Does age matter in advertising agencies? May 28, 2006
Posted by Farrukh Naeem at copywriterjournalist.com in : Advertising , 39commentsCan one be too old to be in advertising? Or too young?
Advertising is a young person’s business, we are being told by some. The new age advertising agency needs to have ideators who know their ipods. Age and experience can be a disadvantage in the digital mindscape, some are saying. The need for “intellectual curiosity” is being stressed.
Matthew Creamer’s feature in AdAge few days back mentioned an agency executive seeking $30 million in damages from the advertising agency for valuing “youth instead of experience” and “terminating older persons because of their age”.
And here I am, someone who grew up feeding on the advertising knowledge and insights from the wizened ones like Ogilvy and Bernbach and Claude Hopkins. Contrasting that reverence for advertising legends had been my secret wish to become the youngest creative director around. I did rise up to lead a team of 8-10 creatives, help start the company’s web division, and work with the creative team to win some of the most coveted accounts in the market that made other bigger agencies see green. Clients were asking for me at the agency briefings, and expecting me at the creative presentations. I have always found it fun to be presenting our agency’s creative concepts to a room full of marketing managers from the client side, many of whom are my father’s age, and managing to make sense to them and win the account. But this was in a country that had the guts to let talent mow down the conventions.
So what is the reality in the market? Who is advertising fortune favouring today here in the Middle East? The GCC? The UAE? Young or old?
If this thing about agencies valuing youth over experience is true, show me a creative director in his teens in this region. Ok, show me one in his early twenties. And I am not talking of associate, assistant, almost creative director. I am talking regional, national, group creative director. Where are these virgin saviors of the digital era?
From my personal opinion, the scales are still in favour of the wizened viziers when it comes to the top positions – not the young Turks. And maybe that’s not such a bad thing. Because knowing new technologies is not the same as being firmly grounded in the intricacies of human behaviour. And making it dance to your tune.
Yet, I say, if young Turks can, with their work, prove the ability to lead the agency’s teams and take the advertising agency places – give them the toys to play – the corner office, the fancy designation, the reserved car park. And don’t just pack the old geezers off because they have more candles on their birthday cake than the bubbly intern. Not age, but work that works should be the criteria in deciding who stays, and where.
I was once refused an interview for a creative position in Dubai because the minimum requirement was TEN years of experience, and I had just two. I applied anyway. Showed my portfolio anyway. Tried to convince the agency that it’s the work, not the age, anyway. They were amused at my guts. But persistent about the 10 year experience minimum qualification. Much water has flowed under the Garhoud bridge but things haven’t changed much.
At least I can speak for Dubai, for this region. Agencies aren’t going to launch a firing frenzy throwing off their grey-haired VPs to substitute them for the tattooed kid on the skateboard, any time soon. We’re not in London or New York, habibi. Maybe I can aim to be the youngest VP in the meanwhile. No, no… more like the “chief conceptual officer” (CCO) of a creative hotshop in Media City. In a pair of bermudas. Is it allowed?
