Tuesday, January 26, 2016

Oddballs in the Workplace

In a five-point memo written by David Ogilvy, the characteristics suggesting potential promotion in a person are listed. Ambition, enjoys working harder, an unorthodox or brilliant brain, engaging personality, and respect for the creative field. This article, “Want to Produce Craft Beyond the Norm? Hire Confident Oddballs,” proposes that another characteristic be added to the list; “the person is confidently peculiar.” This trait makes perfect since in the world of advertising, because what completely “normal” creative person do you actually know. If your school/work environment is in a creative field, take a look around and think to yourself if your co-workers are on the dry, boring side, or if they’re on the eccentric and quirky side of the spectrum. Being creative is a skill many lack.  Many of my friends beat to their own drum, and I think that’s why I’m friends with them. They aren’t afraid to be unique.

“The people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do.” I find this quote by Apple founder Steve Jobs to be extremely inspiring. In advertising it’s hard to make your campaign or message stand out from the clutter of all the others being thrown in our faces each day. You have to have a great deal of confidence in your work. It’s important to look at the world differently in order to come up with out of the box ideas. These “confident oddballs” are usually open to breaking the rules, which is when the real work gets done. Being around interesting people is what forms creativity in the work place.


The article can be found here.

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