Advertisers are like hillbillies. Once you work at one agency for any length of time, you'll find that through the laws of natural attrition, you've got kin at most agencies in the city. They wear a lot of black and they even look like you.I had dinner with a three agency types last night.
Two of us still work together but the other two are now elsewhere.
One's a big mucky muck, high-powered type. She collects a big salary, but it comes with big expectations. The other could be Prime Minister of Canada and still find time to coach little league. She's that organized. She talks faster than I can think. Last year she closed the door on advertising and went client side, to a major domestic charity.
Once we'd exhausted the inevitable topics - who's sleeping with who, and who's been caught sleeping with who -- our talk turned, as it often does, to that elusive work-life balance.
High mucky muck was checking her Blackberry periodically through the evening. Why? Because her agency corporate culture encourages over-work. It's not unusual, she said, to receive and respond to work emails at 10 p.m. at night. In fact, she told us, one of her direct reports had responded to one of her messages (nothing urgent, even) at 2:30 in the morning.
As someone who has been at the bedside of someone who took their last breath, I can say this with complete confidence: No one, on their deathbed, ever thought, "Hey, I should have worked more weekends".
That's not to say that you don't give a solid day's work for a day's pay. Or that you show up on time and give it everything you've got.
But really -- is that all that there is?
I sure as hell hope not.
I know people who are logistics specialists for international development agencies. In huge refugee migrations of tens of thousands of people, my friends are responsible for calculating and ensuring the fair distribution of rations. If they don't do their job right, people will die.
That sounds like something that should keep you up until 2:30 in the morning. But selling tampons? Or packaged soup? Or cell phone plans?
Please!
Addiction to work is every bit as damaging as addiction to other substances.
Okay, that's it. Back to work.
4 comments:
AMEN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Love this, Franny. I would write something very similar myself if I weren't afraid of the comments I'd get. :)
Excellent post. I agree with you completely. Many people take themselves way too seriously when it comes to work. And it just ain't healthy.
Ditto. I'm sure you already know that I share these views. After you've been through enough sh*t in your life - you start to realize what's important - and what is not.
Some people simply choose not to have anything else in their life - and couldn't learn a life lesson if it slapped them in the face.
Doctors should be working at 2am...world leaders too...There's nothing else so pressing that one needs to burn so hard.
Couldn't agree more.
I suppose people who love their job and would do it for free may qualify under the humanitarian worker exemption. :)
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