Written by Harry Mosquera with Interviews by Angel Guerrero
Mike Schalit hates Mondays.
No, it’s not because he hates work.
“I know everything’s going to hit in the first hour you arrive,” he says. “And normally, you got control of it all. So I just find a lot of pressure on a Monday because you have to motivate everyone for the week.”
Mike Schalit knows what he speaks of. The chief creative director of Net#work BBDO is considered South Africa’s top creative and its youngest inductee in the country’s Advertising Hall of Fame. A protégé of John Hunt, acknowledged godfather of South Africa’s advertising industry and worldwide executive creative director of TBWA, Mike has received numerous recognitions for his work, including two Cannes Grand Prixes, along with D&AD and the One Show Awards.
He feels, though, that awards in advertising need to be changed, or at least reassessed.
“I honestly think awards, for me, have hit their zenith,” he explains. “There are too many awards. They are just conning millions of us…I said at one of our BBDO creative conferences, why don’t we, for one year, all of us, not enter awards, but take all the money we would’ve entered and do something amazing with it.”
Yet Mike accedes that awards, as a barometer for creativity, have their place in the industry.
Being the prime driver and control freak of his agency, Mike’s main passion is for creativity to make real difference in his native land—to enhance lives, enrich people and uplift South Africa.
The advertising scene in South Africa is in transition, and the big issue confronting the industry is getting more of the local black population to be involved in advertising.
“It’s never been on their radar.” Mike relates. “We’re trying to tell them to join…for a country like South Africa, with all our diversity, we’re not using enough of the diversity in our market.”
Advertising activity revolves around Cape Town and Johannesburg, although two cities are quite distinct. “Cape Town is more coastal—a more creative laid-back area,” Mike says. “Joburg is more business oriented.”
He admits though, that the better creative agencies are located in Johannesburg.
“Maybe the guys are too laid-back,” he muses about the Cape Town. “We talk about mountain sickness. All the mountains and the beauty, transferring all the focus from work,” he adds, chuckling, “while Johannesburg is just a bit nasty… they try a little harder.”
South Africa is fast becoming a center for television production, and their expertise in the medium is now recognized worldwide.
“It’s probably three things,” Mike opines. “Obviously, its great locations…you can go from mountain to ocean to dessert to snow. You got everything in one region. There’s the technical expertise so at least even if you’re not going somewhere beautiful then we got these (backroom) technicians. The guys have always got a good film industry experience. Just as practicality of currency and time. The guys from Europe literally can actually come overnight, arrive in the morning for work…and the currency is weak so you get really good value.
TV and radio remain the biggest media markets in South Africa. “It’s interesting, radio because of our rural area,” Mike says. “We have a huge rural market, so radio can reach anyone. In 11 official languages. Talk about diversity!”
On the other hand, English is the dominant language on TV. “We have that more open, less sophisticated market so TV still works really well,” he says.
Beyond award-winning advertising, corporate responsibility is a big advocacy issue for Mike. “I’ve always been a social activist,” he discloses. “Probably comes from my parents who were Jewish, and maybe it’s somewhere in the brains: fight for what’s right. I love ideas and creating stuff. And I’ve seen how ideas can actually make a difference.”
Mike believes that each citizen has a responsibility to give something back to the community. “If you’re a creative guy, do it your way,” he points out. “Creative guys still want to have fun. So do your thing…make difference to society your way. You don’t have to do a cute ad. Maybe give some (to) charity.”
He makes it clear, though, that he is just not talking handouts. “Do it in a sustainable way,” he says. “It’s (about) business-building ideas. You’re looking at (communicating) what can you do, what you have learned, how can you grow. Hopefully, it’s about getting wiser.”
Mike pushes for what he calls “goodvertising” and his clients are buying into the idea.
“They do have some budget for corporate responsibility generally,” he notes, “and they think it’s just really giving money to people but you’re taking it in a different way.”
The importance of an idea and being able to see it was one of the things he learned from John Hunt. “So often, a lot of agencies have good ideas,” Mike Muses. “But not many agencies convince their clients to go with those ideas.”
There was another important lesson that he learned from his mentor.
“He taught me about myself,” Mike says. “He was great at going ‘You must be yourself’ because we’re very different. He’s quiet, well-spoken and thoughtful. I’m kind of loud and I go with my guts. I’m like, I could be kind of a bull in a china shop and that was cool. He was like, ‘Hey, you must be yourself.’ And that was a good lesson.”
Working with John Hunt was like working under a very big shadow, and the time came when Mike wanted to start his own agency. So he told his boss and was pleasantly surprised at the support that John extended him.
Net#work started in 1984 with Nissan as its first client. Its unique name was inspired by a Dutch agency called Nethwork. They dropped the ‘h’ and replaced it with a ‘#’ and people would call them ‘Net-hash-work.’ The year 1984 was also a time sweeping change in South Africa.
“We were starting an agency in the same month as the first elections in South Africa,” Mike remembers. “We were very excited…we were going to be the first agency in the new South Africa… and I think that was what really gave us a sense of purpose and passion.”
Their first campaign for Nissan created a furor, meriting sanctions from the country’s advertising standards authority. Leveraging the new left-of-center political realities in South Africa and rival Toyota’s own campaign line ‘Everything keeps going right,’ Nissan proclaimed in its advertising that ‘Not everything keeps going right.’
“We were cheeky,” Mike confesses, “different…and we embraced the new South Africa. And because we had a Japanese partner, we called ourselves ‘Jafricans.’ It signaled a value system were a little bit like Japan and a whole lot of Africa.
Creativity is what drives Net#work
“Creativity is in our blood,” he stresses. “Creativity is infectious because creativity is effectiveness; there is no line. If you do great creative, it it’s relevant, it’s going to be effective.”
For Mike, creativity is not only about doing the right things, but making mistakes as well.
“I’ve learned that mistakes are necessary part of life,” he allows. “I encourage people to come up with stupid ideas, make mistakes. I’ve seen that failures are often seeds of success.”
A quintessential advertising man, Mike loves not only to work, but the people. “I think there are a lot of great people in advertising. They’re dynamic and smart. And I love ideas. How many people work with ideas everyday? Like there’s nothing that’s ever the same!”
If Mike hates Mondays, he certainly has the rest of the week to keep him happy.
This article was first published in the July-August 2010 issue of adobo magazine.
