Mediatel Newsline has been carrying some excellent editorial pieces recently around the topic of media strategy. The latest, from Nick Manning is here; all credit to Mediatel for giving over the space to this debate. It is quite a contrast to the old ‘Agency X in trading dispute with Broadcaster Y’ that passed as the hot debating topic of the day within the media world and which featured so regularly in ‘Campaign’.

A million years ago (last Tuesday) I got a job at the ad agency Davidson Pearce as a media research executive. I had had jobs before (as an ad agency messenger, a research assistant at Southern TV and as a market research junior at a client) but the media research role for me turned out to be a bit of a breakthrough.

Last week’s rant was all about not learning lessons, and referenced the mighty Bob Hoffman, the AdContrarian who made this very point in an interview as part of the Crater Lake and Mediatel ‘Making Sense Of It All’ series.

Why is it that we are so bad at learning from the mistakes and successes of the past? It’s something that bugs me and, I suspect, anyone who’s been around for any length of time.