University graduates ‘unprepared for marketing world’
Most university students who complete a degree “are not prepared at all” for the world of marketing, a Sydney breakfast event has heard.
Prompted by a discussion on the role of degrees in creating good marketers, James Diamond, managing director of Integral Ad Science told the International Advertising Association’s event those entering the discipline are “underprepared” as courses fail to keep up with the latest thinking.
The panel this morning (L-R): Corin Dimopoulos, James Diamond, Anthony Hourigan, Suzie Shaw and Liz Harley. Moderated by Darren Woolley.
Isn’t the point of marketing to train rock solid marketers the unchanging strategic skills that underpin good business decisions? From my experience dealing with marketers of all levels over the last 20 years, it is these fundamental analytical, strategic and business skills that are sorely lacking.
The other stuff? to quote Diamond: “The people who are coming out of university now with marketing degrees, they don’t know anything about programmatic, they don’t know anything about how to negotiate a media contract or how to deal with issues with transparency as an example. Those things are not covered at all.”
Sorry, those things are not marketing. That is ‘digital’, ‘media’ etc – specialist and tactical skills. And given this stuff is changing all the time, I’d think it was an employers job to be training their juniors.
Perhaps what they mean here is specialised, applied streams/applied subjects for marketing students who want to move into fields like media?
Agree with @Milo.
Also, given how impossible it is for the poor sods to find decent internships, I think you’re asking a bit much.
Graduates are graduates, not experienced professionals.
Hi Milo, I agree with you that there are some unchanging strategic skills that every marketer needs to learn and university is a great place for that, but I feel our education system could do a better job of preparing undergraduates for the types of jobs that undergraduates are likely to find themselves in once they move into the workforce. While every media channel needs great new talent there is particular demand in the digital space. So you are correct, programmatic is not marketing, but it is an important tool for marketers and I wish we could find more people with knowledge in that space. Until we do, we will continue to hire great people and invest in them through training.
‘programmatic not marketing’..only for specialist’s? Seriously?! considering 50c to every digital dollar will be traded programmatically in the next two years it might be handy for young post grads to know a bit about it. Considering how main stream it will become young marketers would be silly not to learn these skills..
“Sorry, those things are not marketing”. I would hire 1 graduates with training in digital advertising over a dozen who only know marketing abstractions. They’ll learn marketing principles by doing.
It reminds me Gilbert and Sullivans modern major general – an impressive and well-rounded education, but his military knowledge has “only been brought down to the beginning of the century”.
Not sure where the panel perceives these marketing graduates as arriving from, but the value of a degree – marketing, other business or indeed any other discipline – is surely its capacity to foster an ability to think strategically, research, problem-solve and communicate in a manner appropriate for one’s audience. That’s certainly what I’d be looking for.
The latest in ‘digital’ or negotiating a programmatic media buy can (and probably should, to be sure of being relevant) be learnt on the job.
Hi Luke, I absolutely agree that a big benefit of a uni degree is, as you put it, “it’s capacity to foster an ability to think strategically, research, problem-solve and communicate in a manner appropriate for one’s audience.” In fact that point was made a number of times on the panel. My point is that it would be great if graduates knew how digital marketing works in more detail, what an ad server is, what are some of the key trends that they would benefit from being aware of. I think that would help them start off on the right foot and make the first few months a little less of a steep learning curve. I am not suggesting employers don’t have a role to play…we absolutely do and we need to invest in more training. But if the role of a university is to prepare its students for the workforce I think at least having a unit in a marketing degree that focuses on how digital works would help our grads.
…and in which industries ARE fresh graduates ready for? Medicine, Law, Finance & Banking? Don’t think so.
Courses in marketing or even specific advertising ones are broad enough to help a graduate land a first job anywhere from a media agency, media publisher, creative agency (creative or accounts) or client side just to name a few.
It’s pretty un-realistic to think a course can prepare a 20 year old to be 100% ready for every possible role.
Instead the course should arm them with the skills on how to think, work collaboratively and gain an understanding of the broader industry as a whole.
Specific skills and know hows should be taught by the employer once they actually begin their first job.
I feel that University is to help establish more of a bedrock. The examples illustrated were poor the theory behind programmatic can be taught in 30 mins, the technical skills would require years. And negotiation is covered – but that’s more of a life skill that requires mentoring.
Marketing students need to understand strategy and tactics, while also being excellent communicators.
Spot on Milo.
Th challenge for Universities is that they need to educate students on how to solve problems that don’t exist yet and then place students in jobs that are disappearing rapidly.
Perhaps James needs to review his recruitment approach before blaming universities.
Hi Paul,
I accept your point that we need universities to be teaching students to problem solve. It’s a capability we desperately need in the digital marketing space so I don’t want to take away from the importance of that. But I am suggesting that we could create a better foundation from which our undergraduates could understand exiting problems so that they could help the industry to build solutions to them.
On recruitment, we hire experienced people but also grads. We don’t require our employees to have a degree and I believe in hiring for attitude and teach the rest. But I have watched some of the grads I have hired try to climb a very steep learning curve and I just feel universities could play a role is making it easier for them by giving them more exposure to some of the important issues facing the marketing world.
I would be happy to talk you through our recruitment process in more detail and take onboard your feedback if you felt there are opportunities to improve it. If you are keen, drop me an email at james@integralads.com and we can setup a time.
Hi James,
Another dimension to this issue is the role that AI and automation plays in the programmatic space.
It seems there is an over-dependence on humans for what should be a highly automated process.
As to negotiating contracts and transparency, that is something that comes with experience. In fact, I would argue that there are many of us in the industry who will never grasp these skills.
Marketing is a varied discipline with many opportunities for students. Programmatic is one of many aspects of this and not all students are necessarily interested in the field.
Traditionally, industries and their trade bodies dedicated time and effort to ensure that educational institutes taught relevant curricula. Perhaps we need to revisit this.
I think the difference here is the rigour required on the job and comfort, ability from a numbers perspective and overall complexity vs the coursework that might be sound, to an extent, from a strategic perspective but is not a real reflection of the job.
Marketing (comms) used to be able to attract top tier talent from top tier universities. In the UK, you can still woo the odd ‘Oxbridge’ grad where the industry is still (somewhat) respected. In Australia, it’s become closer to a trade with talent coming from institutions one step above TAFE. So a more appropriate parallel is not asking how ready a lawyer, banker or doctor might be on their first day but a sparky or plumber who have completed an apprenticeship. Now, there’s an idea…
“Maybe undergraduate degrees prepare marketers for the more senior roles they’ll (might) get later on in life, more than prepare them for the role they are probably going to get at the start.”
That’s it ! No more to be said.
No worries everyone, I will start the P.Whipfield.Academy (aka the WhipA) and save the world.
Completely agree with the sentiments expressed in the article and experienced this issue recruiting grads during my many years with WPP. It’s exactly why now I am acting as an industry fellow for Swinburne Uni to create what we believe is Australia’s first industry co-created Master of Marketing. We have partners like Isobar, Australia Post and Facebook guiding the content of all subjects so we have industry ready grads.
This is something that will also filter to undergrads.
I’ve got some bad news for agencies… Your’e not the university sectors target market when they produce Marketing grads. Your clients are their target market.
If you want someone who understand programmatic, hire an Arts (media) grad. If you want someone who can write code, hire an IT grad.
Your clients only hire you because they don’t have the time, resource or skill to undertake that very particular, tactical task that you specialise in. But that task is just one small part of their activity, and universities have limited time to teach them about the whole of marketing. You should be happy about that.