BEWARE: ADVERTISING GRADUATE TRAINEE SCHEMES

I hope any graduates out there considering going into advertising were watching Tuesday’s episode of Mad Men, during which the agency lads boasted:

‘That’s why we have juniors, someone to blame.’

‘You need someone to lay down on the barbed wires so you can run over them.’

Juniors these days tend to be so called ‘Graduate Trainees’. And having started in advertising as a Graduate Trainee myself, I can say the Mad Men attitude is still pertinent in today’s agencies. The ‘Graduate Schemes’ that we’re encouraged to think exist to help young people, are actually the deal of the century for companies, and in particular bosses in need of passing the buck. That’s why so many of them invest millions in these schemes: it gives them cheap staff who are also intelligent, keen and naive enough to throw themselves on barbed wire and be run over time and time again. In the end they may become wounded or unable to move, but no one seems to care, as long as the agency keeps winning awards and getting write ups in New Media Age, and the agency bosses are home in time to bath their kids.

Every year thousands of bright young things apply, and over a period of several days are tested, analysed and questioned to ensure they fit the mould. It’s a similar process to how Derren Brown picks those he thinks he’ll be able to hypnotise. Subjectivity isn’t sought after; desperation on the other hand is a winner, and psychometric tests are given to determine quickness and attention to detail; basically to gauge how robotic the graduates can be, if required.

To go far in advertising you need three things; the ability to bullsh*t, intimidate and stretch the truth. However, there are too many people like that already in advertising, so graduate types who actually do the work with integrity are needed more and more. Mad Men’s Don Draper is the personification of the advertising industry: From the outside he appears very attractive with the perfect lifestyle, but in reality he has no integrity, operates only out of self interest, has built his life on straw and is rotting on the inside.

During Tuesday’s episode, Don’s wife, Betsy, regarded by Draper’s colleagues as a ‘peach of a girl’, finally clicks that her husband is an unfaithful monster, after Don has embarrassed her by, unknown to her, making her the subject of a market research test, only to reveal the result to the table at a dinner party she was hosting. As Betsy is almost breaking down at home Don seals the deal after telling the client about the test on his wife and adds: ‘We’re the ones who’ll have to deliver.’ Yeah, right Don, by ‘we’ you mean your ‘juniors’.

I’ve now reached that point in my advertising ‘career’ when I’ve gained enough experience to know how to pass the buck and let the poor graduates take on all the work and in doing so the blame, while I float around trying not to engage my brain too much and play the political game. I am now careful never to offer to arrange a meeting, work late or take notes, as these are all a generally sign of weakness and, once you do any of these once, that’s it for the foreseeable future.

Rather ironically, I’ve found that the less work I do, the less conflict I get into. Others may think I’m lazy but it’s not the done thing to bring that up or discuss it. However, it is considered reasonable to slag someone off for taking on too much and doing a bad job, no matter how hard they’ve worked, and how little support they’ve been given.

I look into the eyes of my graduate colleagues and see the same confusion and exasperation that I felt for so many years, and I know that I’m now contributing to them feeling that way. I hope they find out quicker than I did that hard work and intelligence won’t get them anywhere and that not even an Oxbridge degree prepares you for navigating the murky waters of advertising.

It’s my last day in advertising today. I, like Betsy have realised that anything is better than this.

Posted 03:22 PM on Thu Apr 02 2009

By Work Slave

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