Slackers love marketing.
It's almost as if they're drawn -- in some weird gravitational way -- to the marketing field.
Don't want to work as hard as the accounting or engineering or computer science majors? Choose a marketing concentration. Not sure what to do with your life? Get a marketing job. Can't seem to excel at anything? Switch to a marketing career.
All of us who've been at this game for some time -- and take it seriously -- have seen it again and again. The stunning incompetence. The people who lack the essentials to perform beyond a mediocre level. The bullshit artists. The coasters who just get in the way.
I don't mean to suggest that the marketing profession is a loser's game. I personally know plenty of brilliant, hardworking people on the client and agency side. There just aren't enough of them. And that makes it a drag for everyone out to do great stuff.
Maybe first-rate marketers ought to head back to school and lecture the freshmen and sophomore students. Catch them before they declare a major.
Here's the pitch in a nutshell: If you're smart and ambitious and conscientious, you could quickly become a dominant marketer. Years ago my friend Bernie said when he began medical school, he instantly realized that everyone was accustomed to being the smartest person in the room.
The marketing profession needs more Bernies.
Recent Comments