“It’s never too early to tempt top talent”

In an industry whose very survival depends on the quality and quantity of top young talent it can attract, SFW’s Chris Whitson suggests we may be focusing our attentions where it is already too late to make a real difference…

There have been many articles written and comments published about the development of talent in our industry; unsurprising really when you consider we work in an industry where the only commodity we have to sell is the talent of the people in our agencies.  To suggest we are poor at finding, nurturing and developing talent would be wrong, but to be honest we can’t claim to be much better than average.

Many of the larger agencies and all of the networks have excellent graduate trainee schemes, all of which are heavily oversubscribed every year. But, in the main, they attract a tiny proportion of the extremely talented graduates this country produces every year.  You see, I believe that for every graduate determined to do all it takes to get a job in our industry, there are ten more who just aren’t sure, and who therefore opt for a more secure, less risky path by applying to the management consultants, large British Corporations or one of the more traditional professions.

Of course, it takes particular types of talent to thrive in our industry but to my mind if we only concentrate on the determined graduates we miss the opportunity to promote our industry as a great place to work to a much wider pool of great talent.

Wouldn’t it be great if we could create an environment where the best and brightest young under graduates could try before they buy?  What if we created a programme of tutorials and linked it to a sustained period of work experience, and what if we offered it to Year two and three students who would return to their studies after the programme had finished?  Not only would that mean more young people get the chance to experience our industry first hand, and work out, without fear of repercussions, whether it’s what they want to do but also, we’d have an advocating sales-force spreading the word about our industry and what it can offer back in the university environment.

It already exists. It was that vision that led us to create the IPA Summer School, which next year will welcome its fifth class of students. The school has grown from a one year experiment by the IPA Direct Marketing Group to a national competition, fully endorsed by professors and careers advisors and universities across the country, offering students the opportunity of a 10 week placement at the best digital and direct marketing agencies within the IPA membership.  Alongside the placement, students must attend a series of seminars and workshops covering all aspects of the agency discipline where leading practitioners generously give up their time to share the knowledge, expertise and humorous anecdotes.

The initiative began with a vision to encourage the best undergraduate talent that a career our industry was exciting, engaging and rewarding.  And it’s working.  In our first year a large proportion of our candidates came from vocational advertising and marketing courses – people who’d already made up their minds in other words – and whilst we still receive a number of these very welcome candidates we see even more from students doing degrees with no immediate link to our industry like Philosophy, Geography, History, Mathematics and Economics.  It’s a small step but we are beginning to see the ripple effect as successful candidates return to their campuses and sell on our behalf.

To date the school has been supported solely by the direct and digital communities at the IPA.  As a result we’ve only managed to accommodate around 60 students over the last 3 years, but around 25 of those are now pursuing careers in agencies (and a few already have an award or two to their name).

Next year, as we celebrate the 5th school we would like to offer a record number of students the same opportunity. So we’re asking all IPA member agencies to consider taking a student for either the Client Service/Strategy School or the Creative School that runs alongside it (or both). Just think of the effect it would have on future talent attraction if 50 or 60 students every year went back to their universities and sold on our behalf.

The final word should go to one of the greatest nurturers of young talent: Arsene Wenger once said, “young players need freedom of expression to develop as creative players… they should be encouraged to try skills without fear of failure”.  I couldn’t agree more.

If you want to know more about the IPA Summer School, please contact Liane Barratt at the IPA.