Last week Digiday ran a piece called "Why Agency People Are Unhappy."
Before we discuss how they got it all wrong, let's get a little perspective.
Unhappy agency people are nothing new. Agency people are whiners, always have been and always will be. Many are lovable whiners, but whiners nonetheless.
Half of the whining is legitimate -- many jobs in advertising suck.
Half of it is just the discontentment of people who consider themselves too creative for what they are asked to do.
And the third half is the natural inclination of everyone everywhere to bitch and moan.
Now back to Digiday.
Has the level of discontentment in advertising gone up in recent years? My sense is that has has, substantially. While I've heard an incessant drumbeat of unhappiness among ad people for 4 decades, I believe it is now considerably worse than ever.
Digiday drags out all the usual suspects to explain this:
As I have mentioned before, when I started in advertising, the largest agency in the U.S. was Y&R with about a 1.5% share of market. According to the latest figures I've seen, four enormous holding companies control over 70% of the advertising in the U.S.
The advertising industry is, structurally, a totally different industry than it was when it was pleasanter and creative-er. It is also totally different culturally. This makes an enormous difference.
A handful of giant megaliths -- controlled by financiers, accountants, lawyers and corporate flat tires (what a colleague of mine used to call "fearsomely dull men in grey suits") -- run the ad industry. They are a very different breed from the craftspeople/entrepreneurs who used to run it.
I think you will find that the agencies in which people are most satisfied these days are either the independent agencies or the agencies that are so creatively successful that their holding company masters wouldn't dare screw with them.
There is no secret to what happens to industries when they become consolidated -- the customers become angry and the employees become dispirited. Look at the airline industry, the telecom industry, and the banking industry.
The ad industry will never be any different as long as it is controlled by the likes of Michael Roth and Martin Sorrell.
We sold our industry to the highest bidders. And in doing so, we sold our soul.
It's hard to be happy when you're soul-free.
A few sidebars today...
...I try to be assiduous in my fact checking, but sometimes I screw up. In a few recent talks I have stated that "people 75 to dead buy more new cars than people 18-34." It should be "people 65 to dead." Sorry.
...Just checked the YouTube video of my talk in London at Advertising Week Europe earlier this year. I am blown away at over 30,000 views of something 45 minutes long. Thank you all so much.
Now back to Digiday.
Has the level of discontentment in advertising gone up in recent years? My sense is that has has, substantially. While I've heard an incessant drumbeat of unhappiness among ad people for 4 decades, I believe it is now considerably worse than ever.
Digiday drags out all the usual suspects to explain this:
- Demanding clients
- Low pay
- Horrendous hours
- Disrespect for the contribution
- Disrespect for creative work
- The effect of the Internet
- Fear of innovation
As I have mentioned before, when I started in advertising, the largest agency in the U.S. was Y&R with about a 1.5% share of market. According to the latest figures I've seen, four enormous holding companies control over 70% of the advertising in the U.S.
The advertising industry is, structurally, a totally different industry than it was when it was pleasanter and creative-er. It is also totally different culturally. This makes an enormous difference.
A handful of giant megaliths -- controlled by financiers, accountants, lawyers and corporate flat tires (what a colleague of mine used to call "fearsomely dull men in grey suits") -- run the ad industry. They are a very different breed from the craftspeople/entrepreneurs who used to run it.
I think you will find that the agencies in which people are most satisfied these days are either the independent agencies or the agencies that are so creatively successful that their holding company masters wouldn't dare screw with them.
There is no secret to what happens to industries when they become consolidated -- the customers become angry and the employees become dispirited. Look at the airline industry, the telecom industry, and the banking industry.
The ad industry will never be any different as long as it is controlled by the likes of Michael Roth and Martin Sorrell.
We sold our industry to the highest bidders. And in doing so, we sold our soul.
It's hard to be happy when you're soul-free.
A few sidebars today...
...I try to be assiduous in my fact checking, but sometimes I screw up. In a few recent talks I have stated that "people 75 to dead buy more new cars than people 18-34." It should be "people 65 to dead." Sorry.
...Just checked the YouTube video of my talk in London at Advertising Week Europe earlier this year. I am blown away at over 30,000 views of something 45 minutes long. Thank you all so much.
