The growing malaise of juniorisation

If young people are hired to do the job of experienced people, there will be fewer experienced, dependable, talented and resilient teams

When I joined advertising nearly four decades ago, it was a comfortable 15 per cent agency commission business. Agencies had offices at prestigious buildings like Express Towers and Nirmal in the central business district of Mumbai. Graduates from the top IIMs happily joined the profession. They were better paid (and pampered) compared to their counterparts in most FMCG companies. Client chief executive officers and agency heads, back then, supped and clubbed together. Martinis, both shaken and stirred, were the toast of client lunches, and how!

Then in the late 1990s, the honeymoon suddenly ended. The media business got separated from