Commentary
McCann Research Drives New ANA Talent Recruitment Effort
- by Richard Whitman , Columnist, November 14, 2019
The ANA has unveiled a new campaign to help persuade college kids there’s a future for them in the world of advertising and marketing.
The group worked with McCann Worldgroup on the campaign, called “Best Jobs Ever.”
McCann’s research revealed that most students view marketing as “simply ads and selling.” (Not that there’s anything wrong with that.)
But as anyone in the industry knows, the profession has evolved well beyond that in recent years.
As Chris Macdonald, MWG’s global president, notes: “The discipline of marketing has changed radically, and the campaign we have developed celebrates this shift and challenges perceptions. It is critically important to communicate to students, professors, and parents what incredible career opportunities exist throughout the industry.”
A video produced by McCann for the campaign can be viewed here.
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The campaign includes a partnership with WayUp, a digital platform used by college students seeking summer internships and entry-level jobs.
“Top-quality talent is the lifeblood of our industry,” said ANA CEO Bob Liodice. “But the current system for attracting and retaining talent isn’t working, and we need to take immediate action,” he added. “This campaign demonstrates just how creative, innovative and powerful a career in marketing can be. I urge all ANA members to support it in whatever way they can.”
The ANA’s Global Growth Council is taking point on the organization's talent recruitment efforts. It’s led by Elizabeth Rutledge, CMO at American Express.
A toolkit for marketers is also planned that will include the McCann video, other materials and a link to a website with additional recruitment assets.
Of course, it would help if Adland and the broader marketing world paid more for entry-level talent, but I guess that’s another issue. It doesn’t seem to be mentioned anywhere in the campaign materials.
Which is probably wise. I mean the idea is to attract kids to the industry, not scare them away.
But clearly pay is an obstacle — as has been discussed at numerous industry conferences. If marketers expect to successfully deal with this talent “crisis,” they need to step up. Otherwise, the best and brightest recruits will continue to head to higher paying jobs in tech, finance and other sectors.
While I applaud the effort and recognize that you must keep things simple if you want to get the attention of young people, the video, while, snappy and easy to take, is pretty vague and, in my opinion, is appealing mainly to those who might like to be "Madmen" ---or "creatives" with a passing nod to those into "data". I would have liked to see something---however simply stated ---that explained the three basic types of jobs---"account handling, "creative" and media. For exapmle, I suspect that there are a lot of college types who might like the idea of account management and many who might respond to the idea of recommending which media a client uses, getting involved with TV networks, publishers, etc.