Your Next Hire Is a Bet on Your Future

A few weeks ago we were super proud to host the Talent Business’ annual Talent Show, Cream, at our spanking new offices in Liverpool Street.

Cream doesn’t really need introduction. If you know you know.  And every Agency and every talent specialist knows. It’s an institution, offering a vital platform for burgeoning creatives – the Cream of the crop, as judged by senior industry peers. The hustle to get a Private View ticket is real. And many teams credit being a Cream Winner as the kick-starter of their careers, including my own long-time creative partner, Rob Doubal.

Rob and I have had the privilege of being involved with this show in some kinda guise for the last 10 years. We have all been in a position where we needed a leg up, so we pride ourselves on taking time to meet with as many new creative folks as we can, as often as we can, helping in any way we can. We can’t necessarily offer a job in every instance, but we can advise and offer up our meagre wisdom. 

We firmly believe that a sure-fire way to future proof the creative offering of your company is to invest in shiny new talent.  Some of our best and freshest talent have come to us never having ventured into agencies before - straight from ad school graduations or from portfolio nights, like Cream. Supporting collaboration, developing pro-bono partnerships and driving inclusivity in this way has in turn generated some of McCann’s most iconic and category disrupting campaigns. 

Junior talent is the Life Blood of agency life. Culture personified. Industry fuel.

Offer space, foster excitement, offer support and opportunity. It is inspiring to have people around with alternative world views, unjaded by industry grind, keen & excited by possibility.

A few years ago we started ‘Open Hour’, a series of subscribed one-on-one video call sessions, offering participants the opportunity to ask questions to industry experts with the aim of encouraging a wider spectrum of prospective candidates to consider a career in advertising. To launch the initiative, we had an idea to run a poster saying “McCann is looking for its next CEO”.  The sitting CEO was a little perturbed, but truth be told we’re constantly looking for our next industry leaders – be they creative or otherwise. We need to. And they all need to start somewhere.

From experience, heading into headwinds the first thing to be cut is commitments around entry level talent. We have always thought this to be wrong.  When under financial pressure we need to align on a belief for furtherment of our company and industry. Bet on the future, look past than the next 12 months. Take the infinite view. 

I would urge every company to invest in at least 2 new junior creative teams this year.

Do it.

What’s the risk?

Go down making some of the freshest work the world has ever seen?

Sing in the rain.

So there we have it. We’re so proud to have hosted Cream at our offices. We met some performance enhancing talent and came away the richer for it.