Slaughter the Sacred Cows
Sally Hogshead
Originally published in Communication Arts July Illustration Annual 2005
http://www.commarts.com/ca/colad/salH_274.html
Somewhere in your agency, sacred cows lurk in the hallways. They're wandering through the HR department, or chewing cud in the CEO suite. You might even have one curled up in your own office.
Sacred cows are the unquestioned rules, dogmatic systems and ways of working that seem off-limits to change.
The problem is, sacred cows block potential. If you blindly accept a pattern, or worse, feel forbidden to challenge it, then you can't improve it. You become stuck. And stuck is the antithesis of everything we stand for.
Only by testing the legitimacy of a sacred cow can you create the best solutions. Here's an example. In our industry, the following statement is accepted fact:Advertising agencies are creative.
We share a vested interest in maintaining this reality. We don't even think to question it.
Yet this statement is only partially true. Yes, we are the most innovative group around-when it comes to our clients. However when it comes to our own companies, we're remarkably unimaginative. Rarely do we stop, look around and reinvent the way we work.
The reality is, certain agency practices are ineffective, obsolete or even unfair. Yet they remain standard policy.
I say we should turn our exquisite insight upon our own agencies, identify the sacred cows and usher them out the door.
I say we accept too much, and question too little.
We buy full-fare plane tickets without hesitation, then eliminate microwave popcorn due to budgetary constraints.
We centralize agency ownership into a few holding companies, then wonder why the work feels homogenized.
We ask clients to approve ideas that make their palms sweat, but rarely have the nerve to present just one campaign.
We leave weeks to research a strategy, and three days to create the campaign.
We always have time for revisions, but never enough time to get it right the first time. We water down ideas to avoid conflict, then end up with ideas that lack passion.
We compromise too much on our work, and compromise too little on the sick day policy.
We spend so much time putting out fires that we've become better firemen, and lesser architects.
We search for fresh options by scrolling down the Fonts menu.
We request "real people" from Central Casting.
We create TV spots for a living, then fast-forward through them on TiVo.
We recommend an honest "vérité" style of photography to clients whose ads might not necessarily tell the whole truth.
In new business, we try to seem bigger, unless we're a big agency, in which case we try to seem smaller and more boutique-y.
We kill ourselves to build revenue, then miss the good ol' days when it was all about the work.
Our job is to develop unique identities for brands, yet we ourselves have virtually indistinguishable mission statements.
We're communication experts, yet often communicate quite poorly among each other.
Our work requires inspiration, but leaves little time to find it.
We entice new hires with a big jump in pay, but reward loyalty with a minimum annual raise.
Creatives who win awards on glamorous clients get a raise, but creatives who take one for the home team by producing mediocre work on difficult assignments end up with a lower market value.
We hire individualists who are just conformist enough to be presentable to the client.
We promote some of the most talented creatives into positions where they no longer create work.
We pour our hearts into nurturing young talent, but if we do our job well, they'll leave the nest for another agency.
We squeeze people out of the business by age 50, then lose our way without mentors.
We have miles of spreadsheets analyzing precisely what people want, but often don't realize how to make employees happier.
We treat color printers more carefully than employees. Computer viruses are an emergency, but diseased morale is status quo.
We spend $10,000 on recruiting an employee for whom we can't afford a $1 birthday card.
We forget to tell clients, "Yes it's now technologically possible to assemble and e-mail a concept in less than an hour, but the human brain's timeline for brilliant ideas hasn't changed.
"Do you recognize any of these sacred cows roaming around your office?
Stand back, and take a big picture look at the way you do business. Challenge each practice to see whether it's a smart way of doing business, or a sacred cow. Poke it. Test it. Make it uncomfortable. Make it prove itself.
If a practice still seems right after being challenged, then great. Keep going. If you find a cow, get right to the core of the problem. Usually it's benign neglect, but sometimes it's complacency, or myopic accounting, or ego, or something equally awkward to bring up.
At that point, start talking about it.Over dinner.While eating a bloody rare steak
- Live like there's no tomorrow. Love like it's your last.
posted by AveragePsycho at
6:38 PM
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