The 21st Century Adman

So earlier this week we handed in a report. Now i’m normally not one to bother talking about reports because reports are boring. You print them on flat white A4 paper in Times New Roman font size 12, double spaced, with APA referencing and a polite, academic style of writing that your professor also politely grades in respond.

So for this particular report, our group decided to get a little more creative. In part because the topic allowed us to do so, and also because it was a good excuse for me to design something… though we ended up not having very much time so ‘designing’ was relegated to a rushed few hour cheong job.

The brief given was as follows:

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The project is a report on the current state of the industry, looking at ONE of five topics. Students should write a 3,000-word report addressing the question, which should cover but not confine itself to the questions below:

Specialisation is the key to success. Talk to 5 individuals and 2 companies who have specialised in one niche area, and explore how specialisation has helped differentiate them from their competitors, or has made it harder to find work. Consider the following topics from the lecture series: Agency work; personnel; budgeting; planning and decision making; leadership and motivation – and any other topics you feel are relevant.

Multi-task or die. Talk to 5 individuals and 2 companies who have found they must break out of their niche or specialisation and learn news skills in order to survive. Explore how multi-tasking (or being skilled in many different things) has helped or hindered them. Consider the following topics from the lecture series: Agency work; personnel, planning and decision making; change management; leadership and motivation – and any other topics you feel are relevant.

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These were two of the five topics offered. We started out meaning to angle ours to the former. But our research led us to places where we could not honestly provide such a single-sided perspective. Eventually, our final product became a marriage of the two and I would like to share it with all of you today.

I guess we (the 5 of us) wrote it intending for it to be easily digestible, something like a magazine, more of an opinion or article substantiated by supporting evidence based on current trends we observed in the advertising industry.

This piece is not meant to be an exhaustive or comprehensive coverage of the subject, we do not claim to be experts AT ALL in this field, but we hope you enjoy reading our exposition anyway.

The 21st Century Adman: Surviving the volatile jungle of advertising in the digital age
Authored by: Walter Sim, Poh Wee Koon, Hendric Tay, Audrey Tsen & Elizabeth Lee

Summary: Where is advertising going as an industry in the 21st century? Gary Leih, Chairman of Ogilvy Group UK, once said, “Ever since I joined the industry almost 30 years ago, I’ve been hearing predictions that agencies are going out of business. First it was the dotcom revolution … then it was the rise of the Internet. It wasn’t true then, and it isn’t true now.” (Tylee, 2009). So who will survive in this industry where the only constant is a constant state of flux? We discuss who, how, and what you need in order to stay abreast for the times ahead.