Redefining Promotion
Taylor Swift and Todd Rundgren
The dynamic tension of artists splitting their focus on promotion and creativity has parallels to ‘moving up’ in a career.
Is it better to have a massive fan base, or to truly express unique creativity in relative obscurity?
Career development has parallels to artistic development. Yet, career durability is more reliant on deep development across many areas, rather than quick ascension based on pleasing people.
Advancing in a professional career has changed significantly in the last decade. The classic professional “promotion” appears to have morphed into the actual definition of the word: ‘active encouragement for the furtherance of a cause, venture, or aim’.
ANOV’s view is that magnification – rather than “promotion” – better encompasses personal elevation. Magnification embodies a collateral effect of broadening an individual’s beneficial impact on their organization.
But beyond semantics, ANOV has a different perspective on upward mobility.
Rather than seeing a promotion as a centrist approach to an individual’s rise in an organization, we take a holistic perspective of interdependent growth potential and how it influences team performance and long-term achievement.
Because all too often, the tipping point of being promoted is a judgement of genial personality, rainmaking potential, and indiscriminate conformity. Such factors are relatively easy to discern.
What are often less obvious are leadership abilities, work quality, unique skills, and regularly applying creativity – all in service of having a meaningful and lasting impact on external clients and internal team advancement.
So, to the analogy of Taylor Swift and Todd Rundgren; two ‘popular’ music-making legends and how they may represent a reasonable analogy of career ‘promotion’ versus career magnification.
Taylor Swift needs no introduction. As a musician and popular entertainer, she is a worldwide phenomenon and has more broad generational appeal than any contemporary musician since the turn of the 20th century. Her music catalog, and nearly constant release of songs, albums, and videos has no peer.
Todd Rundgren, on the other hand, would need an introduction to most under the age of 40. Over a 50+ year career arc, he has issued albums regularly (solo and with bands), developed a deeply devoted fan base, and continually reinvented his artistic approach – that only occasionally has broader mass appeal.
Taylor is undoubtedly a musical artist. It’s also clear that beyond her artistic skills, her business savvy and ability to constantly be on the forefront approaches a type of art form.
Todd would be many devotee’s pinnacle of musical artistry. A pioneer in technology applied to music production, he embraced personal computers in the early 1980’s as a way of giving direct personal access to musical and video production capability. He is a multi-instrumentalist, a legendary producer, and a still-touring performer well into his 70’s.
Todd usually did promotion as a way of highlighting possibilities through his artistic interests and applying wide-ranging technology developments to making music. Often it was related to an album or video or concert tour. But his much more limited renown may well be the result of more time and energy spent on pushing the boundaries of creativity, skills, artistic expression, and musicality.
Taylor Swift and Todd Rundgren both make great music, and the perception of its artistic merit is in the eye of the beholder, i.e., the fans.
However, from the standpoint of admiration, longevity, and boundary-pushing artistry in the popular music genre, one might guess who I would prefer to listen to.
And from an organization’s purpose of advancing people, if going deeper, seeing more, and fostering beneficial and durable performers is seen as magnification, consider shifting more energy and effort towards that.
