The demand for social media teams to become multi-skilled "Swiss Army knives" has created intense pressure to prove ROI, risking burnout and inauthentic content.
Tony Romain, VP of Brand Creative at Fuse Media, explains why these constraints can be a strategic advantage that fosters more authentic work through smaller teams and individual ownership.
Romain’s leadership philosophy centers on creating a "good trade," where employees gain creative ownership and portfolio-building experience in exchange for agility, and on prioritizing a single great idea over chasing algorithms.
Ultimately, he advises leaders to use AI as a tool to free up human potential and to listen to their youngest team members, who are the native speakers of modern media platforms.
The demands on marketing teams are growing once again. Today, success on social media might be one of the best ways to drive business results, but it's also more challenging than ever. While market saturation makes it difficult to stand out, audiences scatter across platforms. Now, proving direct ROI is a constant source of pressure for most marketing teams. In response, organizations are pushing their social specialists to become multi-skilled in-house teams that can juggle strategy, video, design, and copy all at once.
For an expert's take, we spoke to Tony Romain, Vice President of Brand Creative at Fuse Media and founder of the motion design studio Trance. With a career defined by his work shaping the identity of major media brands, including roles as a creative director for shows like Survivor and Shark Tank, Romain is all too familiar with the pressure facing modern creative teams. To manage the new demands on social teams, he recommends a framework built on ownership, authenticity, and strategic input.
"Smaller teams lead to faster, clearer decision-making because there's no time to overthink. From a creative standpoint, this gives individuals more ownership. When one person owns a project from beginning to end, their point of view shines through, and you get a product that's much more authentic," Romain said.
The trend toward smaller, multi-hat teams can be a strategic advantage, he continues. In fact, the very constraints that force teams to be leaner can also help them yield better results. When one person is responsible for a project from concept to completion, their personal stake in the outcome is naturally stronger, Romain explains.
Leading from the ladder: But asking employees to become a "Swiss Army knife" of creative talents also comes with a clear risk of burnout. Here, Romain leads by example, showing that no task is beneath his leadership. "I love getting my hands dirty. We did a live stream a couple of weeks ago, and I was on ladders hanging GoPro cameras. As a creative, I'm delighted to step away from making decks and actually make something. I try to show that if you have an idea, I'll go out and help you shoot it."
A worthy trade-off: To frame the shift as a forward-looking investment, Romain tells his team to create work that serves a dual purpose. "The arrangement has to be a good trade. In exchange for wearing multiple hats, I give my team creative ownership. My advice is always: do something that's great for the company, but also do something that's great for you personally. Make sure you're creating work that you can take with you, something that showcases your unique sensibility."
With an empowered team in place, the question becomes: what should they create? Faced with endless platform-specific "best practices," most feel overwhelmed before they even start. Here, Romain cautions against the futile chase of ever-changing algorithms. Instead, he suggests prioritizing a single, excellent idea and aiming for genuine connection.
The algorithm chase: Because best practices evolve so quickly, any effort to reverse-engineer them has a rapidly expiring shelf life, he explains. "Anyone who says they have the secret to mastering social media algorithms is kidding themselves. You can read a million 'best practices,' but they're often outdated within months. Trying to guess what platform engineers are doing is an exercise in diminishing returns. The only sustainable strategy is to focus on having a great idea."
Permission to be small: Instead of pursuing mass-market virality, he gives his team a more sustainable definition of success. "Most brands can't operate like Mr. Beast, who engineers every second of his content. It's an unfair standard to hold yourself to. Instead of chasing tens of millions of views, success should be redefined. If you can create an authentic connection with 10,000 people, or even 5,000, that is a success. It's a goal that's both meaningful and won't drive your team crazy."
At most organizations, the tension between brand voice and individual voice is growing. By striking the right balance, brands can build long-term audience trust, Romain says. Eventually, it could help them demonstrate the true ROI of authenticity.
Guardrails, not handcuffs: Give creators direction without stifling the voice that makes content feel human, Romain advises. "You need brand guardrails, but they have to be broad enough for interpretation. You can't strangle your creators by forcing them to repeat specific bullet points or by micromanaging every piece of copy. That's a losing proposition. The brand voice has to be interpreted in a way that feels natural, otherwise you just fall into corporate marketing-speak."
The uncanny valley: Audiences who have grown up immersed in digital marketing are highly sophisticated, Romain continues. "People under a certain age are experts in how sales and marketing work. They can smell inauthenticity a million miles away. This creates an 'uncanny valley' for content. Even when something is manufactured to look rough, you can tell when it's off. You have to be incredibly careful about how much official brand voice you inject."
In the human-centric model Romain described, technology like AI is reframed as a powerful partner. By automating repetitive "grunt work," AI can create space for teams to focus on the deeply human work.
An idea in your pocket: "Human work is about abstract conceptualizing and serendipity. It's about taking inspiration and honing it into what I call 'the idea you can put in your pocket.' The best ideas are the ones that are easy to explain—a little nugget so memorable that someone can immediately tell another person about it. That's the creative spark humans provide."
Human-AI tag team: For example, he illustrates this partnership with a practical workflow where AI acts as an infinitely fast research assistant, and the human creator serves as the strategist and editor. "Think of it as a creative tag team. The AI does the grunt work: pulling references, summarizing data, and suggesting directions you might not have considered. But the human must constantly come back in to make conceptual connections, validate the information, and hone the final idea. AI is a tool, but the human provides the crucial creative judgment."
Ultimately, Romain’s entire philosophy is connected by a single, foundational principle. His final charge to other leaders is simple: empower people who are native speakers of the modern media language. True authority comes not from having all the answers, he concludes. It comes from creating a space for the team's native expertise to guide the strategy. "My number one piece of advice is to listen to your youngest team members. Give them the space to teach you. It is not a sign of weakness, and it will not undercut your authority. They know the language of these platforms much quicker than you do. As a senior manager, your job is to pilot the big oil tanker, but they're the ones who know how the engine actually works."
