The one topic no one will touch

Release Date: 06/16/2009

by Al Moffatt
June 16, 2009

One network CEO examines a rather touchy topic -- and finds his own answers to issues that have been nagging at advertising for many years now.

Just looking around the world these days, there are so many topics and issues to write about and pontificate on that it is truly a thinker's paradise. But there is one topic that very few, if any, will touch. A topic so feared by senior advertising, marketing and business people that they dare discuss it except in hushed tones over scotch while secretly tucked away in a corner booth. A topic so politically incorrect that the sheer mention of it could well result in being carted up the hill to be publicly dispatched before a throng of cheering progressives. Yes, it's THAT topic. You know the one:

What the hell is with the young people in the business these days, and why the hell don't they put their nose to the grindstone like I had to in my 20s?

We, as marketing people, are great at labelling people even while claiming to be agnostic about demographics. So we've landed upon labels such as Baby Boomers, GenXers and now, The Millenniums. Or as author Ron Alsop proclaims, 'The Trophy Kids Grow Up'. It seems that every kid over the past 15 years has received a trophy for just showing up, regardless of individual or team performance. So, in essence, the theory goes, we've created a bunch of self-inflated young adults who feel they're entitled to everything under the sun without really having to work for it. After all, they don't come to work on time. They're on Twitter and Facebook when they should be working. Their definition of a successful business is one that gives back rather than one that just makes a profit. And worst of all, you say to yourself, you're supposed to rely on these kids to pull your business out of the recession? Yea right!

Well, I've got news for you. We've never been in better hands. Yes, there's some truth to the 80-text-messages-a-day stereotype of needing constant feedback, freedom and sense of purpose in order to make it through the day without resorting to downing a case of Red Bull. But there's a lot more truth to the fact that this multi-tasking collective is extremely responsible, worldly, technically sophisticated, expressive, sensitive, caring, artistic, creative, socially mature, articulate, conceptual and (shhhhhh, not too loud), hard working.

Just because they don't do it like we did, doesn't mean they're not doing it. Why not work for four hours, go shop, exercise or volunteer for two and then work again until 10pm? Hasn't technology allowed us this freedom and flexibility? Why not scour the internet for seemingly random and meaningless trivia while IMing friends and new acquaintances? Isn't this what we used to do? We just called it 'doing lunch'.

These younger workers are the great connectors, the great knowledge brokers, and the great inventors of today, not tomorrow. In fact their lifestyle, attitudes and ability to instantly assimilate all kinds of different information via technology is kind of like getting a liberal arts degree -- every day! And isn't that what makes a great advertising or marketing person: someone who is inquisitive, someone who is a free thinker and someone who knows a little about a lot?

The challenge that many agencies and marketers are having today is that they say it's tough to find universal thinkers that can think about the big picture while also understanding how all the blurred elements of advertising, PR, direct marketing, events, research, media, creative, digital, business, social networking, technology, etc., etc., interrelate. \Well guess who blurred the lines to begin with? The Trophy Kid, that's who.

So now's the time to cherish and leverage all the new skills this younger generation brings to the party rather than sounding like your dad talking to the wall about 'kids today'. Personally, I've got much more of a problem with the adults these days than with the kids. But that's a whole other topic no one will touch.