Step Change

proper noun | stɛp/tʃeɪn(d)ʒ

Definition: a magical place full of vibrant, curious characters.

“I tumbled down the rabbit hole and arrived at Step Change.”

Okay, perhaps life at Step Change isn’t quite as surreal as Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, but it’s certainly a colourful, quirky place.

Come with me — I’ll show you.

A Day in the Life of a Stepper

Morning: The day starts with a ride in a glass elevator. (A little less ‘Alice’, a little more ‘Charlie’.) 

Upon entering the office, a large shark looms in the background…

Wait, what?

Yes, a large, colourful mural with a pink shark covers the back wall of the office. (We’re predatory marketers. Get it?)

Midmorning: A swift stand-up meeting is held in the Boardroom. Creative thinkers, Graphic Designers, Strategists, and Change Agents stand around the table together. Announcements are made. Achievements are recognised. Ashton fires everyone up! Applause erupts. 

Pre-lunch: Several clients arrive for one of Step Change’s unique strategy sessions. Hands are shaken, welcomes are made, and brainstorming begins.

The Boardroom is slowly transformed into a cavern of colourful Post-It notes and butcher’s paper bearing handwritten ideas and jaw-dropping insights.

Creativity flows, and inspiration abounds. (And more caffeine is consumed.)

Okay, that was a strategy session in a nutshell. I’ll go into a little more detail for you:

We combine creative ideas with strategic thinking. Because great creative concepts are only half the story — they need to be connected to a strong strategy in order to cut through the world’s marketing and advertising noise. (Did you know that the average Australian sees 3,000 branded messages every day?)

“I’ve met more CEOs in the last three years than I even thought existed.”

— David “Seagull“ Siegel, Strategy Executive at Step Change

Lunch: Several Steppers step away from their laptops and bounce into one of the meeting rooms. Stories are swapped over steaming hot bowls of ramen and bottles of coconut water. Adam (or ‘Stones’*) shows everyone his latest gadget — an intriguing, slightly confusing labyrinthine puzzle involving a ball in a sphere. Everyone ooooohs.

*Everyone at Step Change gets a nickname. ‘Stones’ literally jumped on stage and begged for a job in front of 200 people. The nickname comes from the Chutzpah.

Midafternoon: The Boardroom’s strategy session ends with high-fives all round. The clients depart with smiles on their faces. Clare slips into the kitchen, and the popcorn maker starts to whir.

Late afternoon: Desks are dotted with mugs of green tea and bowls of buttery popcorn. Bright ideas are met with creative revelations. New logos are finalised, fresh content is written, websites are tinkered with, and taglines are perfected.

Evening: The day ends with a final flight down the glass elevator. Steppers emerge onto Sydney’s busy streets one by one, satisfied with another day well done. Some scoot off to yoga classes; others skip towards the train station.

End of day. Sounds good, eh? Let’s delve a little deeper.

The Step Change Purpose

The Step Change purpose is to help challenger businesses outsmart their competitors. That means we work with the upstarts, the rising stars, the Davids rather than the Goliaths.

We challenge the norm, take the road less travelled, and create games worth playing.  

We’re thinkers, creators, and troublemakers. (Just kidding.) We help companies break through the noise with cut-through strategy and kick-ass creative. (’Scuse my French.)

Brands we’ve worked with include:

Strategy, from retail to wealth to B2B

$202mil uplift in sales, delivered 10 times ROI

Grew from $30mil to $100mil+ in 3 years

Highest monthly sales in six generations

Changing the way care is delivered worldwide

Raised $8mil venture capital after our value proposition work

There at conception, working on concept, design, and direction

“Since the first day of joining the Step Change team, every day has been something completely different and exciting.”

— Marcus “Bob“ Petaccia, Graphic Designer at Step Change

Our Ways of Being

Life at Step Change is governed by 5 values, which we call our Ways of Being:

Everyone is encouraged to think about what each value means to them, and analyse whether or not there are areas they can improve on. 

It’s a very supportive environment; everyone is quick to offer assistance, and there’s no such thing as a dumb question.

Step Change in Action

In fact, our very first action point within Step Change in Action (which helps to guide our everyday goals and actions) describes Great Questions:

Whenever we liaise with a client, or spend time working on a project, or immerse ourselves in a new creative brief, we’re encouraged think about each individual action point.

We’re also encouraged to own our work.

What does that mean, exactly?

It means we should believe in what we create, understand the thinking behind it, and value the creative or strategic processes that got us there. 

Because, if we don’t believe in what we create, why should our clients?

“The hiring process was so stringent and challenging at every turn, that I had a sense of excitement. This was no ordinary place to work, and I wanted to be a part of it.”

— Roni “Yogi Bear“ Joukhador, Lead Change Agent at Step Change

Stump the Strategist

Another unique thing about Step Change is our Stump the Strategist events. On stage, our expert team of strategists face as many as 500 people — and the audience get to toss their curliest marketing questions at them, who will then create clever solutions within nine minutes or less. Then the audience gets to decide whether they’ve succeeded, or been stumped!

If this excites you, you can be joining the team on stage in as little as three months.

More Things That Are a Bit Unusual…

We work hard. And we like to reward ourselves too! In the office, we have a humble little Um Jar. Every time someone says “um” mid-conversation, the jar gets $1. (You quickly start to notice how often you say “um”.)

The Um Jar’s profits pay for out-of-office Um Nights — when we let our hair down, and paint the town red! And kick up our heels! And throw caution to the wind. And… (Too many metaphors? Yes. Far, far too many.)

Previous Um Nights have involved karaoke, paintball, and trampoline dodgeball.

And that’s life at Step Change. (Well, most of it. We’d need another two hours to tell you everything.)

So if that sounds like fun. Maybe you should see if we’re hiring?

‘Have I gone mad?’
‘I’m afraid so. You’re entirely bonkers.
But I’ll tell you a secret. All the best people are.’

— Lewis Carroll 

PS: If you’re reading this post-2016, our day no longer begins with a glass elevator. Now, we’re in a gloriously large office (it once belonged to Uber; now it’s ours) on the top floor of a warehouse building in the heart of Pyrmont. Even more magnificent, if I do say so myself.