Daily Dose of Pras

In the closing scene of American Pie the 4 friends are talking about the end of highschool, reflecting on what it means, and they toast ”to the next step.” It is in that spirit of cameraderie and thoughtful reflection on years of debauchery that I toast to you, my graduating friends, who are once again taking the next step. 

I recently spent the weekend in Berkeley celebrating graduations with you all. There was a moment at Gee’s graduation party when all the graduates were giving speeches. One even cried. Someone told me a few days earlier that there are two times in your life where you are most likely to be depressed when everyone thinks you shoudl be elated: after college graduation, and after the birth of a child. As I spent the weekend at graduation after graduation, celebrating and drinkin and dancing, that irony - that we should be sad at such a happy time - kept knocking around inside my head. 

I think part of it must be that college graduation leaves us feeling unfulfilled. Highschool, which in comparison to college seems like a cake walk, was preceded by so much fanfare, by so much anticipation, and is followed by parties, by a summer filled with revelry and anticipation of “the next step,” and by a certainty that you know where you’re headed. But college graduation is brief - it comes on suddenly, it happens in a flash and then it’s gone, and when finals end we all scatter, or stay a few days and try to hold onto the glory as our friends slowly trickle away, through our fingers, headed home, headed towards their own futures, and sometimes headed out of our lives. And then many of us are faced with the uncertainty of not knowing what the next step is. Many are faced with the prospect of graduating without a job or a graduate program or a plan to jump into. Many are faced with looming collage loans, an ever-increaing cost-of-living, and the prospect of moving back in with our parents. But fear not, fair traveller, for hope is just beyond the horizon. It takes a year, but we all eventually find out feet, our passion, and take that next step. For more than a few of us, it takes a year before the next step emerges.

Long plane rides have always been a time for reflection for me. An inflection point where you can look back on the life you checked-in with your luggage and that will be waiting for you when you land on the other side. President Bartlett on the West Wing once said that long flights are good ”because we cease to be earthbound and burdened with practicality.” I remember a flight I took 3 years ago - to Denver perhaps - where my fellow traveller asked me what I wanted to do when I graduated. I said “I want to be in marketing.” He responded “that’s not good enough. Be specific.” I pondered this, then replied “I want to work in Marketing for Microsoft of Procter & Gamble. Microsoft because it would be great as an innovator and a place where I could be creative, P&G because they know marketing better than anyone.” I had set a goal. Two years ago, after having graduated and gotten that job at Microsoft, I was on another flight - this time to Indonesia - and reflecting on the year in between. I had achieved what I set out to - I had joined Microsoft - but the role I had was not something where I was making a difference. Even six months into this job, I was still searching for my passion.

And now I’m another flight, back from Berkeley after spending the week with all of you. Since that second flight another 18 months have passed. In that time, I switched jobs within Microsoft and found a role that I could become fully invested in. Something that I was good at, where I could make a difference, and finally own my own destiny. It took me exactly a year after starting to get that job, and in the year since I have done amazing things, learned a tremendous ammount, and found my passion. So now, fair traveller, as you too graduate, have faith that you will find your passion, find your feet, and then start running.

During my first year as the Student Lifestyle Marketing Manager at Microsoft, I felt akin to a cowboy guiding a “wagon train in the stars” much like Captain Kirk. Here I was on the frontier, pioneering new types of marketing to a market often neglected by the people back at headquarters. I had autonomy to run campaigns as I saw fit, I was the only one out here, and there was plenty of open range left to pioneer. There was no one micro-managing, no one asking for structures and plans and meetings - it was all about getting the job done.

I worked so hard to network with everyone across Microsoft, to build relationships, to get Student marketing on the map, to get resources, that now a year later there is attention being paid, there are people focusing on it. Now there are at least 5 other people in student-oriented roles. Now there are people second-guessing decisions I made - people with their own ideas on how things should be marketed to students. And much of my job will now be building consensus. At once I feel both relieved that finally I have some help and support, and also peeved that I am no longer the only one out here on the open range - that the West has finally been won - and there are no sheriffs & laws to abide. It is no longer the era of the cowboy. It is the era of the statesman. It is the era of Picard.

As the Student audience-owner, I am contemplating a series of internal planning meetings to get all of these people in a room together. Much of my next month will be spent in endless planning meetings - a cage of my own making - coordinating and talking and planning rather than going out there and lassoing a customer with a good idea. My initial reaction is to resent these new people. To want to go back to the simpler days of being a cowboy. But then I remember that I built this cage for myself. I saw the importance of settling this frontier, and because of my work they sent out more and more wagon trains, and now I must be the statesman that I wanted to be. I must build consensus - something that I was always good at but had forgotten somewhere along the way.

Comic courtesy of Danny deBruin

My greatest hero growing up was not some GI: Joe or Power Ranger, it was a little VW Beetle by the name of Herbie. Herbie was a car that had a mind of his own, and along with his driver Jim Douglas was one of the world’s greatest race cars. The first movie The Love Bug debuted in 1968 and was such a worldwide success that it spawned a whole series of sequels. The movie featured everything a 5 year old boy could ever want - humor, racing, daring action stunts, with just a bit of romance thrown in. Herbie is the reason that I love cars, the reason I dream of being a race car driver, and why 53 is my lucky number.

I was suddenly brought back to my love for Volkswagens when I saw a current marketing campaign for Volkswagen. The campaign, done by Crispin Porter + Bogusky, is called “I know what the people want,” and it’s actually pretty funny. It features a cute classic VW Beetle with a german accent. In the TV commercials he’s seen interviewing various people.

There’s also a viral website which is pretty funny. The idea is that it lets you vote and then displays what “The people want” while suggesting that “The people want German engineering.”

Overall I think the campaign is offbeat, it has personality, and it espouses the same positioning that has always worked for German cars - pay a premium for quality engineering and performance. I was reading another marketing blog that suggested that this is a terrible campaign because it doesn’t appeal to the cutesy flower-power hippie-loving women who buy Beetles. This is true: german guy, old car, and old college basketball coach - this is a terrible campaign if it’s intended to get my mom or sister to buy a VW. However it isn’t. This is trying to reposition the broader Volkswagen brand as a high-performance German-engineering company similar to Audi & BMW. And it’s not trying to get my sister to buy a Beetle. It’s really going after me to buy a Jetta, GTI, or even that pretty Eos convertible. They’re simply leveraging the image of their iconic original Beetle to do it. So I’d say they will get good mileage out of it.