Winter 2016


15 Anik sums up the professional credentials in


a word: “multiplicities.” Students, she says, must be able to hold multiple perspectives that will enable them to understand “the questions and challenges surrounding finance, technology, manufacturing, sales, strategy, human resources, and other functions.” This is a departure from the model that


academic programs in marketing have traditionally followed, according to Dominique Hanssens, the faculty director of the Morrison Family Center for Marketing Studies and Data Analytics at UCLA Anderson. “In the past, marketing students were often


viewed as extroverts with little appreciation for analytical thinking,” he says. “The requirements to be a successful marketing executive are now more analytical in nature. For example, marketing executives have to be conversant in financial planning and marketing resource allocation so that they can demonstrate the returns on marketing to the financial officers in their firms.” If there is one skill above all for students to


master, it probably is the ability to locate marketing strategies in raw numbers. Coulter says that a colleague of hers calls it “workable wondering”: not merely reporting what the mass of data says, but intuiting what it is telling marketers to do. In data analytics lies the “inner spark” that buildslies the “inner spark” tha powerful brands and sends compelling marketing messages, says Stahl.


w it is telling marke


what the g


ges, sa


rands and sends compellingmag Stahl.


“Soft” skills for building relationships


should complement the structured ones, the educators agree. Jacobs wants his students to become “better listeners” with the “different kind of patience” it takes to follow consumers through the various stages of the purchasing journey. Mason sees writing “direct, succinct, and persuasive” prose as another baseline ability, along with making effective oral presentations and simply knowing how to begin and end a business conversation.


IN SEARCH OF UNICORNS


John Ellett, a writer for Forbes, calls them “unicorns”: those rare professionals who are equally adept at marketing and technology. “They are the bridge builders between CMOs and CIOs and the Sherpas for brand marketers who need help navigating the digital world,” he declares.


clar Educators recognize recognize


that training students in the technologies of marketing is becoming as important as


tudents ogies of ecoming


as


In the past, marketing students were often viewed as extroverts with little appreciation for analytical thinking. The requirements to be a successful marketing executive are now more analytical in nature.


indoctrinating them in its theoretical side. When it comes to dually qualified marketing t


them


cal side. s to dually


technologists, says DePaul University’s Ron Jacobs,


keting says DePaul


Univ “I cann What


“I cannot hire enough of them.” What’s essential for


on Jacobs, enough of them.”


students to learn is that the days of media campaigns “w infinite budgets and infinite tim e over. Instead


students to le the days of me campaigns “with infinite budgets and infinite time” are over. I of “the T


ed ith ts


me” ad


of “the TV com


that takes


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sential for arn is that edia


six months to produce,” says Jacobs, marketers must rely on digital channels to reach consumers much more quickly and personally. This doesn’t mean that there’s no place in marketing study programs for the time-tested technologies of mass communication. NYU’s Martin Maloney observes that if it’s not a good thing to be a 60-year-old who knows only


old media, “it’s no better to be a 25-year-old who knows only new media.” Students should be


briefed on how digitization and the Internet have given traditional media such as outdoor signage and radio new leases


on life as marketing vehicles, Maloney says.


Want to learn more about these mythical marketing creatures? Google: “The Rise of the Unicorns” by John Ellett for more great reading.


WELCOME TO OUR WORLD Today’s academic marketing programs are designed to impart all these skills, and students who acquire them can look forward to plenty of opportunities to apply what they have been taught. According to Kumar, now is a fascinating time to be in marketing, because the specialty is evolving faster than any other aspect of business. “Marketing is in its own world today,” he says.


If they are diligent, students of marketing should be able to live happily and prosperously in this exhilarating environment. 


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