Why Asian Agencies Fail To Attract Creative Talent, And What We Can Do About It.
Every industry needs to find a balance between having senior leaders and attracting fresh, creative talent. The role of senior leaders is to decide on the most important and strategic directions, as well as to balance experience and curiosity to conduct change. Creative talent brings willingness to work hard, energy and new perspectives to help companies remain relevant in a fast-changing market. This is particularly true in advertising business, where young people help us to stay ahead of the latest trends and innovations.
In Asia, and particularly in Japan were I live and work, we are facing a major challenge: the advertising industry is no longer a glamorous job for the young generation. Foreigners love Japanese creativity, but within our own borders we challenge to recognize and spread it. Advertising agencies don’t attract talent as I believe we should be. I think this is due to two things:
First, among the young people who enter the workforce, I observe that they are hooked by businesses that look (more) like the future. They want to work in big data, artificial intelligence and the sharing economy, all of which have a huge impact on today’s businesses and tomorrow’s lifestyle. These are the attractive companies and start-ups to join today, not the big guys.
Second, Japan’s population is aging. Our population’s average age goes up; more and more senior people populate corporate offices. This is also true in advertising: there are a lot of senior guys and middle-aged people who are working within the industry; and I think that this makes advertising innovation more difficult, because the seniority system and hierarchy in this country is hindering change.
So what can they do in this fast-changing environment? Should they leave and retire? What if they love their jobs — like I do — and want to continue in this exciting business by any means?
I recently read an article entitled “wearable robot” which explained that the Japanese construction industry was struggling with the ever increasing average age of workers. The construction industry in Japan lacks young employees who work at front-line as the company strictly limits the immigration as workforce. To solve that problem, some IT companies were able to develop wearable robots that could support senior workers to continue in the construction service, in order to support senior people to carry heavy loads. It won’t make senior people flexible and agile again, but it can help them do the job better!
We couldn’t have imagined this kind of trend 10 years ago, and it can only help the Japanese economy. In the next 20 years (by 2035), according to the Nomura Research Institute (NRI), nearly half of all jobs in Japan could be accomplished by robots.
Well, what if we did the same in advertising? Not wearing robots, of course, but seeking help from innovative companies who could help us remain innovative, relevant for our customers, and attractive for the young people of this country? At ADK, the third biggest agency in Japan, I’ve been in charge of collaboration business with eYeka since 2011. One of our latest projects allowed a leading local tea brand get fresh creative input from abroad, resulting in a highly successful campaign:
Actually, in the first year of the collaboration, I had a tough time to handle the innovative solution that is quite a different model from agencies, but now, I really enjoy managing the projects for content development and ideation. When I work with young talented people at eYeka and the creators in the community, I have a strong feeling that I will revive. I believe that eYeka must become a very pragmatic solution in assisting innovation in the big Japanese companies and also with not-so-young business people.
First, I refrained from explaining about my personal view because the kind of behavior tends not to be welcomed in Japanese companies, but I changed my mind. I’m 50 years old and I’m not young, but luckily the clients and my colleagues contact me and offer new projects related to marketing innovation including eYeka. I’m happy to find that my skill and knowledge based on some experiences meet their needs.
I think that if I were in 10 years ago, it would be very difficult for senior people like me to being in charge of marketing communication that needs people to figure out the cutting edge trend. However, right now we live in a sharing economy in an era of IT and the kind of mature people can change their working style if they can earn the skill of marketing innovation tools and platform. Senior people can work with young talented guys with the kind of skills and open-minded attitude.
