Vladimir Rass is managing director of MindShare, an advertising company. He spoke to The Leader about his career and the peculiarities of working in the advertising sector.

Like so many other things in the business world, advertising is still new in Russia. But, it is an area that has done well. MindSpring’s Vladimir Rass had some interesting points to make on the state of the sector in today’s Russia.

Tell us about your career.

There were several stages in my life, and I had to start from scratch a few times. After graduating from the university I was sent to a very exotic country — Iraq. That happened exactly between two wars in which that country was involved.

What university did you graduate from?

The Institute of Africa and Asia at Moscow State University. I studied Arabic there, by the way, and I used to be quite fluent in it.

What made you choose that university?

This is quite a long story. When I was at high school, my parents wanted me to follow the family tradition and become a construction engineer. My father and grandfather were construction engineers and my great-grandfather was an architect. So, in high school I paid special attention to physics and mathematics, and the latter later helped me. But I am not an exact-science person; I’ve always been more into the humanities. So, in my senior year, upon hearing stories from people who had graduated from my high school in previous years about the Institute of Africa and Asia, I decided to study there, too. I was in the social-science and economics department, which was in line with all my interests at the time — economics, exotic countries and a foreign language.

What did you do in Iraq?

I was sent there as a junior interpreter and moved to a more senior position by the end of my two-year stay there. When I was back about the time Iraq invaded Kuwait, I decided to go into academia. I got a job at the Academy of Science’s Institute of Africa and Asia as a junior researcher. Although I made some career progress and became an assistant to the institute’s director, I wasn’t satisfied with my work. You know how it worked out at that time — it would take you three years to write a book, then it would be lying on a shelf at some publishing house for another three years, after which they would send it back to you for an update. So, I wasn’t satisfied either professionally or financially.

What was your next career move?

In the economy, I have always been interested in two sectors, finance and marketing. So, I was weighing my options in both of them for a while. I nearly got a job at a bank, but there was a better offer from [advertising agency] BBDO Marketing, and we were a good match for each other. I worked there as a market-research manager for a year, after which I was promoted to the position of media director. In 1997 the media direction was turned into a subsidiary of BBDO, and in late 1999 I entered negotiations with MindShare, which was in quite a bad state in Russia at that time, and I finally opted for it.

Did your education and previous experience help you in the advertising sector?

The education indeed helped me because I studied economics. There was a good economics school at my institute, and by the end of my studies there I got some knowledge of non-Soviet economic theories. As a result, I am one of the few people in Russia’s ad industry who work in the field they studied at school.

People in the advertising industry say that there is a shortage of mid-level managers with sufficient qualifications. Do you share this opinion? If yes, why is it so?

It must be so. But this is not because of people themselves; it’s because of the 1998 crisis. After the crisis, for about a year and a half, ad agencies shrank and they preferred to promote their employees to higher positions rather than hire from the outside. As a result, when the crisis was over for the sector, there were enough qualified people for top positions and a gap for the mid-level.

There is a belief that, at the formative stages, Russia’s advertising sector attracted a lot of young talent because the other sectors were developing poorly at that time. But now there are more other options, and the ad industry is no longer the first choice for many. Do you agree with that?

It is hard for me to look at the situation from the viewpoint of a young person choosing a career. But I think the ad sector is still attractive for young people’s self-actualization. This is one of the best-developed sectors of the Russian market. In my opinion, two industries in Russia have been developing according to a Western model — the banking industry and the advertising industry. Now, other industries are catching up. True, career prospects in Russia’s ad industry in the early 1990s were better than now, but this was because the market was just taking off and there was a lot of room for growth. However, I don’t think that there is no room for further growth in the ad sector now. There are niches that have not yet been properly developed.

What are they?

For example, so far, the Russian ad market has primarily developed in two directions — full-service agencies and media agencies. In the West, there is much deeper specialization by industry, and this could become one prospective direction for development. And I believe that even now a person who starts in an advertising company in the lower echelons can learn much more quickly than 10 years ago. We had to learn many things by trial and error, which took a considerable amount of time. I know some examples of young people who started two years ago at low-level positions and have gone up the career ladder quite dramatically. Now, they’re reliable professionals.

What qualities are most important for a successful career in the ad industry?

First of all, you need dedication. Also, you need a creative approach because advertising is a creative process. You need to be broad-minded. If you take a formal approach, it’s only likely to do harm. You also need to be precise. Media planning is largely about figures. Also, you need to be sort of “civilized”: I mean, you need to use civilized approaches in your work.

What are “uncivilized” approaches?

Anything from releasing false figures to giving out misleading information.

Are there any stereotypes about your trade among young people seeking jobs in the advertising sector?

Yes, there are some. Basically, there are two kinds of stereotypes. On the creative side, quite often young people who have some creative potential and skills in this field try to apply their ideas to brand advertising, not understanding that creativity is not enough for successful promotion of a brand. You also need to understand the brand, to know what you can and what you cannot do to it, to know its history. Only if you take all these factors into consideration will you be able to come up with the right concept for advertising a brand. The most artistic idea is not always the right one. We don’t normally need a shocking design for an ad. On the other hand, people think that media planning is a purely technological process. This is also a mistake. It’s a process of thinking above all. “Brain sells” is in fact MindShare’s slogan all over the world.