Over the past few months I've done a tonne of work for a client. There has been endless hours planning strategy, designing and developing creative, managing placements and reporting. I've developed collateral for a dozen social media accounts, run advertising campaigns, managed and activated sponsorships. Heaps of work has gone into it and we are seeing some fantastic results.

As a complete aside to the project, I run off a quick one-page newsletter to update stakeholders on the activities. It's nothing more than a simple internal communications tool which is distributed quarterly. I need many people to know about campaign activities, and it was the best way I could think of to quickly update them. Because I'm a designer, it looked good, read well and was succinct.

This little one-page newsletter has taken off into the stratosphere with a life of its own. It's been picked up by the client's national office and celebrated as a fantastic initiative. Hang on, I'm thinking, this isn't a fantastic initiative. It's just a one-page communication. The real work and initiatives have been in the advertising and marketing work it reported on.

Isn't it weird what people celebrate and see value in?

It has been a lesson in not undervaluing the things we take for granted. My act of communicating to stakeholders had a value I hadn't even realised.

But I'm still shaking my head and laughing…