Why can't ad agencies retain talent?

Log on to the websites of big ad agencies or portals like agencyfaqs and exchange4media, and you see movement. Advertising account movement and executive movement. Life as normal in the advertising industry?

Well, maybe, maybe not. Look closely, and you see restlessness. Most curiously, at the entry to mid-hierarchy levels.

It's curious because monotony and scuttled ambition are not what you associate with the ad industry, thrive as it does on the proverbial "fire in the belly" of youngsters. So what is it — a pay packet chase? Even this is supposed to be alien to an industry that prides itself on job satisfaction above all else.

So, what gives?

A young B-school grad has hopped from Ulka to JWT and now Leo Burnett, all within three years, and she doesn't see anything peculiar about it. With an attrition rate touching 30-40 per cent at some agencies, it wouldn't seem abnormal either. But that's no reason to avoid a good hard think.

"It's a big problem," admits Santosh Desai, president, McCann Erickson, attributing the industry's attrition rate to the plethora of new players looking for ad industry experience.

"There are lots of other domains coming up, like radio, which attract people from the creative side as well," he says.

Ad people are so sought after, adds Santosh Sood, COO, Rediffusion DYR, because advertising teaches them how to multi-task and grapple with a wide cross-section of the Indian market. No wonder boom industries like retail, finance, automobiles, banking, insurance and telecom are so keen on youngsters who've cut their teeth in advertising.

To Josy Paul, national creative director, David, high attrition is a function of the general effervescence in the industry. "There's too much happening out there in the communication space, too fast. The old order is unable to come to terms with this."

Blame the expansion of ad agencies into non-creative fields too, say other observers. As Tarun Das, director, integrated ideas, Oxygen, says, the classic triangle of client, servicing and agency has been shaken up with media and other functions assuming key roles.

"In certain agencies, non-creative people far outnumber the creative ones," says Das. So this raises the chance of someone hopping away.

What's the solution?

Perhaps a stronger sense that an adperson is an adperson is an adperson, dedicated to the proposition that creative persuasion doth make for progress.

"Unless we trim the flab and reorganise the industry," says R Balakrishnan of Lowe, "it will not be able to deliver and retain talent."

The reasoning: people in advertising should be people who are truly passionate about the discipline. It would help, too, if clients understood that passion should not be used to replace remuneration. Good work deserves good pay.