Question

Topic: Career/Training

What Is Strategic Planning?

Posted by Anonymous on 10/23/2004 at 5:11 AM ET 45 Points
I'm a strategy consultant, currently posted with a "Big 3" strategy consuting firm, focusing on branding & marketing clients.

I'm interested in working within an ad agency environment because the proximity to the execution side attracts me.

My question is three-fold:

(1) I'd like to have some insight (or pointers; I have googled, but without any satisfactory results) into what strategic planners do inside ad agencies. Seems to me that SPs neither have the benefit of facing clients as account folks do that, nor the benefit of actually producing anything creative, executionally speaking. Is this an accurate read on the structure of an agency?

(2) What are the exit opportunities open to strategic planners if they wish to leave an agency environment and move on to other careers? Can the skillset, given that it's fairly generic in being of a fundamental strategic nature, be transferred to regular business at client side? I don't mean only marketing divisions at client firms, I mean corporate business/strategy planning side of things. Are there any examples of strategic planners going on to "C" level positions?

(3) Are SPs considered to be well paid in general, at least within an agency context?

Thanks for any thoughts!
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RESPONSES

  • Posted on 10/23/2004 at 11:03 PM Accepted
    I'll offer some observations. Understand that I'm a strategic planning consultant (like you), and I've never worked at an advertising agency.

    First, strategic planning (and strategic thinking) is not a common skill or practice in many businesses -- especially smaller ones. When a novice client goes to an advertising agency, they often want a lot more than advertising; they want full-service marketing, especially strategy guidance.

    Agencies traditionally sell advertising. They take a client's objectives and strategies and create advertising that (they hope) will accomplish the objectives. They usually don't add a lot of value from a strategic standpoint.

    Enter the agency strategic planner. As important as the function is, nobody appreciates it. If clients understood strategy, they'd come to the agency with the strategy and ask them to execute against it. If agencies weren't so focused on creative execution they'd appreciate strategy more than they do.

    Net, I'd be concerned that you're jumping into a situation where you could well be feeding strawberries to the swine. Nobody will apprecaite the value you bring, and they'll view you as an extra appendage to the account team.

    And if/when you decide to leave the agency not many people will understand what you've been doing for the last x years as a strategic planning guy at an advertising agency.

    My $0.02 worth ... from a guy who has been working with agencies and clients for a long time now.
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