When I grow up I’d like to be more like a start-up
Justin’s ‘Agile versus Strategy‘ post has tapped an excellent debate.
One of the most interesting comments comes from R/GA’s William Charnock, who makes the point that traditional ad agencies got rid of ‘the makers’:
They outsourced production to directors, photographers, digital technology specialists etc and carved off media execution to separate media agencies. With no ability to prototype, experiment or execute in the real world, the only option for them was to focus on ‘conceptual thinking’ or ‘BDUF’.
Some forward thinking agencies seem to be addressing this, if only on a small scale, setting up labs for experimentation (a la Ogilvy, BBH, Media labs etc.); creating partnerships with content creators, VC’s and start-ups (who truly are the leaders in market agility and fast fail learning/prototyping).
As William and other commenters say, it’s the start-ups who are the true leaders in this space – not least in terms of overall value creation. Indeed, you could argue that the ‘start up culture’ of high-growth tech start-ups has become a defining (and disruptive) force in work cultures well beyond tech, marketing and media.
