Influx

Roger Martin, Dean of Rotman School of Management, makes a good point in his latest book about design thinking, that MBA’s armed with calculators are hardly the kind of people who are doing to develop your next innovative product.

He’s a strong proponent of Design Thinking, predictably this is where IDEO is at as well. What Martin suggests is the need for a new consulting entity that combines creative firepower with analytical smarts, a kind of best-in-breed creative shop that also offers McKinseylike business strategy.  Martin’s killer app is cost, such a shop would charge a fraction of McKinsey’s rates and achieve better results.

As the Fast Company interview points out, there are a number of challenges that lie in the way of making Martin’s dream a reality, the biggest being the problem of getting corporate cultures to be happy with the idea of creativity as a strategic asset. There’s a long way to go here and since most CEOs are trained to live by the rules of Wall Street and short-term balance sheets, this could be a hard habit to break.

Reading between the lines of this piece, there’s clearly a space for the right communication shops to jump up and be heard. Back in the Mad Men era they had the seat at the table when their ads could make or break a company, now it’s all about product and service design, that’s aligned to a big strategic idea.

Clearly most communication agencies need to fill some of the creative gaps in this space, which is relatively easy to do, but perhaps the biggest challenge is hiring business strategists with MBAs. With agency margins on the wane and Wall Street salaries seemingly showing no signs of abating, this could be tough.

However, if it wants to get there the communication business needs to a better job of selling itself as a place for smart individuals to develop careers, but to make this transition and for their own survival, they need to explain how they can play a more vital and prominent role in corporate success.

Posted by Ed Cotton