Competitive advantage for life: an industry view of marketing communication education

ABSTRACT

A competitive advantage is the desired outcome of a sound marketing communication strategy. However, there are scant explorations of how marketing communication education can build competitive advantages for students entering the workforce. Taking an industry perspective, a leading CEO reflects upon marketing communication practice and raises questions about disciplinary changes in practice and the necessary response of marketing communication education. We explore these questions and derive insights through a literature review which assembles existing research in marketing communication education, and we explore these insights further using Collective Intelligence. Thought leaders in the marketing communication industry interact and share ideas, revealing key insights into necessary skill sets. The paper concludes with a discussion of marketing communication education and its competitive advantage for both work and life.

KEYWORDS:

• Marketing communication
• University education
• industry employability
• Collective intelligence
• industry perspective

Until well into the 19^th Century, college education was principally aimed at the wealthy and the clergy, and the course content tended to emphasize literature and the liberal arts (Lucas 1994; Reese 2000). Applied topics were shunned by many, and marketing communication was wholly unknown. By the late 20^th Century, marketing communication subject matter was widespread (Richards and Ross 2014). This article attempts to assess the value of marketing communication knowledge in today’s society, both in terms of what it brings to the relevant professions and what it offers beyond any professional advantages, i.e., to one’s life in general.

Although it takes time and is increasingly more expensive, a university education can empower graduates to generate competitive advantage for life. University education is often a mandatory requirement on the resume for entry-level employment in the marketing communication industry and can set the trajectory for higher career prospects in terms of opportunity, status, and financial reward (Horowitz 2018; Richards and Ross 2014).

Apart from developing career skills and aspirations, a good university education can help students grow and connect as human beings (Phekoo 1999). Sometimes it is through moving to a new city to attend university, developing social skills and new relationships on the way, or taking advantage of other opportunities available in the university system. Sometimes students grow through having to justify and defend their ideas. Sometimes through finding out what their ideas really are in the first place. These additional, but equally important, soft skills prepare students for the hard decisions in the future life (Hutson et al. 2023; Emsi Burning Glass 2021).

In other words, a university education is not just preparation for a career, but also for life.

Contemporary society is characterzed by rapid and unrelenting change to people’s work, home and leisure. When all aspects of life change quickly, it is unclear how universities should respond. Our concern here, then, is whether universities are preparing students for work, as well as for life, and whether this satisfies the needs of industry employers and the future of students.

This paper is important as it brings together both industry and academic perspectives to address a research question that shapes both their destinies – In a constantly changing world, what skills do graduates need to bring to industry? And what is the optimal mix of discipline-focused and life-empowering skills? Rather than searching the literature for the questions that industry wants to ask educators, this paper asks industry itself and uses the CEO insight as a stimulus for a literature review and question development.

Another equally important contribution of this paper is the use of the innovative method of Collective Intelligence. Instead of quantifying items through a survey, it ignites discussion and interaction among the thought leaders in an online think tank. It is perhaps the first time this method has been used in academic research in the field of marketing communications.

The first section of this manuscript chronicles some of the industry concerns, as a CEO and major employer of marketing communication graduates reflects upon practice and raises questions about disciplinary change and the response to marketing communication education. To answer some of those questions, a literature review assembles existing research in Marketing Communication education, providing some answers and highlighting further questions. Using Collective Intelligence, we then explore the kinds of skills that employers seek in graduates. Mindhive, a platform for Collective Intelligence, ignites discussion among thought leaders in the advertising and marketing communication industry in Australia to reveal key insights into the nation’s top employers’ views about skills sets necessary for students to develop, and whether university education has changed after the disruption wrought by COVID. Or perhaps even whether it should. The paper concludes with a discussion of university education in marketing communication and the competitive advantage it can create for students’ work and life.

What the industry wants to know: a CEO’s reflection

In this section, the Asia-Pacific CEO of one of the Big 4 Media Agencies that manages $40 billion in marketing investment globally provides his thoughts, challenges, and questions about what the industry wants to know.

As a child I thought the best gift my parents could give me was a BMX. However, it was their investment in education which helped me think, solve problems, and build a career. Now, in my role as CEO of a media company, and surrogate parent to over 4,000 employees across the Asia-Pacific, I have become an advocate for quality education. That is not to say a degree is the only means of entry. As an industry we welcome the brilliantly talented, hard-working, curious, and inquisitive people who demonstrate resilience and learn on the job. For most of us though, a good university education is both a means of entry and an investment in our future. That’s why I ask the following questions:

Markets change faster than marketing, and marketing changes faster than marketing evaluation … and they all change faster than the education system. Is the curriculum keeping up?

Many things have been exacerbated and fast tracked as opposed to being ‘changed’. In 2008, a CEO of a major telco predicted that video calling would be a big thing, but with the iPhone only months old, it seemed a generational shift. One pandemic later, the rapid growth of Facetime, WhatsApp, WeChat calls in your personal life, and Zoom, Teams, Hangout and Blue Jeans in your work and study life have made video calling ‘normal’.

The same is true of adopting and viewing streaming TV services, the continuing expansion of existing and new platforms, the pace of addressable media opportunities, and the rapidly evolving data privacy regulation landscape imminently colliding with a cookie-less world. Genuine transformation of the processes and efficiencies in marketing, both from the client and agency sides, is nascent. Yet universities need more time to suggest, influence, validate, and approve curriculum changes. How quickly can a curriculum be adapted so that it is fit for the purpose of better readying people for commercial reality, and does it need to be rapidly adaptive to add value to the ‘real world’?

Another question is about technology and student learning. Is online learning a barrier to creativity and collaboration in the workplace?

At a basic business level, it is much (much) harder to get effective brainstorming done in a virtual setting. There are no post-it notes, putting ticks on the walls, or the glances of disapproval across a table. The easy ability to not fully contribute either by not having camera on, or additional distractions behind the blurred background, are other factors that simply mean that the productivity efficiency improvements do not always translate into collaborative and creative outcomes.

Even with the balance of hybrid/flexible/virtual enhancements to teaching techniques, we cannot lose sight of the fact that discourse, discussion, and (in some great cases) lively debate are essential in delivering the best that education can bring to participants. Learning in a bubble is not conducive to stretching and being challenged. Students who choose to learn online still need to learn the importance of collaboration in building trust and respect. So how do they practice and understand the face-to-face interaction and human qualities that are so important in the workplace?

What should universities teach to prepare the next generation of practitioners? What is the difference between university education and industry courses?

Given the direction of these professions, the areas that will continue to be in high demand are digital and data analytics. World Federation of Advertisers (WFA) members rate digital marketing tech/platforms and data ethics as their #1 & 2 learning priorities (World Federation of Advertisers 2020). Whilst you can teach an old dog new tricks, and people over the last 20 years have evolved in roles to learn these skills, the overall focus of curriculum should have a heavier emphasis on these industry priorities to be of more immediate practical value in the marketplace.

However, building a more practical curriculum raises issues about the balance between vocational application vs theoretical understanding. And if all the curriculum focuses on the practice of digital marketing, it is unclear where students learn and practice the equally important generic skills like thinking and decision-making, leadership, and self-awareness. Further, what do university courses deliver that you won’t get from an industry course? And especially with the rise of micro-credentials and industry associations finding a new funding model, are micro-credentials likely to have maximum impact on university courses?

What existing research tells us

In order to address the questions raised, a review of the literature was undertaken and structured in three parts: (1) changes in university education, (2) technology and student learning, and (3) preparing the next generation of marketing communication practitioners.

COVID and its impact on university education

A pandemic changes everything. Almost overnight, in the Spring of 2020, more than 1,300 US universities closed their campuses to in-person instruction and switched to online learning. Almost a half (44%) continued to remain fully online for the beginning of the 2020–2021 academic year (Smalley 2021).

Universities implemented easy interventions to try to add value to student learning. Online discussion boards and quizzes, social media platforms and apps, podcasts, and video conferencing platforms were adopted to improve student engagement, perceived control, perceived learning, retention, and satisfaction (Ackerman and Gross 2021; Drehmer and Gala 2021; McCarthy, Pelletier, and McCoy 2021; Mitchell et al. 2021; Sutton-Brady 2021).

Moving from traditional face-to-face delivery impacted not only student learning, but also their lifestyles and their mental health, swapping the dorm for their bedroom at home and their part-time job and campus life for zoom chats and Netflix. This enforced self-regulated learning was investigated by Meshram, Paladino, and Cotronei-Baird (2022) who found that students’ ability to self-regulate their learning through goal setting, environmental structuring, and time management directly affected their grade expectations. Yet things like help-seeking and self-evaluation strategies did not directly affect student-grade expectations.

Despite attempts to manage their learning experience, COVID still impacted the mental health of students. By the end of 2020, 71% of students reported increased stress and anxiety and almost half (48%) moderate-to-severe depression (Wang et al. 2020). Students struggled with isolation (46%), hopelessness (32%), and lack of focus (44%) (Dennon 2020), leading to reduced class satisfaction (Peltier, Chennamaneni, and Barber 2021).

Gradually, universities opened their doors, and by 2021–2022, most students returned to campus. However, in the wake of subsequent Covid waves, some students still preferred online learning (Anderson et al. 2021).

Many universities trialled hybrid formats, augmenting face-to-face teaching with online learning (Gupta and Ishadi 2022). Investigating the value of synchronous versus asynchronous learning, Wu and You (2022) found that for conceptual courses which ‘introduce and discuss marketing concepts, theories, and practical applications at a conceptual level’, students preferred an equal split between synchronous and asynchronous. However, in more quantitative classes like research or analytics, the preference shifted to more synchronous learning.

Of course, e-learning is nothing new. Even before COVID, many institutions used digital platforms to support and improve the learning process, often combining traditional forms of face-to-face learning activities with those implemented online (De Nito et al. 2022). Research suggests that student adoption of e-learning correlates with high interactivity, low technical requirements, and reduced investment of time and effort (Shakah, Al-Oqaily, and Alqudah 2019). However, to be effective and meaningful, online learning requires educators to facilitate active participation and co-creation rather than the mere transmission of data (Reese 2015).

Technology and student learning

COVID was just one force for change. Another force for change that has shaped marketing communication since the printing press is technology. While teaching students to write television advertisements must have been a challenge in the 1950s, keeping pace with digital transformation in what has been described as the fourth industrial revolution is the mandate of contemporary education (Kaplan 2022; Sharma et al. 2022). This has incited calls for radical change in marketing education, suggesting a greater role for integrated marketing communication and online marketing (Gábor and Papp-Váry 2020).

Pre-pandemic, academic research signalled the need for digital marketing or social media marketing courses to augment fundamental marketing knowledge and equip students both academically and with practical proficiency for the workplace (Bal et al. 2015; Crittenden and Crittenden 2015; Duffy and Ney 2015). Despite this, in 2019, less than one-quarter (23.5%) of advertising and public relation programs in the United States taught courses in digital media (Fang, Wei, and Huang 2019).

Post-pandemic, while enforced online teaching has empowered lecturers with new capabilities, marketing communication education still faces many of the same challenges as prior to the pandemic. The lack of funding and technology support, as well as a critical shortage of teaching expertise (Newell, Tavanapong, and Berghefer 2017) often determines what is taught and how it is taught.

Perhaps Alhabash (2021, 6) sums it up best, ‘By the time university bureaucracy facilitates any changes to advertising curricula, the winds of change in industry will surpass the necessities resulting from countless hours of curriculum committee deliberations, leading to a contingency of irrelevance’.

Preparing the next generation of marketing communication practitioners

In their systematic review of 20 years of advertising education, Wirtz, Hayes, and Shan (2016, 8) conclude, ‘how to prepare the next generation of advertising practitioners in a way that both serves them, and the industry is an ongoing discussion within the academic community. One of the central arguments in this topic is finding the balance between requiring courses that train students in practical skills related to advertising (e.g., copywriting, ad design) and courses that focus on broader, more conceptual topics, such as strategy and critical thinking’.

This division between skills and critical mindsets in advertising education was first raised in 1955 when Sandage delivered his advertising pedagogical philosophy that is still, many believe, fit for purpose today (Alhabash 2021; Wirtz, Hayes, and Shan 2016). ‘A university should be concerned with training future leaders. This cannot be done if we become preoccupied with training our youth for their first jobs. Emphasis should always be placed on teaching the student rather than teaching a course or subject’ (Sandage 1955, 203). Putting this more succinctly, it is believed Sandage also said, ‘Teach them to be architects, not brick layers’.

This imperative to develop more than disciplinary skills alone is also shared by many already working in the industry. For example, when Childers (2022) asked advertising professionals what students entering a social media role needed to know their answers were (1) No Magical Formula for Success, (2) Constant Change and Lifelong Learning, (3) Attention to Detail, (4) It’s All Integrated, and (5) Creativity is Still King (Childers 2022). Instead of a list of specific discipline skills, they described an approach to problem solving and understanding the ’why’ of marketing communication.

Other academics concur, suggesting this thinking should extend beyond the discipline to the larger social issues. ‘We need to “hack the system” to infuse environmental and social issues into marketing education. This requires reconfiguration and restructuring of marketing education, as expectations of key stakeholders – students, businesses, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), governments, communities, and the environment – have changed to demand social impact and systemic thinking’ (Kemper, Moscato, and Kennedy 2022, 313). This thinking is still largely absent in the curricula, although potentially championed by individual academics in their subject development.

MOOCs and micro-credentials

A different way to learn, which still involves university education, is through MOOCs and micro credentials. First introduced in 2008, and with 2012 unofficially declared ‘The Year of the MOOC’, Massive Open Online Courses or MOOCs bring academic learning to unrestricted audiences at minimal or no cost, thereby helping to address global inequality in education (Ma, Sharif, and Khong 2022; Sharma et al. 2022). Success in MOOC learning depends upon motivation, perceived learning support, learning engagement, and self-regulated learning strategies (Littlejohn et al. 2016). Equally, MOOCs provide potential benefits for universities too, as a profile-building and fund-raising option (De Notaris et al. 2022). However, low purchase rates of MOOCs have challenged profitability for both platforms and content creators (Ma, Sharif, and Khong 2022; Sharma et al. 2022).

A more recent alternative to MOOCs, first introduced by EdX in 2013, is micro-credentials. Created and/or accredited by world-leading universities, these professional qualifications provide in-demand skills in rapidly changing jobs and industries. Like a university program, each microcredential has a formal assessment and the option to leverage that as academic credit towards a university degree (FutureLearn 2022).

While attractive to employers as evidence of self-directed learning in emerging fields, they have also captured the attention of government. In 2022, the Australian Government released its National Microcredentials Framework to ‘provide greater clarity and understanding within the tertiary education sector and amongst learners as to the value, structure and recognition of microcredentials’ (Government 2022). This creates transparency and consistency around credit recognition for students and universities.

For universities, microcredentials represent another way to monetize the curriculum and encourage students to ‘try-before-they-buy’. It also focuses attention and resources on the most popular and saleable parts of the marketing communication curriculum.

Apart from these microcredentials, there are also many industry associations offering training courses. Industry bodies such as the Association of National Advertisers in the US, the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising in the UK, and the Internet Advertising Bureau internationally offer courses to develop in-demand industry skills. This provides a pathway for learners to acquire much needed industry skills while creating another stream of revenue for the association. Some universities partner with industry associations to deliver this training. In other cases, academics also have identified the value of augmenting industry certificates in academic programs (Childers 2020; Brown-Devlin 2021). These include certificate programs from technology companies such as Facebook, LinkedIn Learning, Salesforce, HubSpot, and Hootsuite.

In conclusion, there are many different ways to teach marketing communication. By universities, by industry associations, and by collaboration. And despite all the changes following Covid and the other inescapable pandemic of technological disruption, there seems to be consistent agreement on the need for the strong graduate capabilities. These interdisciplinary skills, knowledge, and abilities equip students to live and work in a changing world and are desired by employers. However, in terms of the discipline-specific skills that the curriculum should address, the list is more unclear. Perhaps marketing communication education has progressed little from 1973, when Billy I. Ross lamented, ‘one weakness consists in the difficulty of knowing what kind of graduate that industry wants. There are those in education who claim that industry really does not know specifically what it wants’ (Ross 1973, 21).

What we still need to know

Given all of the changes that have, and continue to reshape industry, the research described in the next section explores how universities need to react to the dynamic contemporary employment context. It examines how universities can prepare students for their place in the world of work and civil society and give graduates a competitive advantage. In particular, it asks the question: In a constantly changing world, what skills do graduates need to bring to industry? What is the optimal mix of discipline-focused and life empowering skills?

Method

Collective intelligence and the mindhive platform

The term ‘Collective intelligence’ was coined by Thomas Malone, head of the MIT Centre for Collective Intelligence, to convey that ‘intelligence does not arise only in individual brains; it also arises in groups of individuals. This is collective intelligence: groups of individuals acting collectively in ways that seem intelligent” (Kleiner 2014, 9). This is particularly so with the rise of Artificial Intelligence (AI).

In an interview with Deloitte Insights (Guszcza and Schwartz 2019), Malone broadened his definition to include groups of people and computers, collaborating to maximize potential for sustainable development and optimisation. This ‘supermind’ solves problems more efficiently, cost-effectively, and with a superior outcome.

One proprietary platform for harnessing this collaborative thinking is Mindhive. Here, individuals or companies can pose questions to a community of contributors (the hive) for input to an optimum solution. In short, it brings the shared economy to problem-solving. However, it is not just simply a collaboration forum. Emerging AI technology underpins a process of matching the right experts from the hive to the problem at hand with AI also utilized in analysing the responses (Mindhive 2021, 20).

Mindhive is a scalable-crowdsourcing platform built on proprietary technology, enabling the disruption of all layers of the consulting industry with instant reporting, natural language processing, AI-driven predictive insights, and maximized global user reach and engagement. AI has been shown to have the potential to deliver diverse solutions at reduced costs and increased speed (Chowdhury and Sadek 2012, 14), so those seeking answers can quickly find good ideas and actionable insights.

Applying collective intelligence to marketing communication education

Like any research, the first step is to identify participants, whose synergistic interactions are likely to lead to better insight generation (Rock and Grant 2016).

For this exercise, 20 thought leaders from the marketing communication and media industry in Australia were invited to join in the ‘hive’ conversation. They were CEOs of international advertising, digital, and media agencies. Two foundation questions were posted by the discussion leader: Q1: What skills do graduates need to bring to the industry? Q2: What is the optimal mix of discipline-focused or life empowering skills? And how should these skills be developed?

Participants generated responses, raised additional questions and further responses in an iterative ‘evolving’ conversation. AI identified trends in discussion threads through sentiment and keyword analysis. The resulting themes were voted on by the participants. Suggesting insights or topics for the discussion leader to pursue while also helping to overcome the trap of confirmation bias (Guszcza and Schwartz 2019).

Results

The predictive insight of our industry's thought leaders is outlined in response to the two foundation questions.

RQ1:

what skills do graduates need to bring to the industry?

T-shaped skill set

When asked ‘What skills do graduates need to bring to industry?’ The skills that industry leaders first mentioned were not discipline skills, but broader generic abilities like critical thinking or understanding the real problem. Advertising leaders sought people who could think strategically or were problem solvers to ‘find solutions that make the world better’.

People skills also were mentioned and applied to both working with other staff and with clients. ‘It’s a people business, a team business, and you need to be able to manage that in a way that gets people motivated to work with you’.

In seeing this list, one industry partner commented, ‘I would add collaboration and consultation skills to the mix. Then layer on top the more industry specific skills’.

These broad generic skills seemed to constitute a foundation on which other more vocational-specific skills could add depth. This is perhaps best described as a T-shaped skill set, where the depth of the disciplinary skills is augmented with the breadth of different, and often more generic, skills. As one participant summed up, ‘Because at the core of every good advertising professional is a generalist, before developing deeper skills in a specific area or discipline’.

Specific marketing communication skills

Data, data, data. You really need to be able to understand data analysis and interpret that into actions and results. You don’t need to be the number cruncher, or even necessarily the one that finds the insights … but how do you bring data to life and action it? And the questions: Is this the RIGHT set of data? Do these data have integrity? Did we start with the right hypothesis to choose our datasets? This is where Uni can really educate.

Another industry leader felt that university is perfectly suited to teach the creative side of advertising. ‘University is a great place to learn all the hands-on skills we need to craft work, and create all the peripheral material required to sell work in. But the major resource for advertising creatives is still a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants industry-run creative school’.

University was also considered ideal to develop persuasive skills. ‘The beauty and annoyance of our wonderful industry is that there is no right or wrong, but more right or certainly better articulated, or sold more effectively. So, I agree that impassioned selling skills are a necessity in the commercial advertising and media world, so a great area of focus at uni’.

However, many industry leaders made reference to specific skills that could be gained in standard industry courses. ‘For students interested in digital advertising there are a range of free platform specific programs’. Working knowledge and experience using software like Photoshop, Illustrator, or Canva was also mentioned.

Many felt it was not enough to say you completed a short online course, but real understanding came through application and practice. ‘Understanding excel spreadsheets beyond basic formulas – to quickly and efficiently manage, interpret and present data’. However, this practiced understanding of specific skills was more typically demonstrated through work experience.

There was also discussion about whether students required job-specific skills (such as how to write great copy) or if they needed to develop broader advertising skills and digital proficiency. In looking to employ a junior copywriter, one Creative Director said, ‘I look for a grounding in the craft – a love of words or pictures or both’. Another suggested a broader skill set was required. ‘Channel planning? Data analytics? NCD? Coding? Are these all new skills for creativity?’ Even if you worked as a copywriter, you still needed to know something about media, search, and even return on investment. Perhaps, this aligns with the top highlight in the Mindhive discussion, ‘Data-driven creativity is our new reality’.

RQ2:

what is the optimal mix of discipline-focused or life empowering skills? And how should these skills be developed?

The top theme, as voted by discussion members was ‘Be brave. Be self-aware’. While this is good advice for working in advertising, it equally applies in life.

One industry leader suggested, ‘The earlier in a career you have developed a good sense of self, your strengths and weaknesses, what sets you on fire and what bores you to tears, what motivates you (status? flexibility? community?), what helps you deal with stress (mindfulness practises), the earlier you’ll be able to make great CHOICES both in regards to your day to day contributions and relationships, as well as in bigger career decisions (continue this internship here, or take a paid job there?)’.

As well as understanding yourself, industry leaders suggested that you also need to understand others. Often this is triggered by curiosity. ‘You must have an insatiable interest in what other people are doing, what motivates them, what amuses them and what inspires them. You have to step out of your own world and see things through the eyes of others’.

This was also described as, ‘An innate ability to understand human behaviour. I think this can be taught! By showing how data and emotional insights on consumer behaviour can drive change’.

Further, industry leaders felt these skills could be, and should be, developed in university as well as in the workplace, equipping students for life. ‘We always file these things under general “soft skills” and look at it as something that is inherent in some people. But I believe they can definitely be worked on, and good self awareness is the key to unlocking good communication, adaptability, relationship building and general day-to-day enjoyment – all of which is key to a healthy, happy productive time in this industry!’

Resilience was offered as an example of this. ‘The word has been overused a lot lately, but it has always been essential in this industry. An idea you have poured your heart and soul into can be rejected by any number of people along the chain, often with no rational explanation. You have to dust yourself off and put your heart and soul into a better idea’.

Aligned with resilience was admiration for the hard worker and the need for a strong work ethic. ‘The debate about natural talent will never be resolved. But even if someone does start with an innate advantage, they will always be overtaken by the person who consistently works harder’. Another added, ‘And it’s not quite a skill but I want to see your passion for advertising and your work ethic. Don’t bother otherwise!’

Discussion

Is university education keeping up with change?

The foundation of advertising, and all forms of marketing communication, is changing. Perhaps, the biggest mountain in the way of fulfilling the needs of employers is the speed of that change, since university structure generally does not pivot in an instant. Imagine, for example, that a university needs more manpower, or new expertise, to teach a new skill or subject matter to address industry changes. Adding faculty is often a cumbersome process and one that can frequently take a year or even multiple years. That, alone, can put the university behind as it tries to keep up with industry dynamics.

But perhaps more problematic is that the newest and most exciting marketplace changes commonly require cutting edge knowledge and/or abilities. Recent examples might be augmented reality, artificial intelligence, or even something not quite as recent, like programmatic buying. For universities, a major obstacle in hiring an ‘expert’ in those areas is that they are often earning far higher salaries than any academic institution could afford. Without question, this can represent an unsurmountable hurdle. The data presented here do hold some reason for optimism.

A clear takeaway is that a big portion of what advertising executives seek in their employees has little to do with the rapid changes within the industry. Strategic thinking and problem solving have existed at the core of university education in marketing communications from the earliest days. The very first advertising textbook was published by Daniel Starch more than a century ago (Starch 1914). In it he says this: ‘The careful analysis of a successful or an ineffective advertisement reveals underlying principles which have been applied correctly or incorrectly, or possibly ignored, as the case may be. Success and failure are not matters of good or bad luck. Complete analysis of a proposition and careful execution of the plans bring results with as reasonable certainty in an advertisement as cause and effect follow each other in any other controllable human affairs…. success or failure often hinges on a minute understanding of human nature and of economic conditions’.

Starch is obviously emphasizing the need for strategic thinking. He goes on to specifically mention problem-solving. ‘Thus we see that advertising itself is simply a large branch in the still larger department of the marketing of a product. Its aims and methods must naturally first be fitted nto to general plan and policy of marketing that particular commodity, and then the specific advertising problems can be dealt with’.

In those respects, university education does indeed keep up with change, because those necessary traits transcend change.

Furthermore, most full-fledged universities that teach marketing communication do aim for the t-shaped skill set. They assure that no matter which specialty a student selects (e.g., copy writing, account planning), they obtain a broad education that guarantees they can think outside the box around that specialty.

People skills, like dealing with clients and consumers, or collaboration with co-workers, already exist in university programs, too. Group projects are all about developing that skill set. If students are expected to make presentations, that also is about dealing with an audience. Those experiences commonly occur in both advertising/marketing programs, as well as in classes outside those programs.

While some participants did mention skills that are more recent to marketing communication, not all of them are beyond the reach of universities. The need for students to understand data is a perfect example. Universities, especially those entrenched in research productivity, are replete with data experts. Programs that already teach students about advertising or marketing research need only assure students learn the basics of interpreting data. So, even if a particular university has not kept up in that respect, it takes little to adapt current resources to meet this demand.

Different university programs have equally different strengths and weaknesses, but there are schools that do excel at several of the specific skill sets mentioned. While special copywriting and art direction programs are found at several non-university training centres, there are universities that are known recruitment venues for advertising agencies seeking creative talent. Many marketing programs (not to mention some communication-based advertising programs) train students in selling. Use of software programs like Photoshop and Illustrator likewise can be found at universities. None of this is particularly new to higher education.

Is university education still a competitive advantage for life?

T-shaped skills, championed by these industry leaders, provide a core of preparation for the future. These practitioners emphasized the inherent linkage between life skills and work skills. To be successful in either, marketing communication professionals must know themselves, and have confidence in their own abilities. This might seem obvious, but how those skills are developed is less so.

For some people, those traits gain a firm developmental start in childhood. For others, the growth is less well advanced in those earlier years. University advertising and marketing programs provide fertile ground for honing the sense of self. In fact, much of university education in general is all about that, since for many students, attending a university is about emerging from the nest. Suddenly students must take care of themselves, and take responsibility, in ways they may never have experienced previously. This also can, though it doesn’t always, lay the groundwork for learning both resilience and a solid work ethic.

Advertising/marketing training, in most cases, takes this farther. Again, group projects and oral presentations inevitably lead students to learn about their own strengths and weaknesses. The very process of gaining expertise in this field provides them with the tools for developing self-confidence.

Besides understanding themselves, these programs are necessarily about understanding others. This is why separate classes in consumer behaviour are found in most, and it has always been a significant part of advertising education. As Daniel Starch said in that first textbook, ‘success or failure often hinges on a minute understanding of human nature…’ (Starch 1914). Most of the basic principles taught in marketing communication programs, like targeting, surveys, account planning, media planning, etc., are all about the need to understand what people do, when they do it, and why they do it.

When all is said and done, university education is only about half aimed at textbook learning, with the other half concerned with social development (dormitory living, parties, athletic events, and such). Undoubtedly, people could learn those same social (‘soft’) skills on the job, but then they would be learning at the employer’s expense. Arguably, it is far better for them to make their mistakes at university, rather than while working on a major advertising campaign. So most university marketing communication units offer both specific classes that contribute to this development, as well as a soft landing platform for students as they test their own wings.

Of course, there is a difference between teaching something and teaching it well. As the COVID-19 pandemic forced programs to convert to online education, some aspects of the university educational experience have suffered. There certainly are questions that have arisen as to whether learning at a distance has undermined those traditional strengths of the university experience. The long-term effects, however, are yet to be determined.

Conclusion

Although this field is rapidly changing, the priorities exhibited by industry professionals for prospective job candidates focus almost entirely on aspects of preparation that universities have offered for decades. Even the more narrow and specific skills mentioned are already a part of those programs or are well within reach of most of them.

This is not to imply that the newest and best specialties, most of which were spawned by the Internet and mobile platforms, are unimportant. And they do challenge university resources in many instances. It is just that they are somewhat less important than ‘core’ issues like strategic thinking and self-awareness, which are part of the DNA of universities.

This suggests that programs faced with obstacles that slow their ability to adapt to industry changes, or the lack of finances to hire talent with expertise in the latest thing, can still be valuable to students by focusing on those core training they have always offered. Some of those newer topics might need to be learned on the job, but a solid core can prepare them to do that later learning.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Gayle Kerr

Gayle Kerr passion for advertising began as a copywriter working in the industry for more than a decade. She shifted from writing advertising to researching and teaching it as a Professor in the School of Advertising, Marketing and Public Relations at QUT. Gayle’s PhD was first in Australia in the field of IMC and her work in teaching, research and industry engagement was recognized with the inaugural Don Schultz Award for Innovation in IMC Teaching, Research and Practice 2022. Gayle has published over 100 peer-reviewed articles and conference papers on creativity, digital media, advertising and IMC. She was the founding President of the Australia and New Zealand Academy of Advertising and served on the Executive of the American Academy of Advertising. She is also Deputy Editor of the Journal of Marketing Communications.

Ian Lings

Ian Lings is Professor of Marketing and Head of the School of Advertising, Marketing and Public Relations at the QUT Business School, Brisbane. His research on “firm – employee – customer” interfaces has been published in a range of journals. Ian co-authored the research focussed, Sage title: “Doing Business Research: A Guide to Theory and Practice”. Ian authored the seminal article on Internal Market Orientation (IMO), synthesising knowledge from the fields of operations management, human resources management, psychology and marketing to develop a model describing the physical and socio-emotional processes of service delivery. He developed, validated, and subsequently published the first measure of IMO. This measure has been adopted internationally and applied by a number of teams to new organisational contexts. He has undertaken research for a range of clients in differing industries and across different countries. Ian has led or contributed to a range of industry and government funded research projects including projects for the Australian Centre for Research Collaboration in Rail, involving researcher from several universities and representatives from organisations in the Australian rail industry and a large Australian Research Council Linkage project.

Leigh Terry

Leigh Terry is a highly-regarded media operator whose career has spanned Europe and APAC. A digital innovator at the forefront of the media industry, Leigh understands the significant impact technological advancement has on both the consumer and industry at large; and harnesses that information to guide his clients across the region. Having first entered the industry in account management and traditional media planning roles, Leigh was responsible for launching OMD Digital in the UK in 2000. In 2004, he set up OMD's Direct and Data offering while retaining overall responsibility for Digital. He moved to OMD Australia in October 2005 as Executive Director of OMD Digital and became Managing Partner in October 2006. In February 2011, Leigh was promoted to CEO Omnicom Media Group ANZ; charged with the leadership of all assets across Australia and New Zealand. In January 2017, Leigh joined the IPG Mediabrands network, where he is responsible for leading the 14 markets and 5,000+ people across the region. Passionate about technology and its impact on consumers and the advertising industry, Leigh is an inaugural Visiting Fellow in the School of Advertising, Marketing and Public Relations, QUT School of Business at the Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Australia.

Jef Richards

Jef Richards Having previously served as department Chair of the two largest and most influential university advertising programs in the United States, the University of Texas and Michigan State University, he is author or co-author of more than 100 published books, book chapters, and articles about advertising, marketing, or communications. He is on the Advisory Council of the Institute for Advertising Ethics, on the Board of Directors for the ANA Educational Foundation, and has served as a Panel Member for the National Advertising Review Board of the Advertising Self-Regulatory Council. He serves, or has served, on the Editorial Review Boards of 9 different research journals. He is former President of the American Academy of Advertising, a named Fellow of that organization, as well as a recipient of its prestigious Ivan L. Preston Outstanding Contribution to Research Award and its Billy I. Ross Advertising Education Award. He was the Inaugural Inductee into the Rowan University Advertising Hall of Fame.

Bruce Muirhead

Bruce Muirhead is an accomplished academic and entrepreneur with over 25 years of experience in building partnerships between the public and private sectors, focusing on economic, public, and social innovation. He is the Founding CEO of Mindhive, a global collective intelligence platform, and ecosystem of over 14,000 thought leaders and partners dedicated to developing ideas through collaboration to improve public interest's economic and social outcomes. Prior to Mindhive, Bruce established and led the Eidos Institute, a public policy think tank that focused on research-informed human capital, productivity, and wellbeing policy. Bruce has a solid international academic network and has presented over 50 academic and seminar conference papers, published 42 public policy reports, and prepared 29 published articles. He has also led 35 past, current, and submitted multidisciplinary and applied projects totalling over $50M. Bruce's recognition as an internationally respected applied academic is evident by his adjunct professorial position at Griffith University and invitations to speak at international conferences in the USA, South Africa, and the UK. He has led more than $40M in research and development projects in Australia, Asia, Africa, UK, Europe, and the Middle East.