Out with a whimper

It's Monday morning as I write this. And like you, harbor a certain amount of dread about the upcoming work week. In fact, I'm only a couple hours away from "punching" in.

The dread is not borne from an oversupply of challenges. Or because the work is too difficult. 

It's not. 

Whereas at one point in my less-than-illustrious career, I was writing potential Super Bowl spots (this years will be my 31st consecutive year without a contender) and sitting side-by-side with CEOs to steward Fortune 100 brands, now I am doing the work of a marketing journeyman. 

No need to get into specifics, suffice it to say, the hardest part of my job these days is not solving the ask. It's figuring out what the ask is.

Hence, the birth of the ADLOB -- Adlike Objects. Things that look, smell and taste like an ad, but aren't, lest they attract the microscopic attention and criticism of 1/3 the staff on the company org. chart.

Similarly, since we've all been downsized (in the mass communications sense of the word) to the digital domain, the work, such as it is, is clouded by a swirl of indecipherable acronyms. 

I fondly remember the day when a campaign would consist of a TV spot, 3 print ads, a radio spot, a full page newspaper (preferably long copy) and maybe even some point of sale executions.

Today, the word 'campaign' is tossed around with such nonchalance it can be used to describe an email blast, a banner ad and an engagement card. All with the mandatory appearance of luggage that matches. As if anyone remembers.

Dissecting this paradigm is clearly not my wheelhouse. For that I suggest you read Bob Hoffman's take on advertising's reversal of fortune, here. Bob hails from academia, plus a few hundred years in the biz, and has a distinctively scholarly, and expectedly acidic take on all this. 

Here's a small sample.

No point to all this, except that my 65th birthday is just around the corner. And a week from now will mark my second anniversary of being on staff and more vesting of my less-than-sizable equity. 

In other words, the finish line is in sight. 

But so is that dirty nursing home I swore to never lay down in. Guess it's time to grab my vacuum, put on my best Willy Loman face, punch in and make with the small stuff.