Ageism is the diversity debate’s ‘forgotten issue’ | Mumbrella360 video
As the gender and racial diversity debates rage on, a panel from June's Mumbrella360 conference considers why ageism is the issue the marketing industry forgot.
In this session from Mumbrela360, age discrimination is been branded the industry’s forgotten diversity issue, one that’s impacting the level of knowledge and skill within agencies.
While debate rages around gender and race, the skew towards a younger workforce in advertising is often overlooked, the audience at Mumbrella360 was told in a panel session on industry ageism.
A debate exploring the “youth-obsessed” industry concluded that having older members of staff brings experience, knowledge and confidence – traits that are often neglected.
BMF executive planning director Christina Aventi reveals she is referred to as “mama” at her agency – at the age of 43 – an indication of the way the over-40s are regarded in the industry.
“I love it, I love it, but there is something a little bit dismissive and I’m put into a box,” she says.
Aventi added that she is “mortified” at the way agencies say they want to employ “young and hungry people”.
“Back in the day I wouldn’t have thought twice about that but now I am mortified,” she says. “It’s saying if you’re old you’re not hungry.”
The experienced planner adds that the term “over qualified” – often cited as a reason for not offering someone a job – is a euphemism, with “ageism disguised as flattery”.
Louise Genge, marketing director at The Benevolent Society, says: “Over-40s are walking out of the industry before their time with knowledge and in-depth understanding, not only of the agency but the industry.”
But industry creative Warren Brown, while talking up the benefits of older members of staff and the experience they bring, sayd it is also incumbent on employees to maintain a positive outlook and not become “boring know-it-alls”.
“There’s a certain amount of repetition [in the job] and that tends to leave older people in the industry to say ‘been there, done that, seen it all before’ and they become a bit of a boring know-it-all,” he says.
“That really penalises them. There is nothing more exciting than being on the cusp of nearly screwing it up and there is great joy in being terrified. That’s what gets your adrenaline going.
“But as soon as you become this wise know-it-all you are pretty much sunk because everyone around you will be moving at a pace… and you’ll be a drag on the whole vibe, you get isolated and made redundant.”
Brown added that older workers have “cost implications” and are often replaced with “a bunch of juniors”.
Lisa Ramsey, managing director of brand consultancy Channel T says more senior members of staff are viewed with “suspicion” if they have not shown a desire to climb the corporate ladder to management positions.
She says they are sometimes regarded as being “not very good” at their job in they don’t progress when that is clearly not the case.
“We have to get better at allowing people to be good in the space they settle,” Ramsey says.
the loss of wisdom, experience and knowledge that the industry suffers when driving out, passing over or ignoring talented and experienced execs in their 30s, 40s and 50s is (in my opinion) one of the biggest issues facing our industry
I don’t think it’s about agencies wanting ‘young and hungry’ employees just because of youth alone. Employees over the age of 30 are less likely to want to put in the obscene hours employees are expected to work (and with good reason!).
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This is a good step in starting discussion and awareness of this issue. I’ve heard many managers say they were ‘too intimidated’ hiring someone more experienced than them, or call them ‘over qualified’ even when pay expectation is the same.
I do agree that there are certain jobs in our industry that can be done by juniors and the added cost of a senior person is not adding value to that role at times, though. That’s in any industry – but the real issue is when we can’t tell the difference. I know I was made Head of TV in a big multinational agency, responsible for $20M in production per year at 21, and I really had no clue! That role was given to me by people who had no idea of the value of the role and oblivious to the cost of mistakes, and oblivious to the value of a manager with experience versus someone there just to action tasks under guidance. Mistakes are easily disguised in agencies as part of the creative process too. After decades in the industry I can see how insane that was and how lucky I was to keep things together as well as I did (didn’t always!). There are so many roles like this that are undermined due to lack of understanding about the real value experienced people bring.
The current trend for flat management structures doesn’t allow the true value of experienced people to shine through. I’d be interested to calculate up the value of the mistakes made by inexperienced people, wasted head hours spent heading in the wrong direction, duplication of head hours to top up capacity or output, the lost opportunities or the lost efficiencies through lack of creative problem solving, and reduced buying power/skills. What about the alternative ways to do things that add value to clients? How about the untapped abilities from multi-talented people (gained through experience) in a world of silo-ed roles? We don’t measure this stuff, so the value is lost or invisible. What we don’t measure, doesn’t seem to exist.
Perhaps it will be like the in-house versus external supplier trends that go in waves of doing one, then the other over time? Soon we will come back around to a vertical management model because the efficiencies and quality of solutions for our clients is improved? These discussions will hopefully move that cycle through faster. Thanks for raising this.
Just to put things in perspective here – I think there are many experienced people surviving well outside the traditional model that we don’t hear about too and wont be able to measure as we focus on this topic. The only cost to these people is the scale of client they service, which can only be accessed via big agencies. With bigger clients doing more in-house now (and increasing all the time) the experienced people are popping up again and finding a place where they are valued again.
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