Getting a job in an advertising agency.

Partisan Advertising recently ran another advert on SEEK looking for someone to join our advertising agency.

I like to be creative when writing recruitment ads as it makes the process a bit more fun for me. And I like to think it will be fun for those who read it and hopefully it will attract a better kind of applicant. In our ads, I like to include what some people refer to as “crazy pitches”. I start by telling applicants that I do not want to see their resumes. That’s only half the crazy bit. What I ask these punters to do instead is to send me (together with their portfolio) something that shows their uniqueness. This can take the form of a letter, a song, a dirty limerick, a dirty video (so far I’ve only gotten one), a poem, a photo; basically anything that shows the real you. That’s all I ask for.

I do this because I abhor resumes.
 
There’s nothing worse than putting your future employment possibilities in the hands of an indistinguishable Word document set in 10 points Arial with double line spacing detailing when and where and what has led you to this point in your life. Especially if you’re responding to an ad for a spot in an advertising agency, and even more so if you’re responding to an advert written by a crazy person asking applicants to send in dirty videos* instead of resumes.
 
Why? Because you never do the same job twice in advertising.
 
Sure you might be unfortunate enough to do 12 TV commercials a year but the only thing that’s similar between them is the media in which they are shown. The same goes for social media campaigns, logo design, web design, brochures, billboards, packaging and on and on and on. The requirements are different for each because the message, and the execution of that message, is different every single time, without fail.

So when it comes to applying for a job, why do people choose the same method for every application, which also happens to be the exact same method everyone else chooses? It’s kinda like trying to sell a TV commercial for tampons to a company that manufactures bricks. It just can’t be done.

Hence the “crazy pitches” I include in our recruitment ads.  
 
The advertising industry is meant to be full of the crazy ones. The ones that somehow find a way to compare drug use to the frying of an egg; who transform ordinary men wearing ordinary shirts into legends merely by adding an eye patch to their attire. These are the people that manipulate and persuade consumers like sirens calling sailors to the rocks. I’m smart enough to know that I’m not one of these people but I’m also smart enough to know that I want to work with people like that. And you don’t find these people in a two page Word document set in 10 points Arial with double line spacing. Unfortunately, you don’t find them in dirty videos either.
 
*P.S. The dirty video I received was from a cool art director who loved motor-cross and who was covered in mud when he made the video. Sadly he lived in Belgium.