February 2, 2005

pr hell

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Gapingvoid regular Dave Parmet was fired from his PR job yesterday:

There’s a lot of fear in the air. The agencies fear the clients, the media and the real possibility of missing the Next Big Thing™.

In case no one got it, I was canned yesterday. Well my wife thought the entry was obvious but who knows. Nothing so romantic as being fired for blogging. But while the powers that be were running around terrified of what the new world might mean and talking about control and message development, I was running around shouting ‘embrace the new thing.’ So maybe in the end it was me who didn’t ‘get it.’

I’m fine. I’ve got some leads and some freelance work to tide me over. I might even start a PR / marketing blog although there are a lot of people far smarter than I doing that already.

So first things first, can anyone in the PR industry offer him some leads? Please go here.

OK, so if clients are so afraid of missing The Next Big Thing™, then Dave should have been the last one they fired. Idiots.

I met Larry Weber socially last year. Delightful fellow, smart as hell, head of the largest PR outfit in the world.

He said an interesting thing, to paraphrase:

"The future of advertising isn't about selling. It's about letting people know that you want to be part of something interesting."
I found it encouraging that a person at the top of the game would actually say that. Beats the hell out of the usual "working hard for our clients' successful future" crap.

A lot of people who understand the future are the first to lose their jobs. It's the way of the world; it helps the dinosaurs stay on the heart-and-lung machine a few hours longer.

In the end, the people who do what they believe in, who have something to believe in... in the end, they last longer.

And getting laid off occasionally is a small price to pay, in exchange for getting to live in a world where what you belive in actually matters to yourself and other people.

Posted by hugh macleod at February 2, 2005 8:44 PM | TrackBack
Comments

Well Hugh, I know that this won't neccessarily make you feel any better, but getting laid off (3 weeks and counting) is what got me to read Hughtrain seriously. Cheers and good luck!

Posted by: TonyD at February 3, 2005 2:43 AM

Thanks, but.... ermmmmm.... it wasn't me who was laid off.

That being said, I've had my fair share of it in the past.

Posted by: hugh macleod at February 3, 2005 11:12 AM

If you see Larry Weber again, can you tell him to speak to his senior management. I consulted for Weber Shandwick UK last year on web issues. They are well run, traditional PR company, but still well-enternched in an old school mindset.

Posted by: James Cherkoff at February 3, 2005 12:47 PM

Hi Hugh, well said: "In the end, the people who do what they believe in, who have something to believe in... in the end, they last longer"

I'm doing what I believe in for almost ten years now ,all right, honesttly, nobody wanted to give me a job so I had to "invent" one for myself.

Things are going great now, I even got my wife to leave her regular job and now she works with me, at home, online, we can do what we like the most (we're into developing Internet projects for worldwide clients) and we can spend more quality time with our daughter Beatriz.

I think thw world will be a better place when more people is fired from their traditional jobs and realize that they can do a lot by themselves and actually have a life. We need to believe more in ourselves and less in "the system".

Congratulations to Dave for being fired :), really, it's one of the best things that can happen in these times and I'm sure you will find lots of great opportunities now that you're not just another 86 (those working for others from 8am to 6pm like monkeys each day of their lifes).

Regards!

p.s: I'm starting to read the HughTrain today, I'm a big fan of the ClueTrain so I think this will be another great read.

Posted by: Alexis Bellido at February 3, 2005 1:20 PM

Bah, don't know why I misread that. Memo to myself: don't do blog responses last thing in the day. Best of luck to Dave and everyone else out there surviving!

Posted by: TonyD at February 3, 2005 5:52 PM