For twenty years I have been a scientist* working in a sector dominated by artists. That doesn't make it lonely - as a result my colleagues and customers are quite probably more fun and maybe more capable of inspirational thinking - but in recent times this imbalance has made it frustrating.
Its not a question of who's best. Its simply a left brain / right brain issue. And getting the right balance gives you, well, a better sense of balance.
Why does this matter to you?
Well, if you are a dour, bottom line conscious CFO, looking to re-engineer your marketing operations for cost savings, a good place to start would be to get some operationally-minded people involved.
If you are a new wave CMO looking to innovate through the multitude of possibilities opening up around the new technologies of Web 2.0, then getting some technology-literate people involved sounds good for me.
Or, if you are a CEO looking to get some auditing and measurement in place to keep the compliance police at bay, or even if its simply out of idle curiousity to know what your marketing investment pays you back, then getting some metrics-capable people in your team seems somewhat less than rocket science.
Here's the rub. All those creatively minded folk won't want to cede control - or even compromise on strategic direction. And they'll certainly want to be the ones who pick and choose the new Web 2.0 toys that you'll be playing with.
They'll fight you. And they are marketing people after all, they'll play to their strengths. They'll assimilate the buzzwords to a level of competence capable of bluffing the boardroom. But they'll lack the depth of operational experience to know what they are getting into, and they'll lack the attention span to see it through (IT will inherit that poisoned chalice).
What to do? Get some detail people into the marketing function. Folk who roll up their sleeves and actually relish the micro detail in the nuts and bolts of processes. Folk who use spreadsheet macros and pivot tables, and who reach for Visio before PowerPoint. Get some scientists involved who can really move that internal debate about metrics forward in a thorough, consistent, valid and sustainable fashion.
And when you've done all that - use the creative brains for the stuff they excel at. Packaging, positioning, branding and the like.
Succeeding in the new world of marketing, will take a team of the best and the brightest, from both your creatives and your scientists. Make sure you get the balance between right and left correct from the start.
*btw, in my case, that's Economics. And yes, I agree completely, that's just a social science but its a lot further down the road of science than media studies.