Edward Boches has a great post over on his blog entitled Where will the new generation of digital talent choose to work
? that was inspired by his recent visit to Boulder Digital Works. As a member of the first-ever class to graduate from BDW I wanted to expand upon a few of the points Edward makes and begin to answer just what this new generation wants from an employer. (by the way, don’t think that generation implies age in this case – my class included members fo Gen Y, Gen X and even a Baby Boomer so it has less to do with age than mindset)
At the end of the day, the bottom line is that now is the time to try, do, make and refine these approaches because there has been a lot of talk for a long time.
In a nutshell, the places this new generation want to work are the places that are doing (or at least trying) these things, not just talking about them.
Collaboration
Most offices aren’t set up to encourage collaboration in the most basic ways. The furniture, the cubes, the flexibility of the floor plan, availability of conference rooms, whiteboards, etc, let alone the culture. It takes both to really make things work. You have to have people thinking in new ways combined with an environment that fosters collaboration to really make it work.
A Challenge
Give us hard problems to solve and give us the resources / support / freedom to take them on and watch what happens.
We want to create positive change in the world. We want to be working on things that make the world better. If these aren’t your clients, well, sorry.
To Iterate and Invent
Inspiration is perishable. Act now before it’s too late. (line lifted from the amazing book Rework from 37 Signals which describes a lot of the tenants of a great place to work)
To Be Our Own Clients
All those ideas an agency has that are “so good” yet the client won’t buy them? There’s no reason today why you can’t actually make them happen and maybe even profit off of them. In my opinion, the agency of the future should be getting at least 50% of its revenue from non-client sources (i.e. software it creates, products, other services it provides.)
To Be T-Shaped People (and work with those who are)
Account people should be able to code (be literate at a minimum.) Coders should know strategy. Strategy should be creative. Etc, etc. Be cross disciplinary and grow your people to be better every day.
To Understand and Start with, the User
We’re all practicing Human Centered Design whether we’re making a print ad, a website or a TV spot. Shift your thinking and watch the effectiveness shift upward as well.
What else did I miss? Let’s collaborate below in the comments.
