Men at Work Communications: What is it with Millennials

Give a journalist a fact and he or she will start asking questions. So the fact that advertising is obsessed with engaging millennials makes me ask, “What about me?” I’m the other 17% of the Australian population. 18-30s and 50-63s are roughly equal in number in Aus.

When Men at Work Communication told me it had launched a youth division, I made that question formal. While conceding that millennials are not the be all to end all beings, MAW’s creative partner, Michael Willcocks, and youth strategy director, Nick Donovan, agreed to an amicable debate on the subject, which has since been called What is it with millennials?, because if I’d called it, What’s with oldies?, you’d perhaps not be reading this story now.

For starters, isn’t the idea that digital natives are mythical creatures with special powers a little out of date? I’ve caught buses lately. Everyone, of an age, is connected to something other than the real world they’re actually immersed in.

Early uptakers, finding themselves, questioning others…Aren’t millennials rather a lot like you and I were between 18 and 30? Unfathomable? If the average senior creative is in his (or occasionally her) 30s, don’t senior creatives remember what they felt like a few years ago when they were millennial-age?

And then, there’s that really curly one, because advertising Aus is nowhere near tackling age diversity in its industry, can someone who’s never been within a decade of 50 understand what it’s like to be there? I have it on good authority that the idea advertising is engaging older people already is absolutely hilarious.

And if you’re ignoring us because we’re “stuck in our ways”, have you ever tried talking to us about your new products?

So now that I’ve whet your appetite for a bit of verbal thrust and parry, here is Michael Willcocks (Gen X) and Nick Donovan (Millennial) gracefully negotiating a round of questions by me (Baby Boomer) about the mythical Millennial and his/her miraculous allure.