Putting your job description in a box is the best way to kill creativity
After a trip to the Blue Mountains over the long weekend, Beyond Intent’s Mike McGarry got to thinking about the boxes adlanders are overly keen to put themselves in.
I was staying in the Blue Mountains at an Airbnb over the weekend. Our host (let’s call her Helen to protect her identity) caught me off guard when on the way out the door on Saturday afternoon she turned around and asked: “Tell me, what is it that you do for work exactly?”.
Source: Wikipedia
After coming back with a somewhat vague answer about advertising, technology and sales, I tacked on: “Why do you ask?”. I’m not sure why I asked her that. Perhaps it was because I was in holiday mode and wasn’t expecting a professional question from someone that had taken a self-proclaimed “sea change” 18 years ago.
Isn’t this going a bit too far? Almost Douglas Adams-ish in its thinking…
“What do you do for a crust”?
Thinks. Why does she want to know? Who will she tell? What does she want from me? It must be something… a complete stranger asks my occupation… hmmm…. odd…. is she recording this conversation.? Taking voice prints for later use .. somehow? Maybe she’ll mix the words up, accuse me of something and then blackmail me.
For Gawd’s sake. She was making CONVERSATION! Remember that thing? The one stuff that a smartphone doesn’t….
Talk about over thinking something ….
I think you are onto something here. The person who asked about your job description ( let’s not call her Helen – If you want to protect her identity let’s not call her anything) was doing what 99% of people do, she was trying to get hold of a comfortable personal reference point, or as you stated, put you in a box.
I have always thought that the best way to work in advertising, is to have a group of talented people assigned to each area of the profession, and to freely exchange ideas and work practices via workshopping, meetings and frequent exchange.
Creative people need to be free to grow, which means they must be free to share and to experiment, they must also be moderately reckless, and from time to time a little bit silly.
A wrong idea and a giant faux pas, are bad things in practice but wonderful things in rehearsal or experiment.
‘Senior Sales Engineer’ for a company that offers data and insights so that you can sell more stuff.
A GP would say: I make people healthy again
A social worker: I help people who often have not received much support.
SSE: Buy more, so you can sell more.
There is your answer isnt it?
(Not poking fun at what you do. I bet it is a very skillful and technical role, which enables corporates to sell more stuff.)