that tells me they are the most popular of all time through record sales, I translate that to have the most female fans. If you’re going to join a boyband, I guess pick one where you are not the spade of the group and being English in an all American band will definitely get me my own niche.
If it’s for the love of the music, I reckon Michael Jackson and I would have smashed it in the Jackson 6 – I can’t replace anyone in it (apart from Jackie, Tito, Jermaine or Marlon) so I’ll add to it. I have zero musical talent, I mean, I can’t even play the triangle, so I feel Michael and I would probably have gone on to be a world famous dance duo.
