Jezebel 
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New York, 12:28 AM
Sat Dec 12
67 posts in the last 24 hours
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12/11/09
12/10/09
12/10/09
In season three the accounts men suddenly realise there is no "up" anymore. The best they'll ever get is middle management, with the new owners forever holding the gates to partnership... something that was the be all and end all of their careers 12 months ago no longer exists for these guys.
12/10/09
12/11/09
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08/18/09
08/18/09
I hope you've been able to follow whatever speciality you wanted!
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Particularly when it came to copy writing, design, and the nuts & bolts (but lowly paid) stuff. What little ethnic and racial diversity in this agency was pretty much a farce, with my good black friends reporting pressure to only work on urban campaigns and basically being shut out of broader opportunities.
What I did notice, however, was that when it came to getting to work on big ticket creative stuff, and getting to the more senior levels, it was pretty limited group of people.
Women, to a certain degree, had problems at this level, but everyone agreed that there was at least some sort of push to "have a [hot] women in the room." My friend who was the purported hot woman in the room, informed me that this is usually done because maybe they think it's possible to gear whatever an ad is selling, subconciously to women. See: KY Lube Ads.
08/18/09
I know some non-profits have there problems, but I've always had great female role models in the offices I worked.
08/18/09
08/18/09
In fact, the most annoying stereotypes/sexism I've dealt with was at the hands of two female representatives from an unnamed bridal website. They kept throwing out stereotypes about women and sharing nauseating facts about the weddings industrial complex, and looking at me, the only other woman there, as if I were expected to coo at every detail.
08/18/09
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08/18/09
I do have my favorite Mad Men-esque story, and this happened less than ten years ago: We had a P&G account (think "feminine items") and a male account guy was in a planning meeting and, in all seriousness, began to explain to the women there about "how women fel about their periods."
08/18/09
I am surprised to hear that women are lagging in creative, although I assume they mean exec-level creative? It's not clear.
I work in creative services for a retailer and, in fact, just had lunch last week with our CD (a woman). However, working for an agency and working for, say, web or retail are quite different when you're talking about creative, so I assume this is specifically speaking to advertising?
When it comes to selling an "image" I think the reason you see so many subtle male-focused advertising is the same reason (as Latoya brought up last week) unisex product is marketed to men. Women are better at crossing over and hurdling those boxes of sexuality than men when it comes to the gray areas. Obviously I am not talking about Carl's Jr. commercials (targeted to men) or....Yoplait (targeted to women). Think more along the lines of Apple, VW....Ikea, and the like.
08/18/09
And I agree about Bobbie's quote- that stuck with me and I think is one of the best lines in the show. And while Bobbie may have been speaking specifically to women's sexual powers, as Sadie says in the post, I don't think the show was referring only to a woman's sexual arsenal.
Finally, I also work in a creative services department (though I'm on the content/ copy side, and the other half of our team does visual design), and the two heads of our team are women. However, we're in financial services, so the word "creative" is really stretching it.
08/18/09
Or not. I also seem to have promoted myself.
Please allow myself to introduce you to ... myself.
08/18/09
Since then, I've been in IT...none of the same problems. There are assholes everywhere, granted, but not at the same saturation as advertising.
08/18/09
I don't think there's one pat explaination for the imbalance, but some of it does come down to a boys club mentality in some creative contexts. There must be more to it, though. Honestly, I think women need to be encouraged to be creative leaders at an early age--high school or college--so by the time they get to Hollywood or Madison Ave it feels comfortable and normal to them. For some reason, many of the women I meet who are already working seem intimidated to push their creative ideas--even when dealing with female executives.
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