The Musings Of An Opinionated Sod [Help Me Grow!]

So I’ve been doing this advertising lark for a lot of years.

Twenty one to be precise, and even though I’ve been blessed with working for/at/with brilliant and highly regarded agencies/companies … I’ve had more people contact me to say ‘Hello’ since it was announced I was off to head up planning at Wieden’s, than pretty much at any other point in my career.

Now of course when I started in adland, the World ran on steam … a billboard was the local post office notice board and twitter was something birds did so it’s fair to say technology has played a big part in spreading the word [not to mention my smug-as-fuck one man advertising campaign, ha!] … however whilst I love meeting/talking to new and interesting people, I have to admit I find it funny that now my name is associated with the words ‘Wieden + Kennedy’, I’ve suddenly become sort-of popular* when in every other aspect, I’m pretty much the same person – with the same values, attitude, philosophies & views – as I’ve always been.

So to my point.

One of the problems I have always had with adland – and planners in particular – is that they tend to judge/value others more by the company they keep that what an individual say’s or [preferably] does … which is why the people who tend to get the ‘fame’ are the ones who sit in the cool shops, even though often, the planners most deserving of praise are the guys who do great work with less glamouress clients in less cool surroundings.

I wrote about this a while back … detailing why I rate Northern so bloody highly … but the thing that is really bothering me is how little debate really is going on in our industry.

I read blogs, magazines, tweets and while there is a lot being talked about, there’s not much actually being said … quite often it’s nothing more than new packaging of old theories.

What’s caused this to happened?

Well I have a theory ….

First there’s this fucking terrible movement to position planners as Rock Stars.

ROCK STARS!

PLANNERS?

Who the fuck came up with that shit … oh yeah, a planner.

Apart from the fact planners aren’t rock stars and – given our job is to understand people, everyday people, shouldn’t be rock stars – its creating an atmosphere that the annointed ones should never be challenged.

When you factor in the power of technology to distribute and spread messages, you can see why some people are fearful of voicing their alternate opinion for fear of being instantly and universally chastised.

But the thing is, I actually don’t know if many planners do have dramatically different opinions to the Keith Moons and Keith Richards of planning.

Why?

Well this leads to my second point and that is that we have started to believe we’re geniuses. Not just geniuses but invincible geniuses.

We can make everything better … absolutely everything … and anyone who disagrees with us is wrong.

Earlier this week I wrote a tongue-in-cheek post about shit fashion and implied a planner could have made it better … and to be fair, I honestly believe that … however I would lay money that they’d be a whole host of planners [not the ones on this blog, you obviously have no desire to be seen as cool if you come to this blog] who think they could do better than anyone else they were pitched against.

Fashion designer?
Better.

Window dresser?
Better.

Retail expert?
Better.

We have started to be a discipline having one dimensional conversations … talking about subjects that make us feel important and clever with people who make us feel relevant and cool … when for all intents and purposes, the discussions taking place have minimal impact and influence on the everyday lives of the very people we’re paid lots of money to understand, engage and motivate.

Don’t get me wrong, there’s a lot of clever and great people in adland – but in my experience, the ones who are the smartest are the ones who know they DON’T know it all, so go out and get alternative views and experiences … not just from colleagues in the agency, but people in the real World.

I’m not talking cool photographers … DJ’s … painters and skaters – though sometimes that may be the case – but DR’s, teachers, salesmen and prostitutes.

And you know why this works for them?

Because they hear perspectives they’d never of thought of … views they’d never consider … issues they couldn’t imagine and so when they combine that with their natural talent and intellect, they can question the supposed set-in-stone theories, they can argue the latest planning trend and they can make bigger, better and greater things happen … bigger, better and greater things interms of creativity, loyalty and profit.

Of course I’m hugely proud and excited that I’m going to be working at such a great agency within a couple of weeks, but I have to say I’d hate to think someone agrees with me just because I work at Wieden so if I could suggest something for any young planners out there, look away from adland for your inspiration and education and aim to create your own destiny rather than follow someone else’s just because they [1] work at a great agency and/or [2] they’ve been labelled a fucking rock star planner.

Ooooooh I feel better now that’s off my chest.

To be honest it’s not really captured what I wanted to say or what I thought I wanted to write about … plus it’s all over the place and missing some key sections I really wanted to cover – but it’ll do – it’ll have to, I’m writing this late and I need to go to bed.

For the record, I should point out that the reason why I find this blog so enjoyable is that when the insults are over, we have a good debate and it tends to also involve the brilliance of Lauren, Peggy, Marcus and John – who as none adfolk – ensure we can’t go too far up are own arses which is why this blog will be back soonish. [Sorry!]

Right some house-keeping.

1/ Today is my last day at Sunshine – and so I want to say a big ‘thank you’ to everyone and wish them all the best with whatever they get up to in the future. It’s a short ‘bye’ as I’ve already said my formal thing but I still wanted it to go on record.

2/ I don’t know how I’ll do it, but I’ll try and get the results of the Head & Shoulders A[P]SOTW assignment up sometime next week . however if that doesn’t happen, it won’t be my fault, it’ll be the couple of judges who’ve not pulled their fingers out and given me their feedback, hahaha! Eitherway, the results will be out soon and hopefully you’ll find the feedback helpful and valuable.

OK, that’s it . apart from the couple of blog posts I’ve pre-written, this place will be on limited operation until I’ve sorted out a place to live and the China firewall, so until then enjoy the peace.