The 3%, the 97%, and everything in between
Lessons from advertising’s annual kick in the conscience
I’m writing this on the plane back from Chicago.
I just wrapped up two days at the 2019 edition of the 3% Conference and wanted to write down a few thoughts.
Well, to be honest, I wanted to get a bourbon, watch a movie and veg out. But the sound is all jacked up on the entertainment system, so a movie is not in the cards. And I forgot my book in back in San Francisco, so I’m pulling out my laptop and typing this instead.
Still gonna get the bourbon, though. Let’s see where this goes.
THE 3% CONFERENCE
For those of you who may not be familiar, the 3% Movement was started eight years ago by Kat Gordon to increase the number of female creative directors in advertising. At the time, women made up just three percent of ad biz CDs.
Happily, thanks in large part to the efforts of the efforts of 3%, that number now stands at 29 percent. And while still focused on its core mission, the organization now advocates for broader representation of all under-represented groups.
While I was aware of the 3% in its early days (the agency where I worked at the time, GS&P, was an early sponsor) and was personally supportive of its mission (as an “enlightened, sensitive guy”), I didn’t really immerse myself into its until I did something…sort of weird.
Back in 2015, as a goof really, I started a satirical Twitter account called “The 97% Conference” written in the voice of desperate male creative directors hellbent on maintaining the status quo.
I’ve written in detail about the genesis of the account and what I learned in those early days, so I won’t rehash it here since you’re perfectly capable of clicking on the hyperlink and reading all about it, if you so desire.
Long story short: I’ve learned a lot in the last few years and realized I have a lot more to learn. Turns out when you listen to a broader range of voices, you hear things you haven’t heard before. And if you’re not defensive about your own bullshit, you can learn a thing or two.
MY OFFICIAL ROLE
I found myself at the 2019 Conference in a split-personality role.
A year ago, I took an ECD job at independent agency Duncan Channon in San Francisco, and I was attending the conference with my colleague, ACD Kat Michie, to represent our agency. (She stayed at a nicer hotel.)
And I’m proud of where our 80-person shop stands in relation to the core mission of the 3%. Our 15-person creative department is 60 percent female and our creative leadership (ACD and above) stands at roughly the same percentage. Women lead our account, strategy, media, finance, HR, and new business departments.
Of course, our numbers are a snapshot in time (they go up and down) and we’re far from perfect — we have miles to go in terms of diversity. But we are trying to do the right thing.
One way that manifests itself is a culture that is maybe the most HUMANE advertising agency that I’ve ever worked at. We do good work, but we get our shit done and…we go home. A culture that is conscious that work and meetings and travel may need to be scheduled around family commitments — a place that develops schedules that don’t EXPECT late nights or weekends on a regular basis — that’s a culture that supports employees of BOTH genders.
(I used caps for emphasis on THREE words in that paragraph. The bourbon is WORKING!)
So, my attendance at the conference this year was, in part, to listen and figure out what lessons we can take back to the mothership.
There were lots of lessons. Now that they’re posted on the YouTube, you can watch them, too. I particularly enjoyed the presentations by Chris Bergeron, Wade Davis, Denise Hewett, and my friend and former colleague Derek Robson. And Cindy Gallop’s annual barn burner, of course.
(Also, you should read this beautiful reflection from my colleague Kat about what she got out of this year’s conference.)
I have to confess, that there are parts of the conference that I find frustrating. It’s sprawling and embraces many different viewpoints and that’s, well…messy. The practical part of me wants the whole endeavor to laser focus on getting that 29% number to 50%. There’s a LOT of talk when the solutions seems pretty simple: let’s all just hire more female creative directors.
AND…I recognize my priviledge as a white, male, hetero creative director (with the creative director glasses, even!) means I should probably just shut the fuck up. I’m here to listen and learn, not problem solve. The discomfort is a FEATURE not a bug, John. Deal with it.
MY UNOFFICIAL ROLE
The OTHER role that I play at the conference is as the not-so-secret author of @97PercentConf. (I was outed as the creator at the 2016 conference.)
First and foremost, I can’t say enough about how Kat and Cindy Gallop and the entire 3% crew have all been wildly supportive of my efforts to use satire as a tool to raise awareness about the movement.
In the four years that I’ve been writing the Twitter feed, I’ve learned a few things about what makes a good 97PercentConf tweet. I think there are four elements:
1. Timely. The best tweets lean into a moment: the current 3% conference (of course) or a big advertising stage like the Super Bowl or the Oscars. Tapping into breaking news or a current cultural moment (like the first all-female spacewalk) is also good.
2. Embrace your clueless asshole. The account is written in the persona of a male creative director who is DESPERATE to hold on to what he has. Who is incredibly threatened by women. I often think about him in the third person and, while he’s pathetic, I also have some empathy for that dude. He really is confused by all the changes that are happening in the industry and culture and wants it to all go back to a simpler time. That doesn’t make him right, but when he gets sort of frantic and desperate, I think it’s funnier.
3. Lean into my own bias and irritations. Spoiler: I AM a white male creative director in his 40s. So when something irritates ME a little (like waiting in line for the gender neutral bathrooms at this year’s conference), I know it’s fertile territory for my 97% guy. Somebody said “there’s truth in every good joke” and they’re probably right. Finding a truth nugget and exaggerating it into ridiculousness is rich comedic territory.
4. Amplify FEMALE voices. The real goal of 3% and, by extension, 97% is education. So I try and use the tweets to amplify the work and initiatives that support women. When 97% is railing against something that Cindy’s posted, it’s a way to make sure more people see what Cindy said. (Not that she needs any help, let’s be real.) Or when I tweet “DON’T DOWNLOAD THE FELLOW APP” what I’m really saying is “you should check out the Fellow app.”
Whew! Yeah, it’s all sort of meta and “inside baseball” and maybe you think the whole thing is navel-gazing stupidity. FAIR ENOUGH.
But…I’m trying to do the right thing. It’s fun. It makes me laugh. People seem to enjoy it. And until it runs its course or I completely screw it up (odds on which happens first?), I’m going to keep tweeting.
Somebody tweeted at me at the conference this week and said “I want to meet the person that writes this account!” and we met during one of the breaks and it was lovely that she was a fan and I was humbled to meet her. She also said something that I loved, “The whole thing is so…niche.” Amen, sister. It’s a sub-twitter satire account of a social movement for a particular industry…we’re a couple Inception layers down at this point.
And that’s OK, I think. As I’ve said from the beginning, social change requires every tool in the arsenal. I think that includes humor. Happy to be one small micro-action for the cause.
Microsoft Word is telling me this is 1,282 words at this point and, frankly, that’s plenty.
Thanks for the good time, 3% Conference. Let’s do it again.
John Kovacevich is the founder of Agency SOS. He often writes about what he’s learned in the ad biz.
