The Chairman and Chief Executive Officer for Havas Creative North America, Paul Marobella, describes himself as "energized by breaking traditions" and breaking down silos while building up pro-social brand initiatives. He explained these approaches and their application in creating successful campaigns – along with how a background in data such as his own has never been more valuable to creatives (think of their award-winning “blockchain meets ad” for TD Ameritrade). 

Episode 34 of Insider InSites for MediaVillage is a chock-full, free-flowing 40-minute conversation touching on everything from the recent data-meets-creative mergers and acquisitions (Accenture and Droga5; Publicis and Epsilon...), to the imperative of diversity and inclusion.  Here’s a topline of what you’ll hear more about – including case studies and examples -- in the full podcast:

The Inspiration for Havas Villages: “One of the things Yannick Bolloré, Chairman of our company globally, recognized pretty early on was that marketers and brands today struggle with disparate capabilities....When you have a group of people that are hiving around a particular brand’s challenge, and add in that brand's data and opportunity, both in the macro and micro sense, and you have those people working together, living together and building the brand together, the client wins.”

M&A: Building villages – just like the very premise for MediaVillage -- led us to discuss the path towards agencies themselves breaking down silos, such as the acquisition by data-driven Accenture of a creative shop like Droga5 and how that culture will integrate into the larger organization.

The Right People for the Work: “Every brand is different: Sometimes we have a CPG brand that does not sell direct to the consumer, so they don't have the consumer data. ...So how do you make decisions on who to target, when to target [when] you're using second- and third-party data to make some decisions. But you can do really amazing creative [such as the] incredible work Arnold does for Jeff Charney and his team at Progressive... I think that's an example of a collaboration with a client that has courage and creativity and really pushes his creative partners ... for bigger ideas.”

Top Down Inspiration: “Meaningfulness is an important topic for us ... when you work for a guy like Yannick who cares deeply about the work that we're doing, but also cares deeply about having an impact society and on a global level....” Marobella toplined their Meaningful Brands research study, sharing case studies and examples of what brands need to consider and apply today, at a time when the study reveals “a staggering 77% of brands could disappear and no-one would care” but “brands who are meaningful and viewed as making the world a better place are: outperforming the stock market by 134%.”  In light of that, he shared the three aspects brands need to embrace to gain more meaning in the marketplace.

 The D&I in Their DNA:  Meaningfulness extends to the company’s constituents. Hear about a whole program created to help elevate women in executive roles, leading to at least three women in CEO roles, shattering any Havas glass ceiling that had still been in place – including Arnold’s Kiran Smith (recently profiled in Epi 23), Laura Mannes, CEO of Havas New York and Donna Murphy, Global CEO of Havas Health & You.