Know-How Exchange : Student Questions

Dear mhrsaurabh,

One thing at a time.

Doing another course after your MBA may prove you can acquire another qualification but what it may not do is make you any more employable.

The idea of "getting a better job" is a worthy goal for sure, but this will always depend on your notions of what's "better".

Until you've got some experience under your belt and until you've been through a few hard knock situations, your aspiration for what ever is just over the horizon may trip you up.

The perfect job does not exist.

The truth is that the grass is NO greener over there (where ever "there" is) than it is where you'll be at any point in the future.

What matters to potential employers is what you can do for them, not the number of qualifications you've clocked up for you.

Doing an animation course may help you if you want to become an animator.

However, few ad agencies that I'm aware of retain animators as full time staff. Much of that kind of work is farmed out to outside studios that produce all kinds of different projects for all kinds of different clients.

If your intention is to enter the creative side of the ad world, the skills your creative director will be looking for revolve around your ability to write compelling copy, or your ability to lay out a great looking ad.

Really great creatives can do both.

Be warned: competition for entry level creative positions in design and advertising is stiff and you'll be starting at or near the bottom.
And sadly, this rule applies REGARDLESS of the number of qualifications you've got.

You'll be of no use to your creative director if you can't work well with others, or if you're incapable of doing as you're told. Life in a real creative environment is VERY different to life in a college design studio.

In the creative world of design and advertising your qualifications might impress one or two people OUTSIDE the agency. But again, inside, the number of MBA's you've got will mean very little and in truth will play second fiddle to your ability to come up with ideas.

If you don't have an idea in your head, or if your ideas fail to enhance the benefits of the products and services you'll be working on, your career in advertising might be short lived.

Unless your creative and idea-generation ability is Biblical in its proportions, in your early weeks and months of working in a real agency you'll probably be assisting someone senior.

This means you'll be doing a lot of listening, a lot of learning, and, if you've got any sense at all, you'll be asking lots of questions but otherwise keeping your mouth firmly shut.

There's thinking that suggests that the squeaky wheel gets the grease. But squeaky wheels that have been greased and that continue to squeak can be replaced.

So, what you'll be doing is proving your worth and you'll be doing this by building your skills, and by learning from senior staff, many of whom may be younger than you.

This will also provide you one vital lesson that NO course will teach, no matter what school it's taught in or what letters it gives you after your name.

That lesson is this: the value of working you butt off.

I hope this helps. Good luck to you.

Gary Bloomer
Wilmington, DE, USA