By Raymond Smith

Just Keep Going … Persist

Ah, good. You came back. This is the second installment in a series of things I’ve learned – and would love to share – in my 25 years in advertising. The first was to be kind.

The second is to persist. Think about it this way: your education took persistence – years of regular school, then university or college or maybe art school. And the job search took persistence, too. None of it came easy or fast, I’m guessing. But you persisted, and it paid off. You’re finally in. Now, the key is to just keep doing it.

The early years are the toughest. You don’t know exactly what’s what, or who’s who. You make mistakes. You have to do things twice. But it’ll get easier…just persist. Persist through boring meetings and too-long conference calls. Persist through the challenging projects and the late-night pitches. Persist through the inevitable disagreeable people. Just keep going. At the end of each difficult day, take a pause…draw a line under it, and begin anew tomorrow.

And – as is almost inevitable – should your account ever change agencies or your agency ever change owners or your boss ever change identities, you might suddenly find yourself out of work. It happens. And it’s shocking, and it bums you out, and it rattles you.

 What do you do? Just have a good cry, then a hot shower, and then get back out there. Make calls. Send emails. Network. Apply. Interview. Persist. You’ll be working again before you know it, and you’ll have learned something valuable about yourself. Nobody who ever reached the top of their game did it by giving up. One day, you’ll look back and say ‘I did it’. Persist.