Marketing and Professional Development

Do Marketing Professionals Deny Themselves Professional Development?

My opinion is – yes, I think they do.  I’m happy for someone reading this to disagree with me and provide me with their opinion!

Why do I say this? Well, it’s because I see less and less marketing professionals attend events in Sydney that enhance a marketing professional’s career or skill set.   It’s because of a number of factors:

-     Justification of time out of the office:  Marketing is a high pressure, results driven role and anytime spent out of the office has to nearly always be quantifiable and revenue generating. 

-     Finding time to get out of the office: Again, even more so today, marketing professionals are tight on resource and usually it’s just one person holding the marketing fort.  So trying to find the time to get out of the office can be a struggle.

-     Marketing’s general perception that many events are just ‘sales pitches’.  Ok this is a fair perception; I mean marketing professionals know a sales pitch when they see it.  But, an event that can help you do your job better and equip you with the tools and techniques to win shouldn’t be dismissed.

Maybe I’m being a bit harsh on marketing professionals, but I would be really interested in hearing from some, and  letting me know exactly how many events you attended this year that directly relate to improving your role as a marketing professional and not just networking?

Come on people speak up, I’m waiting…..