Hasta La Creative!

Stuart Elliott is in Dana Point for the 4As Conference.

He heard some top people at TBWA distance themselves from all the wallowing about change.

“Stop whining,” Lee Clow told the estimated 380 attendees. The new realities “shouldn’t be scary,” he said, because they offer “a huge opportunity for us” to become far more useful to marketer clients as they seek more effective ways to sell products.

“If you want to participate, you’ve got to start hiring young people,” Mr. Clow said, “and don’t tell them what to do — ask them what to do.”

“We should just stop talking about what was,” Tom Carroll, president and chief executive at TBWA Worldwide, said.

“It’s like driving in the fog,” said Mr. Carroll, who is also the chairman of the association, known as the Four A’s. “You’re not sure what’s ahead of you, but you have to keep driving.”

“All industries recalibrate themselves,” Mr. Carroll said, illustrating his point with a rhetorical question, “How’d you like to be in the CD business?”

Speaking of the CD biz, did you hear Coldplay is pulling a Radiohead?