www.smart-tactics.com

I hadn't planned that my first post should be about Speak & Spell, but last week I was in contact via LinkedIn (www.linkedin.com) with my first ever boss - Irfan Salim. Irfan was always marked for success and after setting up Lotus (Lotus1-2-3 remember?) in Europe, he has gone on to lead many successful companies and now does the same living in San Francisco.

But back in 1981 he was the Marketing Manager for Texas Instruments Consumer products division in Bedford, England and he hired me fresh from university to be marketing product manager for Education Products. My portfolio included a few handheld calculator type games, plus the much more expensive Speak & Spell and its stable mates. And this lead to me becoming recording producer and editor of the English Speak & Spell.

I had joined Texas Instruments with a group of about 30 other graduates, and just like them I was told that for the next 2 years we wouldn't really have a an active role, but were to just aclimatise ourselves to the company. We'd be moved around to see how things worked. That's not how it was for me, I was put straight to work - and I liked it. But it was a challenge and I had to learn fast.

On my 2nd day I was given the Argos catalogue (a major customer) and asked to write all the descriptions for my products to go in the next issue. I was told a good description can raise sales by 25% and there were tight editorial guidelines. In my second week I had to script the TV advert for Speak & Spell.

Speak & Spell had been on sale for a year or so and had enjoyed moderate success, but there was a feeling that sales might have already peaked or that it was not going to keep selling for much longer.

After 3 weeks Irfan asked me "what are you going to do to make it sell for another year". (Don't forget I was still a raw recruit) I mumbled something about making it sound English and he agreed. 2 days later he came back and said "you've got $112,000 at your disposal, I need it in full production my April next". It took me a moment to work out what he was talking about. .... but so begun my journey to create the the 'English' Speak & Spell.