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10 months. got laid off because we were on a big client the agency couldn’t keep. heartbreaking. i was young and naive and worked my absolute ass off, going above and beyond every day. was so determined to bring the agency back to prominence and win a titanium lion. when we got called into the HR office i felt like i was floating above my body watching it all happen. i planned on being there at least 3 years no matter what and completely bought in. this definitely woke me up to the realities of the industry very fast.
unfortunately there was already a few young creatives that got there a year before us who already were the favorites, and we didn’t have a chance. the agency still had great name recognition but we got there just as they started to decline.
with almost no produced work and only 10 months experience, getting freelance gigs was tough. suddenly, we didn’t have the experience for mid level, but we weren’t quite interns either. most top agencies hire their juniors from internship programs and we knew that. so we felt a bit hopeless.
i networked my ass off. sent a million emails. contacted old teachers and friends even though i felt pathetic and annoying. learned how to be scrappy and hustle to pay the bills. i knew if i ran out of money, it was over.
i got a freelance gig here and there, some much more soul sucking than others. every day it felt like a different person was telling me advertising was dead and to go in house or change careers. not fun to hear when you just took on $50k of debt from ad school.
finally a recruiter that had had her eye on me since ad school contacted me out of the blue and i was able to turn it into a full time gig.
18 months later i was laid off again because COVID, but with a much more solid resume and full book of produced work i was semi-proud of. and this time i was able to move back home in pennsylvania to avoid the cost of rent. overall, much more confident this time around.
i went through stages of supreme cynicism and depression but never gave up. i was such a debbie downer that people didn’t even want to talk to me at parties at certain points.
overall, i wish i had gotten lucky and ripped off a cannes-lion project as a junior, but i realized there’s a lot of things out of my control. the only thing you can do is keep working on yourself. this business rewards tenacity and perseverance.
overall, if i had stayed at my first agency, i would have never grown my network, never learned the realities of the industry, never learned just how strong i could be, and never learned my flaws/lost my ego (friends told me some of the additional reasons we got let go a few months after, in addition to financial).
i feel better and stronger now than ever. and can’t wait to crush it at my next gig
oh also i should add that my art director never found a full time job again. he still doesn’t know what his next career step is, 3 years later. this industry can be absolutely brutal. but in a way, it weeds out the people that probably weren’t meant to be in it in the first place, which i think was him.
2 years, asked for a raise more responsibilities. Wanted to outline a career growth opportunity so I could work my way from 27k to 40k (15 yrs ago). He told me good luck, you don’t have enough experience to get to 40. That next day I buckled down and started applying for a new job. 2 months later, I put in my 2 week notice and told him he was right I wouldn’t get 40k, I got 52k instead. Remember it like yesterday.
Chief
1 year. Layoffs.
Same :”(
Year and a half. My boss was drunk every day after lunch. The Mad Men days were still happening.
1 year. I got laid off because of the global recession in 2008. Familiar to many the past year I’d imagine. Hang in there.
thanks for this ECD. part of me blames myself. i’ve had my struggles with mental health and haven’t been perfect at times, but always have felt and been told i have tons of potential. i feel that i’ve gotten myself in a really good place mentally through the help of therapy, medication and lifestyle changes. i feel solid and ready to crush it at my next opportunity.
but part of me wonders if i’ll ever get an opportunity at a good agency again, you know? like have i blown it?
1.5 years, huge raise to hit industry standard (use Glassdoor to understand your worth), bad manager, horrible company ethics, opportunity for growth
A year and a half. Transitioned to a similar role, but closer to what I actually enjoyed doing
A touch under 2 years and I left bc of a 2 hr each way commute to the office.
Less than a year. Money.
3 years, pretty bad agency the whole time but was constantly fed the 'its going to get better' hype. And being the first job, I didn't know what other shops were like so I stuck it out for years, and hardly got anything out. Finally made the jump and started making a bunch of work at a new place. In hindsight should have jumped to an agency that was a better fit after 6months. But now I know.
2 years, bad manager and no growth opps
6 years, no more room for growth
Exactly 1 year. Supreme lack of opportunities. Major loss of clients. Best decision I've ever made.
Job 1: Internship - 10 months, no junior position going.
Job 2: Redundancy after 1 year
Job 3: Quit after 4 years.
Job 4: Redundancy after 2 years.
Job 5: Currently 18 months in, wondering when they'll let me go...
Just over a year. No growth opps and a really salty manager.
3 1/2 years. My first boss left, he was replaced by a world-class asshole who straight up told me that he couldn’t - or wouldn’t - teach me anything because he was a marketer who was put in charge of PR and advertising and if i wanted to do that I should go somewhere else.
So I did.
38 years. Still there. It’s been good.
First job? Three months. I had to quit because school started again.
(I was 13 and worked on farms during the summer)
5 years. Left after I was done with college because I wanted to go into the industry of my major (Marketing/Advertising). Actually took a huge pay cut but it was worth it because after 1.5 years, I got a raise that exceeded what I was making at the old company.
9 months, wasn’t much opportunity to grow given we only had 1 client etc, had a few of superiors who said some inappropriate things, both sexist and racist, some directed at me, some in a general way.