After decades of inappropriate behavior in the ad business, we’ve arrived at an age of extreme political correctness.

No longer will people in the workplace be treated with disrespect due to race, age, sex, religion or political persuasion.

To understand just how far we’ve come, return with me now to those naughty days of yesteryear when the whole ad business was the Wild Wild West of sexual innuendo and flagrant flirting. The line that became popularized was, “That’s what she said.”

This simple four word phrase became the perfect punchline for almost any innocent remark. For example, you could be sitting in a meeting and a female producer might be speaking about a client’s production budget and say, “It’s not very big, but it’ll do the job!” And a copywriter would say, “That’s what she said.” Big laugh.

Or an account guy might be talking about a campaign he couldn’t sell to the client and say, “It got lost in the big black hole” and a secretary would say, “That’s what she said!” More laughs. If the truth be told, the women in the office used, abused and cherished the line as much as the men did.

My personal favorite was uttered by a very attractive blond account executive named Paula. She worked on the Hills Bros Coffee account at Cohen/Johnson and we had a big new TV shoot coming up. The client needed to be on the air with two new TV spots. We were ahead of the game and had actually written four scripts. If we shot all four of them, we could save the client some money on production. So the question was, should we shoot all four, finish two of them, and edit the other two at a later date?

Paula pondered this for a minute and said, “I don’t know. I’d hate to get it in the can and have it sit there for six months.” To which the art director replied, “That’s what she said.” It got a big laugh – the loudest from Paula herself. While I’m on Paula (that’s what she said) I’m reminded of her quick wit. One time, I was on one of my new miracle diets and had lost about 15 pounds.

I came to work wearing my skinny pants. Feeling quite proud of my new slimmer look, I said, “Hey Paula, there used to be an ass in these pants!” Without missing a beat she said, “Howie, there still is.”

The old days were wilder, sexier and free-er. But there’s no doubt that this kind of behavior was misguided and often crossed the line. Thankfully, today, the ad business is more enlightened and far more healthy.

It’s just a little more stiff. (That’s what she said.)

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