Year-end Closeout Thoughts 25
âSo this is Christmas/And what have you done/Another year over/and a new one just begun…â
Iâm not big on Christmas music, but that John Lennon song is one I can stomach. Thatâs because it doesnât implore you to deck the halls with tacky lights or credit card bills, it asks you where you are, existentially speaking, right here and right now.
Advertising people, collectively, are a very self-examining and self-critical bunch. So while youâre polishing off the holiday leftovers, here are some things to ponder as you begin 2008:
Is what youâre doing really worth anything? How do you contribute to the world? Is our industry making the world a better place to live?
Itâs not an easy thing to contemplate. We all make our little Faustian bargains to pay the bills. Advertising isnât brain surgery, but it isnât larceny, either.
Every year, someone does a survey of the most trusted professions. And ever year, âadvertising practitionersâ rank down at the bottom near âcar salesmen.â Believe me, weâre not about to shoot up the respectability rankings when they repeat the survey this year.
Frankly though, I canât think of a profession in the industrial world thatâs a purely altruistic endeavor. With a simple educational detour, I could easily have been someone in a more respected field but with questionable motives. Like a doctor who crawls into bed with pharmaceutical companies and insurers. A duplicitous lawyer. Or a professor more concerned with my tenure track than with teaching.
Still, itâs hard to feel that advertising really benefits the world. Clients donât really appreciate it, consumers try to avoid it, and on the totem pole of commercial art, weâre pretty low. Yet, weâre part of the free market machinery, part of the cycle that keeps goods and services in demand, creating jobs and wealth for some portion