While advertising agency Fortune Promoseven’s team awaited the announcement of winners in the MENA Cristal Festival advertising awards in February, Executive asked Tarek Miknas, Promoseven Group chief executive officer, about the bottom line on talent.
- What is the main benefit of winning an award for creativity?
We are a creative business and I think the awards work on two levels. Whether we like it or not, it is the currency in advertising. It is like the film business; when a movie gets awarded, people take more notice. The way that awards are working in this day and age is that clients want results. They want tangible, tractable, auditable results and they want solutions to business problems. Ninety-nine percent of our case studies are business solutions delivered creatively and effectively. We are not in the business of creating art; we are in the business of creating commercial art.
- Do advertising awards give you a boost in the public eye when compared with, for example, an Oscar?
It gives us industry boost. We are purely a talent-led industry. It is an ideas business and people are not our most precious asset – they are our only asset. And the only way to attract people is when they get excited about working for the brand that you represent. It is very different when people work from an emotional place than when they are working from paycheck to paycheck.
- In your quest to make the creative life pay, were there any impacts on the business side from the economic downturn in 2008?
If we are talking about financial reward, being part of the creative industry has made it always very challenging to get paid. Especially during the recession, clients will always challenge you and say, ‘other guys will do it for half [as much].’
But… I think if you have a substantially better product, clients will make the budgets for it because they need their brands to become famous.
- Did the recession in 2009 result in layoffs in agencies and did those include layoffs of creatives?
We had to lay people off, of course. It is probably the worst part of the job. Cuts were across the board. No part of the agency was protected but we retain our best talent and are constantly trolling for the best you can get. Probably all agencies are.
- Is retaining talent a challenge in this region?
I think it is; you see a lot of the great talents move from one place to another.
- How difficult is it to manage creative talent from the HR side?
Managing creative talent is probably the hardest thing in the world because the emotions are always all over the place and there is a certain level of ego. It is not like a typical business where you ask, ‘Did you clock your hours? Did you fill out your time sheets?’ But the most important thing for creatives is that you understand what they are going through and that you care about the product as much as they do.
- Does caring for the product and creative impulses cause a conflict with bottom line targets?
Of course it will create that conflict. [But] I don’t think for one minute that we can take the foot off the gas on the product.
“Managing creative talent is probably the hardest thing in the world”
