Phrase set on stun

Advertising is a business lousy with buzzwords. And not just ones we create for public consumption.

Within these walls, and I mean figuratively because as any creative who’s worked in an agency in the last fifteen years knows they don’t have walls anymore, there are all kinds of words and phrases it seems people can’t get enough of.

I’m talking about campaign integration. Laddering up. Digital growth. Emerging strategic social media. Content analysis. Monetization solutions. Everyone's picking the low hanging fruit, and pushing the envelope. And don’t even get me started on millenials, brand engagement or interactive experiential guru (not kidding).

You’d hope agencies would be staffed with people fueled by passion and creativity who want to do the best possible work that wins awards, gets results, makes clients happy and lets them get more clients that let them do more great creative. And in some shops, you’ll find a lot of those people - especially if you’re looking in the creative department.

Problem is there aren’t enough of them. Instead, running around in agencies are people fueled by fear. Of losing the client, their job or their corner office - which they’ve probably already lost thanks to open floorplans.

Anyway, bitching and moaning about it isn’t going to change it. These buzzwords are like cockroaches: for every one you manage to kill, there’ll be a hundred more to replace it.

But next time I hear one of those words or phrases in one of the many meetings I’m in, I just may have to counter it with a word I find myself using more and more often.

Bullshit.

Open for business

As I was just saying the other day to my good friend Rich Siegel, creator, curator and pledge drive MC for his Round Seventeen blog, Rich I said, you can never have enough posts slamming open space office seating.

I've written many times about the particular challenges to getting anything productive done in that environment, including here. Rich has also displayed a few well-written tirades about it, like this one for example. But it's not just a couple of malcontent, disgruntled and yet extremely talented and worth every penny and more of their day rate copywriters doing the complaining.

The monumental failure of open space floor plans has also been well-covered in many publications I'm proud to say I've stolen from some of the finer agency mailrooms around town. Fortune to Fast Company, the Washington Post to New York Magazine, and everything in between.

Now, it's one thing to bitch and moan when you're one of the cogs in a giant holding company wheel who's forced to work at the picnic table. It's quite another when the company who set it up that way realizes the insanity of it and warns you about it.

I noticed a help wanted ad, a section of which is shown above, that lets you know just what you're getting into should you decide to work with them. In case it's not legible on that Kaypro II screen (employee offices aren't the only place they're saving money), here's what it says:

Ability to work and write in an open office environment with a considerable amount of distractions and interruptions.

I don't know the exact definition of the phrase "mixed message", but I have an idea this is pretty damn close.

What they're saying is, "Hey, we know it's virtually impossible to get anything done in this office setup, but we don't care. Deal with it." Fair enough. I suppose we all have our own choice to make.

But if a company tells me, brags to me, they had a bad idea that's making them less productive, my job more difficult and they're sticking with it because it's cheaper to have me overcome their stupid obstacles than it is for them to change it, my choice would be a resounding, unequivocal no thank you.

Right after I hear what day rate they're offering.