Both sides now

WHEN Wendy Clark walks into the sparsely outfitted meeting room of DDB's Kallang office in her stilettos, she is all smiles - none of that under-the-radar bluster or self-conscious preciousness that people in power are wont to exuding. Yet, as BT photographer Kelvin Chng also senses it - somehow, she fills the frame.

The new global CEO and president of DDB Worldwide is the first woman to have scaled such rarefied heights in the North American advertising industry. But the mother of three is on a mission to make sure 50-50 gender representation - under her stewardship - applies to the boardroom as well as to the rank-and-file in the DDB network that spans 200 offices in over 90 countries and has more than 13,000 employees on its payroll.

She has given impassioned talks at DDB's North American meetings, taking a leaf from the playbook of Shelley Zalis, CEO of The Female Quotient, who famously wrote: "Talent has no gender, talent has no race, talent has no religion, talent has no age." DDB has its own version of that clarion call to close the gap - a "Talent Has No Gender" social campaign, which the DDB boss wants everyone to embrace.

"While we have 50-50 representation in our organisation now, what we don't have is 50-50 representation in all areas of leadership. So, on the one hand, that is a real plus because we have a great pool of talent, but on the other hand we have to work on matriculating that talent up and throughout the organisation. It's very important that everyone is on the same page when we say that we have to be as diverse and inclusive as the marketplace we serve.

"I actually bristle when people say that it is 'the right thing to do'. It's not just the right thing to do, it's good business. All the statistics out there suggest that companies with gender balance in all levels of business are more profitable and more successful - they have longer tenures in the upper quadrant of business - and I think the most recent statistic I saw was, if all countries elevated their gender representation to the highest-performing country in the region (I'm not saying we all have to be like Sweden) it's US$17 trillion incremental GDP. That is a huge development."

Ms Clark- who was appointed to the top job in February - says she had the benefit of running the North American operations for 24 months before she took over the global CEO and president role. "What I was handed was a well-run business, so we've had a very thoughtful transition and succession plan. It wasn't a shock and it wasn't all the way new."

Prior to joining DDB, she had been in leadership roles at The Coca-Cola Company and in AT&T. "I never went into my career thinking that I was going to be a CEO," Ms Clark is quick to point out. "From an early age, I knew that I just wanted to work. I was raised by a single mother, and she instilled in me a desire to always be able to support myself. She had planned to be a single mother and that was kind of woven into my fabric - to work and have a career."

Privilege and pressure

Although at the onset Ms Clark was not sure how her career would pan out, she says she is grateful to have mentors and sponsors who helped develop and shape her worldviews and gave valuable feedback in moulding and preparing her for the challenges as she slowly but surely cleared the rungs of corporate life. "On the one hand, it is an incredible privilege to lead people - and that people want to follow you, follow your vision - and at the same time, there's a fair amount of pressure, and you can never deconstruct those two thoughts," she says.

"There's pressure to deliver, pressure to provide for all these people who believe in you. So you have to make sure that the vision is right and that they also have careers that are fulfilling to them and that those two are never left to be deconstructed - the privilege and pressure."

After six months at the helm of the 68-year-old agency, Ms Clark is already seeing the business in much better shape than a year ago. While figures from DDB are not publicly available, parent company Omnicom Group (of which DDB Worldwide is one of its three global advertising agency networks) announced in July that its net income for the second quarter of 2018 increased 10.8 per cent from a year ago to US$364.2 million. For the first six months of the year, net income for Omnicom Group Inc grew 10.2 per cent to US$628.3 million, from US$570.4 million in the same period in 2017.

Ms Clark intends to build on the growth at DDB. "Obviously, we are very much in the creativity business - we believe creativity is the most powerful force in business.

But if we say that that is our highest order, and we don't create growth for our clients, Number One, they won't be clients with us for very long; and Number Two, that sounds more like running an art gallery to me - where the creative business isn't about commercial success or growth."

She is very clear on the stance that an advertising business needs to adopt in these challenging times, with the disruptive conundrums that social media constantly lobs at the industry. "We are in the growth business, and the way we achieve that growth is through creativity. Those two are connected thoughts but the bigger thought and what our clients call us for is growth. Clients don't call us saying: 'Hey, I need more creativity'; instead they tell us: 'Hey, I need more growth' " .

Importance of speed

Ms Clark says today's advertising agency client is focused on finding incremental growth, speed and cost efficiency. "Speed is a currency in today's marketplace," she emphasises. "Efficiency and speed - these two macros constitute the massive needs of all of our clients. They want more efficient operations, ways to take their non-working dollars and be able to move them into working dollars - in our language, so we've got to figure out new ways of working and models and methods and processes.

"Finally, speed - we see speed having a horizontal impact across our client's businesses, not the least of which is marketing and advertising. So in the supply chain, R&D, product sourcing and distribution - everything we do is impacted by speed. It is what helps drive our clients' businesses."

But how does Ms Clark reconcile the hard-nosed business of surviving as an advertising agency with the demands of also providing an ecosystem for creative people to thrive and gestate new ideas? Her answer: Be nice.

"I think it's incredibly important to be nice. Bill Bernbach - the B in DDB - envisioned the agency when he started it in 1949, that it would be filled with talented and nice people - and the saying goes that if you were nice but not talented, then we are very sorry. But if you were talented but not nice, equally we would not suffer under the plight of people who are not nice. This has been a principle of this agency for the last 68 years.

"The other thing that I talk about a lot is that of caring. So often in business today, caring is increasingly an aside. With our clients, who feel the immense pressure of costs, when they strip down the projects to the very bare bones, till we're not scoped to care anymore - yet we very much do care.

"And I think bringing caring back into business is critically important. The people around these halls work all hours of the day - often all days of the week - and it's important that: No 1, we care for one another; No 2, everyone who works in the DDB group feels they are in a culture that cares for them; and No3, that we care for the work that we create and I want us to very much care about the product that we put out in the marketplace."

Apart from nurturing an ecosystem of caring and plain old nice-ness, Ms Clark has also been broadcasting her "Motivation Monday" on Facebook every week since 2016, where she talks to all her associates in over 90 countries in a live feed, where everyone gets to ask questions in real time. "It's the most important thing that a leader can do: to establish a vision. And then hold themselves and the organisation accountable to that vision, and do everything in their power to remove any barrier that impedes this.

"I think that is the encapsulation of leadership. I obviously can't be in over 90 countries at the same time, and so being available for questions and being open and transparent to the answers to those questions, sometimes can be very difficult.

"I get asked about competitors, I get asked about wins or losses we have around the world. Those are difficult questions, perhaps easier not to answer. But I have to challenge myself; if I can't answer them, then how can anyone else in the organisation be expected to answer them? One of the biggest jobs in leadership is to create sense - sense-making - and assuring people that we have a plan, and that they are a critical and important part of that plan.

"Also, the most powerful lever in business is Belief. When an organisation of people come together and have a shared belief, there is nothing we can't do. As a leader, I am compelled to create belief in this organisation and about our vision, our plan, about the potential of this business. I will spend all my waking hours doing that, given the choice."

While others would baulk at the sheer pluralism of advertising options today - print, TV, radio, gaming and, more recently, social media - Ms Clark's raison d'etre is that in challenges lie opportunities. "We have a canvas that is incredible. One of the programmes we touched on was an after-sales app - a loyalty app that we developed in the Asia-Pacific market for Samsung - that defies the template of what is 'traditional practice'. It's actually an app for after the sale has been effected, creating retention and loyalty among Samsung's customers.

"We also just started a gaming division called Tribal Ex, where it's all about gamers and game development. So again, this canvas is truly broad and wide and which I think attracts creative people, and we don't want the constraints. We want the opportunity to imagine solutions for brands with the widest lens possible, and what we know is that it has to be anchored on those enduring truths of a brand that is important to consumers. The simplest distillation of what we are doing now is: 'What do we have as a brand; what does that brand have that consumers want; and which competitors can't match?'"

How does a leader manage the one constant that plagues every industry on the face of the planet: change? "I think the definition of an agency is that you can't stand still. Stasis for an agency would be lethal. The future for us, as a service organisation, is always going to be around partnerships and our clients.

"We are fortunate enough to have very visionary clients - McDonald's, J&J, Mars, Exxon and VW - these are very big, progressive brands. If you are going to partner with them, it makes you bring your very best capabilities and your A-game to the table. A lot of what we are doing today is based on future capabilities, codifying ways of working to engage consumers in today's very fragmented marketplace, and we are testing new technologies to be on top, such as VR and AR (virtual reality and augmented reality).

"So if you don't like change, then this isn't the place you want to be; you need to be constantly pressing and asking questions and picking up rocks and looking under, you have to be massively curious to work in this business."

One recurring thread in Ms Clark's talks features the line by retired US Army general Eric Ken Shinseki who quipped: "If you don't like change, you're going to like irrelevance even less."

"I am very wired like that," says Ms Clark. "I am very comfortable with change. I invite it, because I'm actually not good in muscle memory. When I get into muscle memory and rote, I get bored, and I am not as effective. I like the constant challenge of things not being fully known, and the demands and requirements to discover. I thrive on that.

"I like the water just where my nose is, barely out of the water and I can barely breathe. That feels good to me, almost living on the edge. Not recklessly but curiously."

Another nugget about Ms Clark that might surprise some : she thumbs through Sun Tzu, the Chinese military strategist. "Sun Tzu's The Art of War has been with me for 18 years now. Yes, you're asking me how an ancient Chinese warrior figures in all this - anyone who has worked with me, it almost is like a running joke now - but it is my touchstone on everything. My old boss, when I was in my old agency earlier in my career - GSD&M in Austin, Texas - Roy Spence, used to quote Sun Tzu. I then sort of leaned in to The Art of War. While it's a very dry read, it taught me the five traits of successful leaders: to be Brave, Caring, Disciplined, Smart and Trustworthy. And if you think about those words and you think about them in combination, I have found no better ingredients for what I think successful leadership is made of."

Juggling work and family

With the rigours of a high-flying corporate persona, how does the mother of three juggle work and family? "Well, you don't, that's the thing. I actually did not get it right. It's not perfect, it doesn't have to be perfect. It was perfect for me and my family, and we figured out how to make it work, but I think women - I talk about the Superwoman Syndrome a lot - I think women have this idea that they have to be the best mom, best worker and best sister, best daughter, best parent, teacher, classroom leader - and you know, you find yourself exhausted.

"You're holding yourself to these high ideals - it is not possible. The question people ask me is, can you have it all, this mystical notion of whether women can really have it?

"And I say yes, but you can't have it all at the same time."

Ms Clark explains that while she is sitting here in Singapore and having a fantastic time professionally, she is not with her children. "Now I can't make up for that. I'm miles and miles away. But I'm going to fly home overnight tonight - and am going to be with them tomorrow; I'm going to pick them up from school.

"The most important thing you can do is show up right after school, and then spend time together. We've already planned the rest of the evening together - we're going to have ice cream!"

Ms Clark believes that if women hold themselves to it all at once, it becomes artificial. The more abiding arrangement is one that allows one to step back and say: " I feel fulfilled - professionally and personally", even though sacrifices have to be made, and there are challenges to be surmounted.

That ambidexterity in finding a sustainable balance between work and family; the right gender mix in the boardroom; in crafting a vision for growth while also carving space to care for staff - these sum up Ms Clark's leadership style.

Wendy Clark talks to BT Weekend about The Importance of Being Nice, and more, here: bt.sg/videos

WENDY CLARK President and CEO DDB Worldwide

Born 1971

Married with three children - daughters Molly Grace, 16, Josephine, 14, and son JB, 11

Education: BA from Florida State University

2001-2004 Senior VP, Director of Client Service, GSD&M2004-2008 Senior VP, Advertising, AT&T

2008-2014 Senior VP, Integrated Marketing Communications and Capabilities, The Coca-Cola Company

2014-2016 President, Sparkling Brands and Strategic Marketing, Coca-Cola North America

2016 Joined DDB as CEO, DDB North America

Since Feb 2018 President and CEO, DDB Worldwide

AWARDS

2011 Cited as Brand Refresher on Fast Company's Top 10 list of Innovative Business Disruptors

2014 The Matrix Award from New York Women in Communications

2017 Named Executive of the Year by Ad Age