9980: Delayed WTF 17—Mad Ave Assimilation.

MultiCultClassics is often occupied with real work. As a result, a handful of events occur without the expected blog commentary. This limited series—Delayed WTF—seeks to make belated amends for the absence of malice.

The half-hearted diversity discussions at the recent 4A’s conference and the announcement of IAM graduates shed new light on the
training consultancy being launched by Nancy Vonk and Janet Kestin.

To recap, Vonk and Kestin are starting Swim, a training program for young advertising agency creatives. “With agencies no longer investing time and money to bring people along, it’s pretty much ‘sink or swim,’ and a lot of talented people sink,” explained Vonk. “Careers are stalling, work is suffering, and retention is poor.”

It’s a safe bet that Vonk is talking about White creative staffers. After all, she and Kestin are chummy alums from Ogilvy, where Ogilvy North American Chairman-CEO John Seifert expressed depression over the company’s lame diversity efforts.

Yet Vonk and Kestin inadvertently point out the monumental challenges that minorities face trying to succeed in the advertising industry. Hey, if White creatives require exclusive training, imagine what it must be like for non-Whites. The presumption already exists that minorities depend upon additional tutoring to make it on Madison Avenue—as evidenced by the plethora of segregated internships, inner-city high school initiatives and colored college courses. It appears that Whites feel minorities can’t make it without extra help.

So if Swim indicates even Whites could benefit from special attentive care, the logical next thought would be to believe minorities need super supplemental seasoning.

On the flip side, this really goes back to the arrogance of White adpeople. Specifically, no one ever considers the reality that the group with the greatest urgency for reform is the White majority. The Impact Study showed minorities endure isolation in the field; that is, our industry is not friendly and/or welcoming to non-Whites. But one never hears about philanthropic schemes to enlighten the culturally clueless. No courses are presented for eliminating exclusivity to build inclusive workplaces.

It’s much more pleasant to promote assimilation under the guise of goodwill.

9956: C’MON WHITE MAN! Episode 20.

(MultiCultClassics credits ESPN’s C’MON MAN! for sparking this semi-regular blog series.)

Advertising Age provided a snapshot of last week’s 4A’s conference in Los Angeles, including the following excerpt:

It’s been talked about for years, but it bears repeating: Agencies need to commit to hiring a diverse workforce at all levels. If they don’t, they risk creating work that doesn’t appeal to the changing demography of the nation. Speaking openly, Ogilvy North American Chairman-CEO John Seifert said the agency received its latest cultural survey last week, and called it “depressing” because “we hadn’t achieved what we set out to do.”

Ogilvy North American Chairman-CEO John Seifert represents the crème de la culturally clueless on Madison Avenue. He is among the leaders who publicly declare a commitment to diversity, yet personally and professionally don’t do a damn thing to address the situation. Rather, guys like Seifert wring their hands and furrow their brows, feigning deep concern when asked to comment on the subject.

In 2009, Seifert confessed the industry is “not exactly leading the way” in regards to diversity, and he admitted his agency was “not blind to the fact that there is so much more to do to recognize our ambitions.” The remarks were delivered while Seifert was rubbing elbows with Rev. Al Sharpton at the NAACP’s 100th anniversary celebration.

In 2011, Seifert “soft-launched” OgilvyCulture with all the enthusiasm of an Old White Guy attending a Black History Month event. At the time, Seifert admitted, “…[If] there has been a weakness in the marketing communications industry generally, it’s that the makeup of agencies is not reflective” of the consumers to whom they advertise. Regarding OgilvyCulture, Seifert said, “We’re feeling our way; I’ve said to everyone this is going to be messy for a while.” When has an agency leader ever predicted messiness for a new venture except when it involved the integration of minorities?

The Impact Study probably caught Seifert off guard, as the survey indicated minority employees held positive feelings about working at Ogilvy. Seifert responded with a statement saying, “While we are grateful to see our progress recognized, we still have so much to do in attracting and retraining the best and brightest talent from the cross-cultural landscape we serve.” Did Seifert make a Freudian slip, accidentally inserting “retraining” for “retaining”? A week later at the 4A’s soiree, Seifert showed signs of clinical depression over his agency’s failure to meet its diversity goals. What did he see that the Impact Survey participants did not?

Why are passive racists like Seifert permitted to keep their jobs when they consistently fail to create meaningful and measurable results with diversity? In every other area of our business, leaders are held accountable for success. Yet when it comes to replacing exclusivity with inclusivity, it’s completely acceptable to get away with a substandard performance—provided you hone the ability to act with contriteness and fake bipolar mania.

C’MON WHITE MAN!

9934: Save The White Creatives.

Adweek reported Ogilvy & Mather alums Nancy Vonk and Janet Kestin are launching a training company for young creative staffers. “With agencies no longer investing time and money to bring people along, it’s pretty much ‘sink or swim,’ and a lot of talented people sink,” declared Vonk. “Careers are stalling, work is suffering, and retention is poor.” Oh, so it’s not just the minority adfolks who require extra training?

Vonk and Kestin Launch Training Consultancy

Ex-O&M creative leaders fill a void in advertising

By Andrew McMains

Nancy Vonk and Janet Kestin have turned the dearth of training in the ad industry into a business model.

Vonk and Kestin, co-chief creative officers of the Toronto office of Ogilvy & Mather, are leaving the agency to launch Swim, a company that will help train and nurture creative staffers. The business opens next month.

“With agencies no longer investing time and money to bring people along, it’s pretty much ‘sink or swim,’ and a lot of talented people sink,” Vonk said in a statement. “Careers are stalling, work is suffering, and retention is poor.”

Swim will offer in-person and online training, and incorporate the experiences of leaders from many creatively driven industries. The company will work primarily with agencies. Its first client is the duo’s former employer: Ogilvy.

In unveiling the business, Vonk cited a spring Adweek story that illustrated how a Starbucks barista gets more training than the average agency staffer. That story stemmed from a talent management survey that Arnold global CEO Andrew Benett unveiled at a 4A’s conference in March.

To fill the CCO slot that Vonk and Kestin are vacating, Ogilvy named Ian MacKellar, executive creative director at Canadian independent shop Bensimon Byrne. Earlier in his career, MacKellar was a creative leader at BBDO Toronto.

9924: Invisible Admen And Adwomen.

From Advertising Age…

Silent Minorities: Industry Employees Speak Out About Adland Isolation

Results of Study Called ‘Very Disenchanting, But Not Surprising’

By Ken Wheaton

The average ad-industry employee likely agrees the diversity issue is a very unfortunate situation. One that should be remedied. By someone. But on a daily basis, he’s likely to carry on, figuring for the most part the industry will evolve and that his nonwhite coworkers are content with the state of adland.

The reality, according to a new study, is that a whopping 74% of minority employees in the industry agree that “My experience as an employee from a multicultural background is different from my colleagues’.”

The Impact Study, conducted by cross-cultural talent consultancy Tangerine-Watson, surveyed a total of 831 ad-industry professionals of various races and across general-market and ethnic shops between September and December of 2011.

The study’s numbers likely won’t shock anyone who’s paying attention to the issue. As 4A’s CEO Nancy Hill said, “It is very disenchanting, but not surprising at the same time.” Carol Watson, founder and CEO of Tangerine-Watson, called the results “sad and concerning.”

But one thing this survey provides is actual voices from those responding. What comes through is mostly a sense of resignation tinged with sadness.

“I try to keep my cultural preferences outside of work. … Since there isn’t much diversity I just have to go along with the flow,” wrote one respondent.

Another wrote about feeling excluded “when nobody [in the office] introduced themselves to me.”

“Many other people are allowed to just ‘be.’ As a black man I often have to shield my ‘real’ self a bit. I wish I could be as open as others. It’s something they don’t even recognize.”

Gender came up in a number of comments. Indeed, men (37%) felt more strongly than women (27%) that their experiences were “very much different” than their white colleagues.

Why does any of this matter? Obviously, aside from doing what’s right, it’s good for business to have ad agencies reflect the reality of the world we live in. One of the 4A’s most recent diversity efforts is called “Competitive Edge” for just that reason.

And it can be bad for business when a creative team overlooks important cultural cues in a campaign. For all the social-media outcries in 2011, the No. 10 most-read story on AdAge.com last year was “Nivea Pulls Ad, Apologizes After Racism Accusations.”

But even speaking up to voice concerns about such things comes with its own baggage. “Simply being aware of the presence (or lack thereof) of racial overtones in our advertising concepts and being turned to as the one to call it out is an unwritten responsibility—and I fear an unwritten liability,” wrote one respondent.

And there’s also the worry of being stigmatized as a complainer. Wrote another: “I have been treated differently for expressing negative feelings vs. my white colleagues.”

That’s not to say everything boiled down to race. When asked what they liked least about the ad industry, whites, African-Americans and Asian-Americans all picked “instability” as the top choice. “Instability” was the No. 2 choice among Hispanics, with “challenge balancing work and personal life” being the No. 1 dislike.

That said, lack of diversity does play a major role when it comes time for employees to decide whether or not to say in adland. African-Americans (33%) and Latinos (21%) were more likely to cite lack of racial and ethnic diversity as a very important reason for leaving the industry, compared to whites (4%).

For an industry that’s been hammered over this issue off and on since the late 1960s without a great deal of progress to show for it, keeping the minorities it has is just as important as recruiting fresh talent.

Ms. Watson hopes that the answers to the surveys—as well as a more granular look at the data and follow-up surveys—will provide some guidance for agencies.

Looking at some of the responses regarding those times multicultural employees actually felt included, some of the fixes don’t exactly require an industry-wide initiative. Being invited to meetings, being included in award-submission processes, being consulted on anything from creative to the new offices—these were among the things that made respondents feel more included.

Another step agency employees could take? Perhaps realizing that not everyone sees the time period portrayed in “Mad Men” as something to admire. (Responded one person to the scenario “I feel excluded”: “When they had a “Mad Men’ party.”)

But internship programs and affinity groups and mentoring and reverse-mentoring opportunities were also all mentioned by respondents. And that’s where agency executives and the industry as a whole have to step in.

“I’ve never been shy about saying we have work to do,” said the 4A’s Ms. Hill. “Our actions … have cultural cues we just need to think about, especially when we’re the majority culture.”

Which general-market agencies are doing right by way of diversity? Ogilvy & Mather and Wieden & Kennedy came in tops across the categories among non-Caucasian respondents.

In a statement, Ogilvy & Mather North America Chairman-CEO John Seifert said: “While we are grateful to see our progress recognized, we still have so much to do in attracting and retraining the best and brightest talent from the cross-cultural landscape we serve.”

Regarding Wieden & Kennedy, former employee Jimmy Smith chairman-CEO-chief creative officer of Amusement Park Entertainment, said, “It’s incredible what Dan [Wieden] and Dave [Kennedy] have accomplished … especially miraculous when you consider that Portland [Oregon] is one of the whitest joints on the planet.”

What does Wieden have that others don’t? No. 1, said Mr. Smith, is its client roster. “Cool attracts cool,” as he put it. But it’s not just Nike. “Dan and Dave have love for people of color. Dave has been heavily involved with the American Indian College Fund since I’ve known him. And it’s true: Dan wishes he could be reborn as a Black jazz musician. …John Jay is a partner at W&K and he’s Asian. He helped me immensely with my transition into W&K, and I’m sure he’s helped many others since I left.”

Much of which affirms something else Ms. Hill said. “The clear message in all of this is [that] it starts with the CEO.”

9918: Mad Women Mirrors Mad Men.

In 1986, ad veteran Jane Maas published her autobiography titled, “Adventures of an Advertising Woman.” Roughly 25 years later, “Mad Women: The Other Side of Life on Madison Avenue in the ‘60s and Beyond” seemingly reworks and repackages Maas’ tale to capitalize on the popularity of AMC series Mad Men.

For blog visitors seeking a legitimate review of the book, Businessweek delivered an honest and accurate critique, and Kirkus Reviews chipped in a polite summation too—rightly opining that “Maas’ memoir will likely not have the impact of her classic 1977 tome How to Advertise (co-written with Kenneth Roman).”

MultiCultClassics will forgo the comparisons and contrasts to the author’s other works, preferring to examine the cultural similarities between the imagery presented in Mad Women and the altered realities depicted in Mad Men.

For starters, Maas attempted to address the inequities, discrimination and harassment present on Madison Avenue, although almost entirely from a gender perspective exclusive to Whites. The book’s index tells the story, where words such as “stereotypes” and “bias” tie to the challenges Caucasian adwomen faced. However, Maas doesn’t really take a stand or condemn anyone, opting for the safer “it was what it was” position. Contemporary activists for gender equality in our industry won’t find an ally in Mad Women.

Regarding race and ethnicity, Maas’ book follows the AMC series by virtually ignoring people of color. It’s interesting to note that while Don and Betty Draper employed housekeeper and nanny Carla (a Black woman), the Maas family included lifelong housekeeper and nanny Mabel (aka Carmen Dyce, a native Jamaican living in Brooklyn, New York). The loyal Mabel receives decent coverage in the book, albeit similar to the role Carla played in Mad Men.

The word “diversity” appears in the book’s index, yet it just leads to a couple of pages discussing WASPs, Jews and gays. Ogilvy & Mather President Jim Heekin once asked Maas, “Do we have too many homosexuals at this agency?” Maas admitted to being dumbfounded and unable to answer the question. Apparently, nobody ever queried if there were too many minorities in the office.

Oddly enough, the only minority reference pertaining to the advertising business comes one page ahead of the pages designated for “diversity” by the book’s index. Here’s the total paragraph:

Mad Men has it right about the lack of diversity at agencies in the 1960s. The only black faces you see on the show are Hollis, the elevator operator, and Carla, the Drapers’ maid. Ogilvy & Mather hired its first African-American copywriter in 1968, and assigned her to my group. The day before Betty arrived, the copy chief of the agency took me aside and told me quite seriously that if I became aware of any “anti-Negro comments or gestures,” I had full power to fire the perpetrator on the spot. Nobody said a word. Betty came quietly, stayed with us for about a year, wrote some effective ads, and moved on to a better job at another agency. She helped us take a big step forward.

Unlike every other individual in the book, Betty is not identified by her last name. It’s difficult to determine who this female Jackie Robinson might be, and MultiCultClassics will happily accept assistance from any knowledgeable visitor to properly recognize the woman. Can’t help but wonder if the lack of last name was an unintended slight or an inability to completely recall the person who “helped us take a big step forward.”

Despite its cheery reminiscing over the advertising industry, Mad Women mirrors Mad Men by reflecting all the cultural cluelessness still present on Madison Avenue today. We haven’t come a long way, baby.

9775: Gap & Ogilvy Be Very White.

About a year ago, the Gap named Ogilvy as its global agency of record. Here’s a new series of print ads for the retailer. Not sure why the Gap needed an agency to produce this shit. And why is everything so White? Perhaps OgilvyCulture wasn’t consulted on the campaign.

9751: Corporate Cultural Collusion Kool-Aid.

Advertising Age reported that Kraft is shifting its Kool-Aid account from Ogilvy to Saatchi & Saatchi, citing the need for a “fresh perspective” on the brand. Right. First of all, everyone knows that minorities comprise a key audience for Kool-Aid (MultiCultClassics addressed this topic last year). So moving the work from one outdated White agency to another outdated White agency will hardly lead to freshness. Once again, Kraft is showing its commitment to supplier diversity is total bullshit. And the food company’s business sense—in terms of partnering with experts capable of sparking sales—is pathetic too. It seems like “fresh perspective” is code for Corporate Cultural Collusion.

Saatchi Snags Kraft’s Kool-Aid, Capri Sun

Marketer Cites Need for ‘Fresh Perspective’ on Beverage Brands

By Rupal Parekh

Kraft is once again rejiggering its roster, handing Publicis Groupe’s Saatchi & Saatchi creative duties for Kool-Aid and Capri Sun. Those beverage brands were previously handled by WPP’s Ogilvy.

Agency representatives either declined to comment or referred calls to Kraft Foods. Bridget A. MacConnell, Kraft ‘s senior manager-corporate affairs for beverages, told Ad Age that Saatchi’s New York office will be responsible for handling the two accounts and said the impetus was a desire for new creative thinking.

“While we appreciate our long partnership with Ogilvy, we needed a fresh perspective as we drive our refreshment beverage brands forward,” she said via email.

The pace with which Kraft continues to make changes to its agency roster is astounding. A Wall Street analyst recently found that between 2009 and 2010 Kraft had switched ad agency assignments on brands accounting for a whopping 48% of its total U.S. measured media spending.

The changes in the company’s agency relationships are part and parcel of a much larger wave of organizational changes at Kraft, which is in the midst of splitting into two companies—one focused on the North American grocery business, and another that concentrates on snacks. As a result of the split, Kraft has announced that it will slash up to 1,600 jobs. Meanwhile, the company is in the thick of ushering in a barrage of new products.

For Saatchi, the win expands its place on Kraft’s roster of agencies after winning creative duties last October for the world’s largest gum brand, Trident.

It also provides a continuation of some good momentum to kick off 2012, helpful on the heels of its late December loss of the JC Penney account after a five-year relationship. In the past month alone, Saatchi has picked up these additional Kraft assignments, a new creative assignment for the Sapphire credit card by Chase, and has been called in to help out on Miller Lite with a new brand campaign.

Between January and November of 2011, Kraft, which is the 32nd biggest national advertiser per the Ad Age DataCenter, devoted between $35 million and $40 million in domestic measured media to Capri Sun, and about $20 million on Kool-Aid, Kantar data shows.

For Ogilvy it means a further reduction of its Kraft business. The agency once handled a broad array of brands for the packaged-goods giant, but over the past few years it has gradually seen many of its Kraft accounts flee to other agencies. It continues to have two big global pieces of Kraft business, Tang and Cadbury chocolate, and also does work for Honeymaid graham crackers.

Contributing: E.J. Schultz

9629: BP Means Bullshit Propaganda.

Advertising Age reported on the latest marketing bullshit blitz from BP that launched after Christmas. Pretty sneaky to quietly break the campaign while everyone is distracted with the holidays. Of course, the oil company recently managed to reel in a $4 billion settlement, which will likely help pay for the fresh propaganda. In 2010, Louisiana restaurateur Ralph Brennan suggested determining how much BP is spending to rebuild its corporate image after the Deepwater Horizon disaster and “ask them to match that for us.” No such luck. However, BP did give spokeswoman Iris Cross a fancy makeover.

BP Launching National Ad Blitz After Christmas to Tout Gulf Recovery

WPP’s Ogilvy, Purple Strategies Behind the Campaign

By Rupal Parekh

Targeting the legions of Americans who’ll be home and relaxing on their couches the day after Christmas, BP is launching a 60-second ad Dec. 26 in an effort to convey progress in the cleanup of the Gulf Coast region after the Deepwater Horizon disaster in the spring of 2010.

It’s the first spot in a series of ads—which will once again feature BP employees—that will provide updates and run nationally through early 2012. The latest ad was produced by Purple Strategies, which worked in tandem with Ogilvy on the digital ads, and Ogilvy PR in Washington, which is working on a social-media campaign.

The ad marks BP’s first since late 2010. In the days following the massive oil spill, BP launched its “Voices of BP” campaign, which featured employees promising Americans that the company would restore the Gulf Coast and rectify damage to the environment caused by the oil spill. A subsequent campaign, “Voices of the Gulf,” made local business and community leaders the stars of the ads, promoting tourism along the Gulf Coast.

The latest messaging is timed to coincide with the shifting of BP’s efforts from cleanup into an environmental-restoration and -research phase. In a statement, Geoff Morrell, BP America’s VP-communications said: “We made a commitment not only to restore the Gulf but also to keep the American people informed of that effort. We’ve made significant strides over the past year and believe it’s a good time to provide a progress report to the nation.”