Thank You For Smoking: the movie lesson "marketers' self-esteem matters"

No matter what you have become now, if you are anything like an average person, it is very likely that you doubted yourself at some point in your life. Self-esteem is an important psychological
asset one can have. Several factors contribute to its development it affects several life outcomes in turn.

Psychologists have researched self-esteem thoroughly, and there are several studies that show that self-esteem is associated with many positive outcomes in our lives including positive interpersonal relationships, academic success, career success, and others (Kammeyer‐Mueller, Judge, & Piccolo, 2008; Bagozzi, 1980). Another construct associated with self-esteem is self-confidence which tends to be byproduct of high self-esteem.

In case you didn’t know, self-esteem is an individual’s overall evaluations of themselves; how they see the person within themselves, while self-confidence is the degree to which an individual believes they are doing the right thing and that they can do it.

For people who constantly need to approach, persuade, and negotiate and interact with other people—lobbyists not the only ones, wait yet—being self-confident is quintessential.

Here are some movie lessons from “Thank you for smoking” for marketers and salespeople. I admire the movie for teaching me the lesson: “for marketers, especially those in advertising and sales, self-confidence and a strong belief in their own life and what they do is necessary.”

In the movie, Nick Naylor (Aron Eckhart) is a lobbyist who argues with the public, government agencies, and media for the so called ‘cigarette mafia.’ He is repeatedly questioned about his job—which supposedly kills 1200 people a day! At one point Heather asks him: “No, I don’t imagine that’s a problem. I want to know how you see yourself.” Nick immediately replies: “I’m a mediator between two sects of society that are trying to reach an accommodation.” That’s the way he sees his ‘killing’ job.

As working adults, our jobs are the activity that consumes most of our time. And how satisfied we are with our jobs depends on how we see them. Thus, job becomes an important factor affecting our self-esteem and our self-esteem also determines how satisfied.

Marketers and salespeople are some kind of a fraud. You don’t even need evidence for that, because that’s how you think of them. They are blamed for false claims, selling people things they don’t need, and manipulating people—which may be part truth but we are not going into that debate. So, how can they protect themselves from guilt which leads to dissatisfaction with your job and results in career failure?

Thinking on the bright side of your job and not the one people point out to is the real hack to stay satisfied with your job. Nick Naylor is really satisfied with his job. He replies to critics saying: “Michael Jordan plays ball. Charles Manson kills people. I talk. Everyone has a talent.” This means he is clearly proud of his talent: talking.

We know that marketer’s jobs in general and salespeople’s in particular are challenging jobs. The skill of self-esteem and believing in meaningfulness of your job as a marketer would matter. At another instance, Nick N. says: “I like a challenge. If you want an easy job, go work for the Red Cross.”

An important and specific lesson for Public Relations people is arguing correctly. This is suggested by the statement: “That’s the beauty of argument. If you argue right, never wrong.”

Conclusively, what we learn from this movie, and our experiences in fact, that for people whose jobs are challenging and considered by the society a threat to the community need to be more self-confident, self-believing. Loving one’s job is just one, there can be many other things to learn. Note that our assumption is that you are satisfied with your job, people’s taunts are the only problem.

References

Bagozzi, R. P. (1980). The Nature and Causes of Self-Esteem, Performance, and Satisfaction in the Sales Force: A Structural Equation Approach. The Journal of Business, 315-331.

Kammeyer‐Mueller, J. D., Judge, T. A., & Piccolo, R. F. (2008). Self‐Esteem and Extrinsic Career Success: Test of a Dynamic Model. Applied Psychology, 204-224.