‘There’s challenges around that at the moment’: M&C head on why agencies aren’t attracting young talent
The chief creative officer of M&C Saatchi ANZ has told Mumbrella what he believes is the biggest challenge that is stopping younger talent from wanting to work at agencies.
In his first interview since joining M&C Saatchi last November, Steve Coll appeared on Mumbrella’s one-on-one podcast where, among a range of topics, he gave his take on the state of agencies in 2024.
“I would love to see more younger talent coming into the business because I think there’s challenges around that at the moment,” Coll told host Neil Griffiths.
“I think there’s probably a perception that AI is going to end up taking the jobs that people might’ve expected to do in creative agencies; that AI will do the thinking, the writing. And I think we’re up against that.”
While new talent entering the industry remains an issue, M&C Saatchi is one of many groups that have been hit with redundancies in the last six-12 months, which also includes CHEP, Dentsu, Google and most recently, News Corp.
As well as artificial intelligence, Coll said there might be a perception that advertising doesn’t have as much “glamour” as an industry like technology, which could be stopping younger people from entering the industry.
“I’d love to see us as an industry lean into that and being able to pull young talent from diverse places into the business,” he said.
“I think… that’s going to massively, massively help improve [and] continue to improve the quality of our work.”
Also on the episode, Coll discussed the recent movements at M&C Saatchi and what’s in store for the future of the agency.
Listen to the full episode with Coll here.
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Neil Griffiths is the Managing Editor of Mumbrella. He joined the company in October 2023.
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You could improve this issue with real action. But agencies are not serious when it comes to incurring short term cost for long term gain. This sort of top down simplicity from a C level who is on likely 15-20x the salary of a grunt junior is classic barking at the moon.
Let’s see this level resolve the bigger drivers:
– Graduate talent pipeline: the industry pays minimum wage level salaries for immediately utilised staff controlling huge sums of money. The ratio of salaries to learning and development is under 1% (whereas in more adult industries it’s closer to 6-8%). Graduate talent gets no exposure to real decision makers, huge lack of information passed down to them to help them do their job/learn. Graduates will work where there’s opportunity to develop – and plenty of other prof services are seeing strong grad intakes.
3-5 year experience drop off. Junior staff are treated as billable utilisation for years and then eventually respond in kind, viewing the employer as simply a revenue source. Hence the huge churn of 3-5 year talent who have a huge demand imbalance in their favour and have seen loads of their friends and managers made redundant when the business didn’t want the overhead. These future leaders become disengaged, often leave, or view the industry rightly thru a transactional lens.
Return to work women drop off – no business invests in a safe space for returning Mum’s. They’re generally relegated to part time role salaries with full time role expectations, back in a utilisation only value exchange unless they’re willing to work late/weekends and have a client facing role but deal with the performance expectations of a line manager who can’t relate whatsoever.
Experienced level ceiling – after approx 8-10 years the salary ceiling hits unless you’re a special exception. Means people can cap out on earning at their mid 30’s and be stuck in client lead roles. Very few are able to transition to adjacent roles. Cretaes another mass exodus where people need to leave the industry to exercise their value
Highly caveated L&D – ad world puts loads of risk caveats on any sort of benefit. Forget a mid-level person wanting to do a masters, they can pay for it themselves and do it in their own time. A senior person wanting high level training in new areas – only if its paid for by Google or Meta. Reasonable parental leave – only if you’ve worked non stop for x years and then return for y years. An industry event – can’t you just ask the DSP to pay for it? The main trainign most ad people get is via platforms because they pay the agencies $30k per head who completes it. So L&D becomes another form of extraction.
Disempowerment of middle management decision makers – the removal of all discretionary decision making from line managers means that the people ultimately tasked with developing people day to day, can’t even expense a coffee without someone in New York approving it.
It’s staggering Coll doesn’t acknowledge the real drivers here.
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Left 5 years ago and can wholeheartedly recommend it.
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Why don’t you pay them as much as the ‘glamourous’ technology industry then? I would suggest that is a bigger barrier to entry than people worrying about AI.
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As a former agency junior, it’s more likely the shockingly low pay, high-stress environment, long and unpaid overtime leading to burn-out and feelings of exploitation that is contributing to juniors not wanting to work agency side. Why would they want to work for an agency when it’s twice the pay and half the hours client-side?
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…how many times he starts his sentences with ‘I’?
It’s not about you. If you bothered to actually ask young talent, or any talent these days to be fair, as to why they don’t want to work in agencies it’s because the leaders think they know everything.
Talent want to be seen, heard and appreciated. 3 things that are rarely experienced in the toxic agency culture.
Here’s hoping he reads these comments to actually garner a bit of insight for the next time he decides to be the expert on this subject.
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I’d say the biggest problem agencies have is that their clients are full of ex agency staff who know how useless and unorganised the agencies are these days.
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Alternatively, agencies have become synonymous with poor working conditions & burnout. Gone are the days where table tennis and after work drinks are enough to distract them from the issues in this industry. Flexible working conditions in tech, along with long term career progression may just be too good to refuse. Time for a shakeup in the industry!
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I feel for Steve drawing fire on an issue not of his making, but these comments are spot on.
Our stock in trade, creativity, has never been less valuable to clients.
The agency model is in structural decline.
Peers in other professional services roles are earning 50% to 100% more at the same stage of their careers, and long term career prospects in agencies are very few in number.
Young people and grads will be well aware of this and rightly looking elsewhere to build a sustainable, long term career.
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Great way to kick off your time in a leadership role at a new agency.
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If only it was as easy as paying more. There was a time agencies could do that – they even used to get fee increases based on rises to the inflation rate! But, those days are long gone. Nowadays, agencies are being asked to do more and more for less and less and the reward for doing a great job and being re-appointed is, “Congratulations, but you’ll need to cut your fee by 10%”. The ‘fat’ just isn’t there anymore.
Sad, but true.
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I can tell you, this is simply not true.
I’m sure it’s a factor, but I have spoken first hand to many of these ‘young talent’ and the issue is not the glamour of the tech industry, but the systemic issues within agency land.
Burnout, poor working conditions and opportunities for growth (both professionally and $$) are a major concern.
Start by investing in your staff. Fruit boxes, table tennis and after work drinks aren’t enough to distract young talent from the state of the ‘agency’
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Low pay, high stress, long working hours – are the agencies out of touch?
No, it’s the kids who are wrong!
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Couldn’t be happier after leaving ad land for ‘client side’. It’s true what they say in what you will find – flexibility, hybrid arrangement, no crazy hours, a respectful working environment, clear paths for progression, proper performance reviews, rewards, bonus structures, learning, and still the chance to work with agencies. My only regret is that I didn’t do it sooner!
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Man, how unbelievably tone deaf.
The pay is terrible, the pressure is insane – you are constantly pitted against your peers to win awards, and worst, the work is awful because we have to bow to clients that dont respect the craft and dont want to take risks. And lets not forget that if you aren’t in the ‘boys club’ you aren’t moving up. It has nothing to do with AI, it’s the culture, the lack of appreciation, and in the instability.
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Definitely feeling the ‘Experienced level ceiling’ – the longer i stay at this level the further i get away from the work and more into client service which is what i have accepted as part of the role, but it is slowly becoming my whole role. It is more about commercials and revenue than it is creating great campaigns to deliver business outcomes.
My next step would be to a Business Director and i couldn’t think of anything worse despite wanting more $.
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wholeheartedly agree that this absolutely misses the point about why young people are leaving or not even starting in the industry.
if you’re smart, why would you go into agency when the big 4 consultants pay a 30% higher entry salary straight out of uni, to do the same gruntwork and long hours?
the structural decline of the industry is also not the fault of clients or staff. Agencies are not valued because its clear to those hiring them when they don’t have the experience, knowledge or capability to deliver quality work. The agencies that do, demand a premium and seem to more often than not get it. Again, this is a problem of agency leadership and structure, not the fault of the young people who are actually doing the work, without getting the training, guidance or support to deliver on what has been sold.
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