Seems to change dependant on which company you ask. I have personally seen here in Finland most major ad and media agencies lay-off people. It’s very difficult to fire someone here in Finland without real cause & hence in some ways the economy has helped these agencies to go into this process called “cold termination” – which essentially is a BS way of saying we are gonna fire a whole bunch of you and give you some legal mumbo jumbo that its up the company to decide who goes! It has given agencies the opportunitiy to review their strategies & get rid of the old useless people who have no understanding of the ad/media landscape today.

Right now, lots of talk is going around about new divisions specializing in digital opening up, ROI based models and so on – Funnily enough friends are telling me that these are radical new ideas when really, is it just that Finland is two steps behind the rest of the world – creatively there are great guys/girls here but strategically I really can’t say I have seen anything that would meet the standards I have adhered to in the UK, Australia and other major markets…

Old colleagues in Australia have said by January 2010 brands will be recruiting again – 90% digitally focused… Here in the Nordics the market is quite stale – companies are not sure and in most cases companies in the Nordics are very “safe” and don’t take big risks. 

Simply interested to hear whats going on out there… Finland is slowly curving back up I think and by the end of the year/beginning of next year gaps will start to be filled. How about the UK?