It has been a tough year for many working in media. Jobs appear to be shrinking amid AI transformations and cost-cutting drives necessitated by struggling or transitioning business models.

WPP has cut its head count by 7,000 in the past year. Omnicom’s acquisition of IPG will lead to “cost synergies”, which also translates to potential redundancies, and similar consolidations are expected to come to the TV market. Meanwhile, publishers continue to get squeezed by Big Tech via the development of AI search, and Big Tech itself is also replacing many of its workers, especially at the entry level, with AI.

We view our mission at The Media Leader in part as being as helpful as possible to the industry in which we serve. With that in mind, we wanted to open the conversation about redundancy and see if we could help impart advice on those affected or feeling precarious.

Annabel McCaffrey leads the Advice Line team for NABS, the ad industry’s wellbeing charity. Last year, NABS received a record number of calls from those in distress, including a 39% year-on-year increase in calls for redundancy support.

We asked our readers and listeners to send in their questions on the topic of redundancy and related topics, and host Jack Benjamin put those questions to McCaffrey.

Highlights:

1:49 : Characterising the current state of adland

5:21 : Is AI replacing jobs, particularly at the entry level? Are jobs applications even being viewed by humans anymore?

15:05 : Advice for putting a CV together, networking

22:53 : How redundancy impacts people at different ages

39:07 : How can organisations do more to support staff and achieve buy-in for mental wellness efforts?

Related articles:

What to do if you’ve been made redundant: Tips from experts

WPP cut 7,000 jobs over past year

What I learnt from redundancy early in my career

Dealing with redundancy

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Thanks to our production partners Trisonic for editing this episode.

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