By Adrian Gianforti
I thought working at a PR agency right out of college was career suicide. In fact, I didn’t even consider PR agencies to be an option for me. I had a ballooned ego and I thought I was going to be a big event planner in New York City and be, well, fabulous. All I heard over the years was that at a PR agency, you would be doing ‘grunt’ work the entire time for little pay, and never rise unless you moved around.
Here’s what I got wrong: I wasn’t fabulous in New York City. I had made it into an event design firm, as a temp, which turned out to be one of my career’s most thankless, exhausting jobs. I was broke and struggling to find full-time work because it was 2008. I was lost and felt like I had no career prospects.
If I had a better idea about PR –from getting exposure to a huge variety of work to working with some of the most creative and strategic minds–I would have made some different decisions. I wouldn’t figure this out until after three years working in government, two years of graduate school, and a year of freelance consulting. Chance and opportunity (not “LUCK” – I don’t love when females chalk up their success to luck, I worked my tail off) met when I was presenting a deck to a nonprofit client’s board members at Ogilvy’s Washington, DC office. A woman who chaired the board asked me if I was looking for a job in consulting when I was asking her where the bathroom was, and within a month I was walking through the bright red doors of Ogilvy.
PR agencies are a lot of work, and the compensation can always improve. But they teach you an incredibly valuable skill; team collaboration. Yes, your project management, writing, design, creative, etc. skills will also improve with the client work; but I was always pushing myself to be a better colleague. Clients can be tough, like, really, really tough. And having a team you can be in the trenches with is essential. I’m reminded of the old adage, “We’re consultants, not contractors,” which always had a negative ring to me. In reality, we were contractors; hired guns to accomplish an objective. Whether it be brand awareness, selling products, securing media placements, and so on–our jobs are to make the client look good, full stop. And after 10+ years of making clients look good, I decided it was time to see what the other side looked like.
Now serving as an internal marketing and communications lead at the brand heritage agency History Factory, I walk this line of client and contractor. I consult with my team on what will make them successful in the market, while also working, with outside agency support, to accomplish those same objectives of my old clients. This is why I’m delighted to share an important discussion I recently had with the Page Society members.
Agency vs. Client
What does my story tell you about agency life? Working with the best and the brightest comes in all forms, and client work gives you the best of both worlds. Yes, there are bad clients out there, but there are incredibly good ones. When I worked with the Mastercard Foundation, the work gave me purpose, and that in large part was because the Foundation team valued me and my team as true partners. So much so that I was slated to go overseas and work with their new Kenya team in Nairobi for two years, but the COVID-19 pandemic had other plans in store for me.
This trust and access from this client, and others, are two of the key pillars Page agency members highlighted as a critical part of the success of an agency/client relationship. ‘Having a seat at the table’ provides the transparency and engagement a client manager needs to fully understand the client’s business. Otherwise, they are being delivered information in a vacuum, or at the very least, through several filters that can make for a shaky foundation. This leads me to the third point – business acumen.
Whether you’re a global NGO or a consumer products company, we’re all running a business at the end of the day. And the only way an agency will be successful is to be allowed to have a clearer connection between the work and business outcomes. That’s not to be confused with not seeing the value of say, a trade publication hit. That will always have value because we need to show progress to internal stakeholders. But let’s take a moment to think about how that trade publication placement came to be; trade articles are LONG and often very technical. That media pitcher not only has to know the business, but she also needs to know how to field questions from a reporter who is an expert on her client’s business. Not to mention that getting that reporter’s attention can be a lengthy, grueling process because they’re inundated with PR people.
All this is to say (and the final point from the Page discussion): Clients would benefit by knowing the business of the agency business. There’s an expectation to serve up the latest industry trends; the best creative; and the most impactful campaigns – yet, budgets are tighter and agency teams are often juggling multiple client projects while trying to treat each client like their ‘only’ client. This is a toughjob. I’ve seen many people get burnt out, realize the job is not for them, or in my case – want a new challenge.
Agency people stick it out because they can. Because they can’t see themselves anywhere else, and they love the work. They strive to make the relationship with clients better, the work more meaningful, and the outcomes even bigger. It’s important to know that this job isn’t for the faint of heart, but the rewards are a huge payoff. Would I ever go back to an agency? Maybe. If they’ll have me
Adrian Giaforti is senior director of marketing and communications at History Factory. Culpwrit asked her to expand on her personal career insights following a recent Page corporate/agency panel that she moderated.