DESPITE SOME BIGGEST NAMES IN THE AD WORLD COMMENTING THAT CREATIVITY CANNOT BE LEARNT SIMPLY BY GETTING AN MBA DEGREE, THEY DO GRUDGINGLY ACCEPT THAT AN MBA PREPARES PEOPLE TO MANAGE A MULTITUDE OF TASKS IN THE AD INDUSTRY BETTER THAN THEM
A chewing gum can light up a complete village, a soft drink can make you popular with the ladies, a bank can take care of all your financial worries for the future… Advertising is mostly intended to persuade an audience to purchase or take some action upon products or services, which is cuddled around a power idea that strikes the decision chords of the consumers. Cutting the elongated story short, how does one learn how to get the ‘great creative idea’? Cutting it further, can an MBA education help an individual in becoming more adept at creativity – especially with exhaustive subjects on innovation, business process reengineering, branding and consumer marketing being taught?
On the positive side to the debate is the fact that a B-school education teaches the student much more about marketing than can ever be learnt by a pure-experience bred ad industry professional – really, would an ad-industry professional ever truly understand the concepts of Johari Window and perception management? Better is the point that while an MBA graduate is busy in making ads that lead to closing the sale, the ad-industry ‘creative’ professional is simply bent on creating the “world’s most creative ad,” so to speak, sales be damned. But then again, on the huge negative side is the fact that a Zoo Zoo would never have been a Zoo Zoo if an MBA had tried to create the idea. In other words, creativity – critics claim – requires those extra grey cells that are God and parents gifted, through exposure and education while growing up, and not just through an MBA school. So where do MBAs stand on this?
Arvind Wable, Executive Director & CEO-Delhi, Draft FCB-Ulka, also an IIM-A alumni, believes creativity and management are completely cohesive in the ad world and that a good strategy is as important as creativity – “The degree develops marketing skills, makes you understand the strategy behind it and most importantly, makes you well planned. All this give rise to advertising where both skills meet.”
V. Sunil, Executive Creative Director, Wieden+Kennedy, agrees with Wable’s concept that a B-school degree is relevant in the ad world, though in its own place. Sunil (who’s most recent creation is the Indigo Airline ad, which, while being creative, focuses on ensuring that the viewer understands Indigo gets you ‘there’ on time!) says, “A lot of time is invested in planning and deciding what the advertisement should communicate to its target audience. It is the wholesome effort of a team to make a great ad, to bring out the vision of the brand with the creative vision of the script, music and lyrics well planned in advance and then executed. A degree in management helps one execute in a planned way.”
Rahul Nanda, Chief Operating Officer, Webchutney, a leading interactive consultancy in India, disagrees to an extent and feels that a B-School degree is essential when it comes to planning and account management, but not in creativity – “Management surely is important everywhere and it sure makes the processes easier in advertising, but the main onus still remains on the creative guys.”
Advertising companies have evolved today because they have successfully diversified into complete media consulting firms. Says Viraj Kalra, Head, Planman Marcom and an IIPM alumnus, “The money they receive from their overall media businesses are much higher compared to the pure advertising portion of it.” One example being father-daughter duo of Sam and Lara Balsara, who’ve now diversified their Rs.25 billion firm Madison into 20 units across 9 specialized functions in advertising, media, out-of-home, PR, rural, retail, entertainment, mobile and sports, at the same time employing over 800 communication professionals, a significant bunch being MBA graduates. Arvind Sharma, Chairman and CEO, Leo Burnett India, goes one step further and accepts to 4Ps B&M that he even uses MBAs for targetted creativity, “Leo Burnett has been a regular recruiter at the business school campuses for two decades. They say that great campaigns are born out of great briefs.
Great briefs are an outcome of considerable amount of analysis and pre-work – the kind of work MBAs are well trained to do.” Sharma adds that among MBAs, those with a good innate understanding of people and communications are preferred. The debate is surely here to stay and would require some more years of analysis to end. For now, MBAs in the ad world are an inevitability.
For more articles, Click on IIPM Article.A chewing gum can light up a complete village, a soft drink can make you popular with the ladies, a bank can take care of all your financial worries for the future… Advertising is mostly intended to persuade an audience to purchase or take some action upon products or services, which is cuddled around a power idea that strikes the decision chords of the consumers. Cutting the elongated story short, how does one learn how to get the ‘great creative idea’? Cutting it further, can an MBA education help an individual in becoming more adept at creativity – especially with exhaustive subjects on innovation, business process reengineering, branding and consumer marketing being taught?
On the positive side to the debate is the fact that a B-school education teaches the student much more about marketing than can ever be learnt by a pure-experience bred ad industry professional – really, would an ad-industry professional ever truly understand the concepts of Johari Window and perception management? Better is the point that while an MBA graduate is busy in making ads that lead to closing the sale, the ad-industry ‘creative’ professional is simply bent on creating the “world’s most creative ad,” so to speak, sales be damned. But then again, on the huge negative side is the fact that a Zoo Zoo would never have been a Zoo Zoo if an MBA had tried to create the idea. In other words, creativity – critics claim – requires those extra grey cells that are God and parents gifted, through exposure and education while growing up, and not just through an MBA school. So where do MBAs stand on this?
Arvind Wable, Executive Director & CEO-Delhi, Draft FCB-Ulka, also an IIM-A alumni, believes creativity and management are completely cohesive in the ad world and that a good strategy is as important as creativity – “The degree develops marketing skills, makes you understand the strategy behind it and most importantly, makes you well planned. All this give rise to advertising where both skills meet.”
V. Sunil, Executive Creative Director, Wieden+Kennedy, agrees with Wable’s concept that a B-school degree is relevant in the ad world, though in its own place. Sunil (who’s most recent creation is the Indigo Airline ad, which, while being creative, focuses on ensuring that the viewer understands Indigo gets you ‘there’ on time!) says, “A lot of time is invested in planning and deciding what the advertisement should communicate to its target audience. It is the wholesome effort of a team to make a great ad, to bring out the vision of the brand with the creative vision of the script, music and lyrics well planned in advance and then executed. A degree in management helps one execute in a planned way.”
Rahul Nanda, Chief Operating Officer, Webchutney, a leading interactive consultancy in India, disagrees to an extent and feels that a B-School degree is essential when it comes to planning and account management, but not in creativity – “Management surely is important everywhere and it sure makes the processes easier in advertising, but the main onus still remains on the creative guys.”
Advertising companies have evolved today because they have successfully diversified into complete media consulting firms. Says Viraj Kalra, Head, Planman Marcom and an IIPM alumnus, “The money they receive from their overall media businesses are much higher compared to the pure advertising portion of it.” One example being father-daughter duo of Sam and Lara Balsara, who’ve now diversified their Rs.25 billion firm Madison into 20 units across 9 specialized functions in advertising, media, out-of-home, PR, rural, retail, entertainment, mobile and sports, at the same time employing over 800 communication professionals, a significant bunch being MBA graduates. Arvind Sharma, Chairman and CEO, Leo Burnett India, goes one step further and accepts to 4Ps B&M that he even uses MBAs for targetted creativity, “Leo Burnett has been a regular recruiter at the business school campuses for two decades. They say that great campaigns are born out of great briefs.
Great briefs are an outcome of considerable amount of analysis and pre-work – the kind of work MBAs are well trained to do.” Sharma adds that among MBAs, those with a good innate understanding of people and communications are preferred. The debate is surely here to stay and would require some more years of analysis to end. For now, MBAs in the ad world are an inevitability.
Swati Sharma
Source : IIPM Editorial, 2010.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri and Arindam chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).
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