16183: How Decolonizing Design Can Diversify Adland.

Decolonizing Design: A Cultural Justice Guidebook by Elizabeth (Dori) Tunstall is both auto-biographical and anti-racist—a call-to-action for justice, equality, and institutional transformation, as well as a call-out to the colonization that has historically harmed non-Whites and adversely impacted design.

 

Tunstall has served in a range of leadership roles, culminating to her current position as Dean of the Faculty of Design at Ontario College of Art and Design University, Toronto—and she’s the first Black person to hold such a title in the world. Other professional accomplishments include associate dean and professor at Swinburne University of Technology in Melbourne, Australia. In Adland USA, Tunstall has worked for White holding company Publicis Groupe and White advertising and digital firms such as Arc Worldwide and Sapient (although technically, it would be improper to label the latter a White enterprise).

 

The book presents plenty of provocative perspectives—like putting Indigenous demands first in DE&I hiring plans. Hell, Adland USA DE&I hiring plans prioritize White women, White LGBTQI+, White people with disabilities, White people who are neurodivergent, White old people, and numerous other White groups well ahead of non-Whites, with Indigenous communities relegated to the bottom of the proverbial totem pole. In fact, it’s unlikely that the standard White advertising agency even has DE&I hiring plans.

 

Another interesting point involves Tunstall’s success in orchestrating the “cluster hire strategy”—that is, appointing numerous minorities into executive slots at once. Recruiting a group of people together can—in addition to accelerating DE&I efforts—help lessen the pressures that may build up around a single minority appointment, as there will be communal support from the start, which also aids in retention.

 

To be clear, the maneuver happened in Canada, where legal measures (e.g., the Ontario Human Rights Code) allow such group hirings when it can be shown an underrepresented segment has historically faced discrimination. It’s hard to imagine executing the move in the UK or US, where cries of reverse discrimination would likely commence. The ruling majority, of course, has no problem with the Caucasian cluster hiring that created an exclusive industry. In short, Adland would turn minority cluster hires into major clusterfucks.

 

Read Decolonizing Design: A Cultural Justice Guidebook by Elizabeth (Dori) Tunstall. For a primer, check out Tunstall’s thoughts on how to make Adland a safer space for Black people.

15222: Arc Worldwide Job Listing Is, Well, Dopey.

Is this job listing another example of a White advertising agency—Arc Worldwide of Publicis Groupe—seeking minority talent to appease a client? The gig is dope if candidates have the mad skills to crush it. Word. And there are no perks. Guess Marcel failed to identify qualified talent in the global network…?

13698: Worldwide Exclusivity At Arc.

Adweek reported, “Leo Burnett Group’s Arc Worldwide Expands After Winning MillerCoors”—plus, the firm hired or promoted seven executives. The accompanying photo (depicted above) shows the leadership at Arc Worldwide is not exactly reflecting worldwide diversity.

10750: Why Integrated Marketing Fails.

At Business Insider, Jim Edwards further investigated the mess involving a Kellogg’s CRM project at Publicis Groupe’s Leo Burnett and Arc Worldwide. A bunch of employees from the agencies resigned en masse, threatening to take the project with them. The eight rogue workers are now facing a lawsuit, the agencies look bad and the client has yet to make a public statement.

Can’t help but think the scenario underscores the fallacy of integrated marketing as presented by holding companies—and holds implications for the continued failure of implementing diversity initiatives too.

Despite the hype by networks offering a variety of services seamlessly across multiple units, true and effective collaboration is still a pipe dream. In the past year, Leo Burnett has absolutely demonstrated the sad reality. The place has unintentionally created solid case studies for dismantling the system.

For example, Digitas apparently won the Sprint account last December, leading a mythical “Team Sprint” with Leo Burnett on the roster. Yet it seems as if Burnett has seized control of the branding—producing painfully awful TV commercials—while the digital and direct portions sputter aimlessly. The sole bright note has been the elimination of spots featuring CEO Dan Hesse. This is not integrated marketing. It’s old-fashioned, dysfunctional corporate politics.

The Kellogg drama stars Leo Burnett and Arc Worldwide, a partnership of traditional advertising and below-the-line disciplines (although rumor has it that in the Chicago market, Arc’s bottom line is well above Burnett’s). According to Edwards’ probing, the defecting executives included SVP Kristy Gibbs, who allegedly is the only person who understands the Kellogg CRM database. Really? A $710 million account serviced by global agencies had just a single human being capable of overseeing a project? That’s not a very deep bench. Leo Burnett and Arc Worldwide obviously lack the resources and expertise to handle Kellogg’s broad needs. Hell, it’s likely that Burnett was too occupied churning out Allstate Mayhem commercials to notice what was happening with Kellogg. The agencies deserve to lose the project—and possibly the total business.

The illusion of integrated marketing goes beyond Leo Burnett and its mates. The same bullshit occurs with virtually every holding company coalition. And in most instances, the traditional advertising agency is the root cause of the problems, as these shops tend to believe integration starts with traditional advertising. This might work in an ideal universe, except the “big ideas” generated by traditional advertising agencies rarely consider the other disciplines, as these shops remain clueless about anything that is not traditional advertising. On the flip side, the non-traditional advertising agencies remain clueless about traditional advertising. Need proof? Find any commercial from Digitas or Razorfish that doesn’t thoroughly suck.

The dilemma extends to the simple fact that traditional advertising agencies, digital agencies, direct marketing agencies, promotional agencies, public relations agencies, etc. are each operating distinct business models. Clients even pay the different disciplines differently. Ever see a traditional advertising guy effectively run a digital agency, or a digital guy effectively run a traditional advertising agency? When the separate shops try to unify, the result is a contemporary Tower of Babel, where everyone is speaking their own language and no one can understand or translate the objectives and directions. Need more proof? Consider Draftfcb, Enfatico or the soon-to-crash Commonwealth. Hell, toss in Cavalry too.

So how does it all apply to diversity? Well, if adpeople have difficulty learning to coexist when there are actual professional motivations and benefits, it’s hard to imagine integration could succeed on a cultural level. As the above scenarios show, White folks can’t even stand dealing with White folks.