8515: AAF & TCG Predict The Future.

Just received an email that opened with the following:

What does the future hold for the creative field? The AAF, in partnership with The Creative Group, wants to hear from you! Share your views on what you think it will take to survive—and thrive—in the creative/advertising field three to five years from now.

By providing your input, you’ll not only be a part of our new “Creative Team of the Future” project, but you’ll also help bring about positive change. For the first 1,000 survey responses received, The Creative Group will donate $5 to AAF’s Most Promising Minority Students Program. Upon completion of the survey, you may also request that a free copy of the results be e-mailed to you when they are released in June.

Wow. Can’t think of two organizations more qualified to probe the future of creativity in the advertising industry. It took the AAF 62 years to find a Latino worthy of Advertising Hall of Fame® induction. And The Creative Group is essentially a glorified temp agency.

Do the AAF and TCG really believe advertising executives are capable of predicting the survival requirements for the field? Additionally, the only people more clueless about the ad game’s future—and even its present, for that matter—are AAF officers and creative headhunters. So this entire exercise is the blind polling the blind.

The survey includes a few diversity-related questions. For example:

How important do you think it will be for creative/marketing professionals to speak more than one language in the next three to five years?

In your opinion, will creative/marketing teams become more or less culturally diverse in the next three to five years?

Do you expect the emphasis on multicultural advertising to increase or decrease in the next three to five years?

First, most creative/marketing professionals have barely mastered English. And given Madison Avenue’s record on inclusive workplaces to date, it’s safe to say creative/marketing teams will be no more culturally diverse in the next three to five decades. Finally, the trend toward White agencies stealing minority assignments—as well as the growing “cross-cultural marketing” fascination—means multicultural marketing as we know it will undoubtedly devolve into a political mess. However, it should remain unprofitable for anyone choosing to practice it.

Meanwhile, industry honchos will continue to generate smokescreens by donating spare change to initiatives like the AAF’s Most Promising Minority Students Program. Or emailing asinine questionnaires.