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Don’t downplay Gen Z in advertising, we’ve only ever known digital disruption

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By Trinity Taylor

Trinity Taylor, a Gen Z account manager at Lucky Generals, warns the industry not to underestimate the ingenuity of the supposed juniors; you’re on their turf now.

TikTok, iced coffee, and clouds of vape smoke are probably what spring to mind when you think of Gen Z creatives, but there is way more to us than you might think.

As Gen Z-ers in the UK advertising world, we don’t just adapt to digital trends—we drive them.

We’re the first generation to grow up in social media, watching it evolve from picture-perfect Instagram posts to a space that now values authenticity and openness through TikTok. This isn’t just our space; we helped create this turf. In an industry that’s still catching up to the idea that authenticity often beats perfection, we have a distinct competitive advantage.

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Here’s what I’ve observed while navigating the ad world as a Gen Z-er, as well as some of my thoughts on how we can use our generational strengths to keep pushing boundaries.

1. Embrace newness

It’s a challenging market at the moment and with growing pressures, it’s understandable that there is desire to stick to the tried and tested. But Gen Z grew up in a constantly shifting digital and cultural landscape, where everything from social media to fashion trends evolve rapidly. It’s all we know. What’s ‘in’ today may well be outdated tomorrow, change feels less intimidating and meticulousness less essential.

Crucially, this has shown us that playing it safe or striving for perfection isn’t just outdated—it’s downright boring. As audiences increasingly seek authenticity over flawlessness, brands like Ryanair and Duolingo are leaning into self-deprecating humor and embracing a more ‘real’ approach. Ten years ago, those kinds of campaigns might have been seen as risky or even disastrous. Today, they’re examples of how thinking outside the box (or even tearing the box apart) can resonate with audiences. My advice to Gen Zs here; use your bravery to push both brands and your colleagues out of their comfort zones. Encourage them to try new things, jump on trends, and have more fun with brands. Now, it’s about connection as much as perfection.

2. Fluidity is your friend

In advertising, roles can often feel like rigid boxes—creatives on one side, account managers on the other. But Gen Z, we’re often criticized (or praised, depending on who you ask) for being anti-label and “too woke.” While these labels might sound like buzzwords, they actually highlight an important point: we’re used to fluidity, and that’s a strength.

Just because you’re an account person doesn’t mean your thoughts on the creative process don’t matter. And if you’re on the creative team, don’t shy away from voicing your opinion on client communications.

One of the best things we can do as juniors in the industry and something that is actively required of us at Luckies is to ask questions and seek input from everyone, regardless of their job title. It’s in these cross-role conversations that the magic often happens. So, don’t let traditional job descriptions limit you. Your perspective is valuable, and sometimes, the best ideas come from the most unexpected places.

3. Don’t get pigeonholed

Let’s face it: the shift in media consumption habits has been dramatic. People are watching less TV and spending more time scrolling through their feeds. As the generation that grew up with, and in many ways, shaped social media, we’re often viewed as the go-to experts for all things social. It’s flattering, sure, but it can also be limiting.

My advice?

Don’t let yourself be pigeonholed as just the ‘social media expert.’ While it’s true that we bring invaluable insights into the world of social, we also have the potential to elevate the entire creative process. Use your knowledge of social trends, technology, and emerging tools such as AI to bring fresh ideas to the table across all aspects of a campaign. We’re more than just the people who know how to make a TikTok go viral—we’re the ones who can help shape the future of advertising as a whole.

Own your Gen Z perspective

Being a Gen Z-er in the advertising industry is a bit like being the new kid in school. There’s a lot to learn, a lot to prove, but also a lot of opportunity to bring something fresh and exciting to the table. We’ve grown up in a world where change is the only constant, and that makes us uniquely equipped to thrive in an industry that’s all about evolution and creativity.

So, embrace the new, break down those silos, and don’t let yourself be pigeonholed. Our generation has the potential to bring about real, meaningful change in the way brands communicate and connect with their audiences. And if we can do that while having a little fun along the way, even better.

By Trinity Taylor

Sourced from The Drum

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Ad industry needs to be kinder, says Saatchi & Saatchi CSO Richard Huntington

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By Richard Draycott,

In the second part of his Politics for Drummies podcast, the chief strategy officer discusses the complexities of British politics and how the ad industry could help revive the category.

Kicking off part two of our Politics for Drummies discussion with Richard Huntington, the chief strategy officer at the ad agency that swept Margaret Thatcher into office 45 years ago, podcast host Alastair Duncan poses the challenging question of which politicians Huntington actually admires.

“Jumping into my head is Shirley Williams,” answers Saatchi & Saatchi’s Huntington, “because of the work that she did around comprehensive education in the 1960s and how close she came to genuinely changing the education system. I’m also currently revisiting Harold Wilson. There’s some slight historical revisionism around Wilson and what he actually achieved. Labour sort of hate him because he wasn’t particularly principled, but look at the dramatic social change that happened in the late 60s and we are still living with that today every day of our lives.”

He goes on: “I am a huge admirer of Keir Starmer for nothing more than the discipline he’s delivering. Divided parties do not win elections and that is what he has fundamentally done in four short years to the point where, you know, it is just chaos over the other side.”

Huntington is an active and vocal advocate of mental health reform in the workplace and talks candidly about how he deals with his own mental health and how he is enabling people within his organization to face mental health challenges together with no shame.

“If you start talking about your poor mental health, you’re really just saying to your employer and your clients, ‘I can’t do it…’ But if somebody who is middle-aged, white, male, heterosexual and with a relatively good career can’t say something about this, then how the fuck is anybody else going to volunteer that information?

“What happened as a result of my saying something about my mental health was that people began getting in contact with me and, privately and personally, we realized it was a serious problem. So many people are just papering over the cracks the entire time to hold it together.”

Compassion, politics and advertising seldom go hand in hand, but Huntington believes we can only become better at what we do if advertising cultures change.

“We’re such a competitive business and, in advertising, everything’s either brilliant or shit – ‘They’re a brilliant agency, they’re a shit agency.’ We haven’t traditionally been particularly kind. Whether we can be kinder and whether we can build kinder cultures is the thing that I just don’t get about our business. It isn’t hard to be hard on the work and easy on the people. But the number of agencies and agency leaders that genuinely do that and don’t accidentally boil over into the other is not, in my experience, universal.”

Feature Image Credit: Saatchi & Saatchi strategy leader Richard Huntington

By Richard Draycott,

Sourced from The Drum

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Are ‘creative agencies’ killing creativity?

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By Nick Horne 

When I say that creative agencies are killing creativity, don’t get me wrong. I’m not trying to set up an all-out war with particular agencies. It’s not about agencies that fall into the ‘creative’ category per se. It’s the term ‘creative agency’ itself.

It’s a conceit invented to save the ‘ad’ agencies of old from crumbling under the up-surge of digital. In theory, it moved them away from being the TV agency in the mind of marketers, allowing them to maintain a bigger piece of the pie.

Likewise ‘smart marketing’: for some it’s a fair title, but for others it’s been a mask. An excuse to pitch the ‘we do digital, too’ idea when really, they’re creating a 15-second cut-down for social because digital is a loss leader to the bit they really want, the 60-second TV or cinema ad.

What does it mean to be creative?

The term was invented at a time when the more interesting and creative work was happening in non-traditional media. And so, a land grab was made on the ownership of creativity. As a result, every other media channel now seems to operate in service of proving the value of those big shoots.

Print and radio have become devalued and frequently lacking creativity. The industry has created an environment where budgets and effort are being funnelled so much to one medium or production that we’re tying our hands and cutting off huge opportunities for brands to shine.

Digital has all too often been demoted to basic social cut-downs of the 60-second film, with little consideration of how well it suits the behaviour of that channel.

I’m not going to decry TV as a medium, and I’m not going to argue against the many cases made over recent years for the value of brand building or fame, and the contribution TV makes to that.

It’s important that we stick to the true meaning of creativity. As Paul Feldwick put it, it’s “the artistry and skills that make things popular and distinctive” and not “innovation or originality for its own sake”. But, nor is it the sole pursuit of one type of agency, and one form of creativity from very singular minds.

It’s important that we stretch to find (or craft) the new whether that’s in film or other mediums. The problem is that, currently, it feels like some creatives start with ‘where would we like to shoot next?’ and not ‘what’s the idea?’. Where there is an idea there sometimes seems to be little challenge as to ‘how do we express this best?’.

There are plenty of examples where digital- or experiential-first ideas have created huge fame. They were admittedly fewer and further between, but we never harnessed and made repeatable those instances before resorting back to the safety of the old proven mediums.

The problem

Big networks have gone on to hoover up creatives from a broader more diverse creative background but then create a culture where those creatives are also drawn toward writing the big scripts, they’re rewarded more for that, and it’s held in higher regard.

It shouldn’t be down to the creative teams to fight to broaden the output; that’s the role of agency leadership and the clients. The direction and brief from the start should be to look in every corner to unearth ideas.

I spoke to one senior creative who had recently left a big network and was excited at the opportunity to “do different stuff”; to not be hemmed in by this culture. On one hand, it’s a symptom of the creative drain. But on the other it’s wildly damning of the industry’s standards. Creatives used to leave agencyland when they couldn’t live up to its demands anymore, not the other way around.

It’s also in part the power dynamic created by the term ‘creative agency’. Ownership of creativity by a small, core group whose interest is really in a limited range of mediums will always create a conflict of interest.

The solution

It’s more important than ever both for the retention of creative minds and also for the creation of the best work that we re-introduce tension in the industry, and that clients demand it. Not fewer/larger networks taking up the larger share of budget, but more open and equal bites at creativity, agencies encouraged to challenge each other. Helping make us think more broadly and freer. Ultimately, creative minds with a focus once again on idea first before medium.

And there’s the crux: ideas should own the title ‘creativity’. Not companies, not media channels; ideas. And competition for the best idea is the only healthy way.

Feature Image Credit: Creatives aren’t challenging themselves enough, according to True’s Nick Horne / Ryan Quintal

By Nick Horne 

Sourced from The Drum

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‘Work won’t love you back’: adland workers share why they are quiet quitting

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By Ellen Ormesher

‘Quiet quitting’ has become the labour market’s latest buzzword. We hear the stories of advertising industry employees rethinking their work-life balance.

The premise of quiet quitting is straightforward. A somewhat updated version of the work-to-rule form of industrial action in which employees perform their duties to the letter in order to slow productivity, quiet quitters no longer go above and beyond their pay grade, instead maintaining firm boundaries when it comes to their work-life balance.

Many of the people The Drum spoke to say it has helped them to sustain their mental health and wellbeing in the face of what has been a turbulent few years. However, others say the phenomenon is merely a reassertion of healthy work-life boundaries.

But moreover, is quiet quitting really the answer to poor working conditions? Or does advertising’s insidious toxic culture require more organized, radical action?

The root causes

Emma* had four years of experience under her belt when she was the first marketing hire at a startup, where she was offered a £23,000 ($28,000) salary.

“I was then promoted to head up the marketing team of three and became a line manager after about 18 months at the company, and my salary increased to £30,000 ($35,000). I pushed for a raise in line with my expectations as I had been solely responsible for the marketing strategy and execution for over six months but due to working in a pre-revenue startup, it didn’t happen. I had also been promised shares in the business (one of the key benefits of joining a startup) since I joined, but nothing materialized.”

Her frustrations meant she was forced to reassess how much effort she was putting in for little reward, she says. “I spent the following few months logging on and logging off when contracted and taking my full hour lunch break. In a startup they want people to grind, but being underpaid with no shares – there was no way I was doing this. I became unmotivated and unexcited, and I no longer bought into the company’s mission. After about four months of quiet quitting, I decided to start looking elsewhere and then two months later signed a contract for a new company.”

But tales of high expectations met with low pay and gruelling hours are common throughout the advertising and marketing industry. Sarah* says the last several months in her marketing role have been “extremely demanding.”

“I have a broad and challenging remit – covering both internal and external communications. I work at least 15 hours over my contracted hours every week, rarely take proper breaks and struggle to switch off at weekends and even on holiday. There has been little to no let up from the pandemic period when things were even more challenging. Warning bells rang for me when, during what should’ve been a totally relaxing holiday, I was waking up plagued with anxious work thoughts; worries about the pile of emails and build-up of demands awaiting me on my return.”

‘Quiet quitting’ is just refusing to be exploited

Sarah explains she sees her decision to quiet quit as more of a reassertion of boundaries, of resetting and prioritizing self-care “rather than ‘slacking off’ or being unprofessional.”

“I’ve taken a conscious decision to change how I operate. I’ll never stop caring about doing a good job, but I’m taking steps to break the cycle of stress before it leads to burnout or worse. I’ll be logging on and off at reasonable times, taking daily breaks, declining non-essential meetings, blocking focus time in my diary and reclaiming headspace for the things that matter, rather than being all-consumed by work.”

Similarly, Simon* says: “Constantly going above and beyond in terms of workload and hours, despite receiving a salary far lower than the standard of pay in other professions and below what you really need to live a reasonably comfortable life in or around London, solidified the idea in my mind that work will never love you back.”

Another factor was the Covid-19 pandemic, he says. “Daily death-toll announcements, creaking public services and ongoing economic impacts really put everything in perspective. Brands and campaigns no longer felt like a big deal, and I started to resist the idea that I should spend any time beyond my working hours thinking about them.”

However, Simon says it is all these factors combined that have left him resolved to think of his job as just that. “A means of making money to feed my family, pay my bills and fund my lifestyle.”

He says: “I now strongly resist the idea that one’s job should be the sole avenue for self-actualization – life is finite and I don’t want to spend it caught up in the stress of work. Is this quiet quitting or just refusing to be exploited and manipulated?

”Has it cost me in terms of advancement, my relationship with management or my daily passion and motivation? Probably. But these are a price worth paying for a balanced life and a slightly freer existence.”

Work-to-rule

For some adland workers, however, the phenomenon of quiet quitting has its limitations. Frankie* says it’s a privilege to be able to act in this way because many marginalized groups have to go above and beyond to prove themselves within the workplace. “This is why in pop culture the coaster archetype is often a suburban white guy,” they say.

“At the start of my career [across journalism and marketing], I often worked nights and weekends for years. It took getting to director level to be able to quiet quit.“

Frankie says it’s also an unfulfilling position to be in. They describe quiet quitting as “an individual rebellion that doesn’t change anything.“

“For it to have real impact it needs to be organized and collective. This would also be more inclusive of those that just can’t afford to work to rule. In fact, in organizing circles, work-to-rule is an established tactic, so perhaps the future of this trend is in coordinating and organizing it.”

*Names have been changed to protect identities

Feature Image Credit: AdobeStock

By Ellen Ormesher

Sourced from The Drum

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