Adweek reported the 4As appointed Justin Thomas-Copeland as its next CEO.
Great, bring in a Black man when DEIBA+ heat shields are experiencing accelerated abandonment and anti-woke platforms are attracting energized enthusiasm. Then again, it’s not like the trade organization has ever made an impact on the underrepresentation of non-Whites and systemic racism in Adland.
Hell, did the 4As have to extend the executive search to Europe to find a candidate of color…?!
Justin Thomas-Copeland Takes the Reins as CEO of the 4As
He succeeds Marla Kaplowitz, who steps down at the end of the month.
By Alison Weissbrot
The American Association of Advertising Agencies (4As) has selected its next CEO.
Agency veteran Justin Thomas-Copeland will take over leadership of the organization from Marla Kaplowitz, who has led the agency trade group for eight years. She announced her plans to leave the organization in May 2025 last July.
Thomas-Copeland takes over after an extensive search run by the 4As board, led by Abbey Klaassen, chair of the board of directors and CEO of Dentsu Creative. The search was supported by executive recruiting firm Grace Blue.
He is currently based in Europe and will relocate to New York for the new role.
“We had such tremendous interest in this role from such a diverse mix of leaders from across the industry,” Klaassen told ADWEEK. “There’s so much passion for making sure the agency industry continues to stay strong, relevant, and thrive.”
Ultimately, she said, the board selected Thomas-Copeland because of his background in digital and creative, his strength as a people leader, and his clear vision for the 4As in a time of major transformation in the agency business.
“The vision for me is really simple: it’s for the 4As to be the leading partner in agencies and how they reimagine client value,” Thomas-Copeland said. “We’ve got to support and advocate for our agencies to thrive, but it has to land with clients for it to really matter.”
Proving value to clients
Thomas-Copeland is no stranger to the agency world. With more than two decades of experience under his belt, he’s run Wunderman, RAPP, OMPG Health, and DDB North America as CEO.
While he plans to continue much of the work the 4As is currently doing, he sees an opportunity to reorient the member experience around helping agencies prove their value and impact on clients. This requires the organization to adopt a “practitioner’s mindset,” he said, so that “the value to the member is clear of being part of the 4As community, and the client sees the benefit of that as much as possible.”
“How can we help our members continue to not just deliver, but also articulate and communicate their value?” Klaassen added. “I think that is a really nice place for the 4As to be focused on.”
Under Thomas-Copeland, the 4As will continue to provide thought leadership and guidance in the areas most impacting its member agencies, from how to think through new service models to embracing a transforming industry and redefining what great creative work and talent looks like in the age of AI.
“The first thing is to listen and understand what the issues are, and we’ll do that with our members. We’ll also look at the ANA and partners who can give us a client perspective,” he said. “Whatever we do, we want to offer it [in] the mindset of scalable services. How are all of these things scalable to help the broader base?”
The 4As will also continue its focus on talent, though the organization shared that it is making changes to its Multicultural Advertising Internship (MAIP) and Vanguard programs. Initially created to support entry and mid-level diverse talent, respectively, these programs will now also be open to all individuals and will “no longer be just for people of color,” according to a 4A’s spokesperson.
Thomas-Copeland said that despite the attacks on DEI from the Trump administration, programs that look to attract diverse talent and build inclusive workplaces “has to remain the kitemark of the 4As and what we do in the area of talent.”
“I see no change in that,” he said.
Kaplowitz’s legacy
Kaplowitz joined the 4As as CEO in 2017 with the intention of staying in the role for no more than five years. Eight years later, she’s leaving at the end of May, staying on to help Thomas-Copeland through the transition.
Under her leadership, the 4As repaired the relationship with the Association of National Advertisers (ANA), which had grown tense in the wake of growing transparency issues between agencies and clients. Through that work, the organizations published thought leadership that aimed to evolve the agency-client relationship, such as a series of studies evaluating the cost involved for both parties in new business pitches.
During Kaplowitz’s tenure, the 4As also established the Advertiser Protection Bureau, which pulled together competitive members to develop an industry-approved brand safety framework.
She also led a push to evolve the 4As internally into a more modern organization with new back-end technology systems, as well as a revamped website.
And she led the organization through Covid-19, a time when many agencies “were really fighting for their life,” Klaassen said.
“She’s done a lot of hard yards on things that maybe people don’t necessarily see, but will feel intuitively,” she said.
No comments:
Post a Comment