December 1, 2022 • 34 mins
Throughout the tumultuous pandemic, Christian Juhl kept a steady hand at the helm of GroupM at WPP—the world’s largest advertising and media investment company. The key to Christian’s powerful leadership lies within his early experiences in the eye of the dot com boom and bust. The memories of wondering whether his paychecks would cash have not faded, and neither have the corresponding lessons. Listen as Christian shares those lessons with Bob; plus, how Christian and his team are leveraging GroupM’s size to change the industry, and the world, for the better.
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
You're listening to Math and Magic production of I Heart Radio.
I think it's a really important behavior. If people realize
I think it's okay to fail, comes out a silking
valid and fail fast, get smarter quick. We don't want
to be a traditional player in the space. We want
to be the provocatur Hi. I'm Bob Pittman. Welcome back
(00:25):
to Math and Magic. Stories from the Frontiers and Marketing.
On each episode, we explored the interaction of the two
keys to successful marketing and business, the analytics, the math,
the data, and the creative and the magical ideas created
to respond to identified needs or opportunities. Today we have
someone in the middle of the transformation of the advertising
(00:45):
and media business to reflect the possibilities and full potential
unleashed by technology. He's a pioneer of digital advertising and
sits a top Group M at w PP, the world's
largest advertising and marketing holding company. He's Richtian Jewel, the
global CEO of Group M. Christian was born in Guam,
a military family kid who moved a lot from New
(01:07):
Hampshire to California. He wanted to be a pilot, but
his dad told him he was too tall. As a
young man. He had a great curiosity that opened the
world to him. He was a digital pioneer who survived
the dot com bust and emerged as a senior leader
of razor Fish, including its time as a part of
Microsoft and then Publicists. He went on to be the
global CEO for Essence before his current mission. He's been
(01:31):
in small and entrepreneurial and he's been at the largest
and has a unique perspectives as a result. He's known
for being a keen strategist, a transformation expert, and a
strong culture builder. He mountain bikes, plays golf skis and
is still tall. Christian Welcome, Thanks for having me. Before
we get started, I'd like to give everybody a quick
(01:52):
view of you in sixty seconds. Ready. Do you prefer
cats or dogs? Thoughts or early riser or night owl?
Early riser? The wire or the crown? The wire? T
shirt or tie T shirt? Hiking or fishing, Hiking to
a good fishing spot, Michigan or Alaska? Alaska? Trombone or
(02:14):
trumpet trumpet? Work life balance or work life integration? Favorite band?
What have I've been listening to? Billy Strings? If you
weren't working in marketing, what would you be doing teaching
childhood hero my dad favorite brand from your childhood, Alexander
Colure has made these great sweaters and I thought they
(02:35):
were so cool. Never had one pretty expensive back in
the day marketing campaign you're most proud of. I love
the Nike work that we did. Guilty Pleasure Pringles ideal
Sunday afternoon, walking the dog with my son. First concert
Paul Sign and Rhythm of the Saints. My mother took
me first job washing dishes at Pasta Fresco outside Sacramento, California. Okay,
(02:58):
the last one. If you could time trap, would you
go back to the past or go to the future future.
Let's get started way back in one we launched MTV,
one of the first cable only networks, and at that
time Nielsen just measured viewing a broadcast TV. You can
imagine the advertiser's reaction. Great idea, come back to me
(03:18):
when you've got some numbers. But a couple of folks
saw this as an opportunity to get a jump on competitors.
Roger and Rico was running Pepsi at the time and
was hell bent on moving his share against Coke. He
saw these young people watching MTV so in the absence
of any ratings, he buys us. Coke, on the other hand,
said we have no interest until you have measurement, and
Coke sat on the sidelines for over five years. In
(03:40):
that time, Roger moved the market share of Pepsi against
Coke the most it's ever been moved before or after.
And this example, Pepsi picked performance, even though it's harder
to quantify. Coke chose measurement. In the next decade, when
we took the Internet to the mass market, I was
at a o L at the time in the nineteen
nineties and is reminded over half the traffic of the
(04:02):
Internet in the US came through a o L in
those days, and we did have the data, metrics and performance.
Yet the major agencies at that time ignored digital l abvertizing.
Even though a o L had gone from few million
dollars in advertising to billions of dollars in that five
year period, eight percent of the ad revenue did not
come through agencies. This lack of adoption really opened the
(04:23):
door for all those digital only agencies that sprung up.
You are part of that and later had to be
acquired at much bigger prices. When it became obvious how
huge the digital tam was becoming. So two decades later
and two examples of dislocation at a time of change,
and here we are in You're now not the new guard.
(04:45):
You are the establishment. You're the global CEO of Group M,
though we're fifty billion billings thirty five thousand employees worldwide,
and you're evolving Group M to continue to be a
major leader. So here's the question. How are you evolving
the business, the structure and the culture to take advantage
(05:05):
of your unique data and enormous scale, and how do
you avoid the pitfalls like the ones I just mentioned
to make uncomfortable change acceptable to your organization. You know,
I talked about the early days of people taking risks
without actually understanding the full metrics or measurement or the
(05:26):
things that today we would take for granted. In terms
of putting a media deal together. I think there's always
an element in advertising and marketing about, you know, early
movers and those who are willing to take a chance
in the reward that can pay off with that. Early
days of the Internet, there were a lot of failures.
You know, I lived through a lot of it. I
mean I started on the Internet in company called us
(05:46):
Web and tragically bought my first house on my first
commission check I think in two thousand one, roughly five
days before the company filed for bankruptcy as March first,
and which was a rather trying moment for myself. When
you look at that, it's not even just about two
thousand one. If you look at even more recently, I'm
like women in Jeff Katzenberg doing Queeby and the amount
of money they're able to raise and then subsequent decline
(06:10):
to that business. So you're always in this place where
you're trying to make the right decisions about which media
partners to work with and which sort of creative outlets
are going to bring the most connection between brands and consumers,
and I think there's never a perfect formula for it.
Relative to home structuring group them, you talk about structure
and culture and let's stay culture first, actually, because I
think that's one of the biggest things coming out of
Microsoft and publicists and going in to run Essence, which
(06:33):
the time is about three people mostly in the UK,
founder led organization, really shaped my view on culture and
the power of culture as a true economic differentiator for
a business. Tell then people talk about culture. They put
mission revision on the walls and you see them around
your office and like, okay, great. But the very first
management meeting I had with the three founders of Essence,
(06:54):
we run it out of the little room and soho
LOFs in New York. And I was already for the job.
I started as a us CEO only, so I built
these plans and growth targets and key accounts and management
team structures and what we were going to do and
technology implementations. And I walk into this room and they're
already there, and there are four chairs facing each other
(07:17):
with no table in between, no screens, a little coffee bar,
and Matt Isaac's who was to see you at the Times,
has had a seat and before you can even know,
stending okay, I'm ready to show you, guys what I
think the North American plan should be. And he goes, no,
no, no no, We've got three hours just to talk about
how you're doing, what we think this thing might look
like and feel like over time. I don't know if
you've ever done that, really, just sit there with no
(07:38):
table in a square with four people that you don't
really know that well well you're trying to impress them
about your knowledge of the business or what have you.
But it's extremely uncomfortable. There's no barriers and there was
no preconceived notion. And we sat there and sort of
hashed out an understanding of what Essence was and how
we wanted to treat each other as a management team,
and how we wanted that to show up in our people.
(08:00):
And I sum it up now and I've brought it
to group. I'm as well. It's assuming positive intent at
every turn, and I want everybody Group Time to feel
like this is the place where their expression is welcome,
where creative ideas are welcome, where they can disagree with management,
where they can speak up, and where they're trusted, and
where it's an environment of positive intent. When you took over,
you flew something like over two hundred thousand miles to
(08:23):
meet people all across group him. Were you doing those
kinds of meetings like you did with the founders of
Essence where you just sat and talked as opposed to
show me your presentation. Yeah, I have an odd entrance
point in the group them, right, we sold Essence into it.
So I was a turnout CEO. So I was sort
of a witness to the management team for three years.
(08:44):
When I took over the job about three years ago. Now,
one of the first things I did was just get
the management teams together, and I said, we're gonna do
things differently. We're gonna trust each other, we're gonna listen
to each other. We're going to build a strategy together,
and we're going to share that strategy with all thousand
employees so that they know what the purpose of Group
(09:06):
M is, what the purpose of the agencies are, how
we can count our technology division. Up until that point,
Group M was a collection of companies, and so trying
to sit down and talk about the future of this
industry and media is becoming technology driven. It looks more
like software than it looks like manual planning in media deals,
and we're going to get really good at automation and
(09:27):
and understanding technology. And that means investing hundreds of mens
and dollars and doing it once, not doing it in
sixty different methods with different partners in every market around
the world, and getting people aligned to that type of thinking.
It requires a singularity of culture and understanding of how
we're going to hold each other to account. In Even
(09:47):
during the lockdown, you hosted a video series called The Regroup.
What was that tool for in this cultural transformation? It
was the way to stay connected, in a way to
burn forward a lot of diverse voices from around the
world with us, and I was talking to people in
Pakistan and in India and in Europe, across the US,
and to remind people of who's on the other end
(10:08):
of the phone or the team's call. In this case,
we really want to go wide and deep into the organization.
We want to hear employee stories, We want to hear
about the client work they were excited about. Between the
reaction to that and your two hundred thousand miles of
traveling and the listening tour, what revelations came out of
it that you probably wouldn't have gotten had you not
(10:28):
done those. I would say the amount of strength and
some of our markets around the world, the amount of
relationships with you know, the publisher's side and the client side.
You know, when you go to market like India and
we're close to market share, it's just a massive market
with incredible strength from Group M and w PP there
and it's just really really impressive to see the kind
of clients that they work with and the programs they
(10:51):
are able to put in place. And then when you
go to other markets where we're still growing and learning,
you know, just incredibly diverse business. You know, I think
our on was forty two as and employees and eighty
two different countries. I mean, it's just continues to grow
in the strength even at that scale is really really impressive.
You talked about some elements of corporate culture here and
(11:11):
your values positive intent, trust, listen to each other, accountability,
what else is important to you and that value system
that builds up the corporate culture. Risk taking. I think
that we really have to be willing to change ourselves
and to realize that the way we've been doing things
is not the way that will be successful doing things
going forward. The migration in the digital, migration into programmatic
(11:34):
I mean I really rapidly accelerated our investment in programmatic channels,
pushing out a home into digital formats, looking what we're
doing connected television, new partnerships like the Netflix Microsoft partnership.
How do we embrace those in a way that we're
not scared of holding onto things in the past that
we're really successful with, but realizing you know, will find
ways to be successful in these new markets, and our
(11:56):
clients count on us to lead them into these new opportunities.
And I think it's a really important behavior of people
who realize that it's okay to fail, you know, and
it comes out of silicon value and fail fast, get
smarter quick, And we don't want to be a traditional
player in the space. We want to be the provocateur.
I suspect coming into your job, you found that probably
(12:18):
the appetite for that risk taking and the fear of
failure probably was at another level than you needed. How
did you change that? How did you get people comfortable
with that? What's really important? And the key thing that
I did was I did that tour around the world
and we formed something called our our Synergy Strategy, which
was really just defining Group M as a global organization,
(12:41):
the accountabilities between management agencies and ambition to build a
large global shared services and media delivery organization. And we're
making great progress on it. I mean, it's showing up
in our new business wins, it's showing up in client
satisfaction scores and the other piece. And I would just
give a credit to Mark even us, you know, he
(13:01):
asked me to take over group them three and a
half years ago. I mean I never saw coming, and
I literally said, you would not want me to do
what I want to do to group them. That's the CEO.
I just said, I can't imagine what I want to
do with something that's attractive to you. I write a
whole new blueprint and I sketched out for im on
a piece of paper, and he goes go to it.
You have a complete, total authority to do ever you
need to do to make those changes. I think that's
(13:23):
what needs to do. Also more on math and magic
right after this quick break. Welcome back to math and magic.
Let's hear more from my conversation with Christian Jewel. I
want to go back in time just a little bit
to get some more context on you. You were born
(13:45):
in the early seventies, grew up moving around as a
kid in the eighties and nineties. Can you paint the
picture of those times and your life? Then? My families
from Michigan, sort of Midwestern cultures and values to family.
My mom's school teacher. My dad join the military out
of Vietnam and shows the Air Force. You know, his
first station was in Guam, and you know, I don't
remember much about it, but when they were moved to
(14:07):
New Atwer and kind of spend some time there, and
I remember a pretty traditional family, you know, my dad
it's kind of home by five, and my mom's a
teacher and be home and we dump dinner together, an
older sister and a younger brother. And we moved to Alaska.
You know, Alaska was great. We're outside a lot. We
had a camper trailer, and we spent almost all summer
out at the river fishing and pike in picking blueberries.
(14:27):
And we had a family car game called Cutthroat, which
is sort of a lot like gym and we don't
play that and pretty simple and very very nice. And
then we moved down to California. Talk a little bit
about that moving. How did all this moving affect you.
It's only in recent years I've actually come to think
about that, to tell the truth, I've seen my own
son and grow up, and I've seen the friendships that
he's developed and how close they are. You know, I
(14:49):
kind of realized the challenges and moving around so much
gring and I look back and I see some people
now that I'm close with who have friendships from kindergarten
or beyond, and I'm jealous about looks amazing to be
able to have that, And I think that's something you
don't get, you know, when you're in a family that
moves every four years, and relationships or something that probably
the most important thing in your life, and to be
(15:11):
able to maintain and sustain those It's something I've worked
on a harder at in the last fifteen years of
my life than I did before. What kind of kid
were you? How did you define yourself and what was
your own self image? I don't think I any kind
of a weirdness to try and define myself. I think
I was trying to get from point at a point
the most of the time to my childhood. You know,
part of the challenge moving out of different schools and
(15:33):
being different, you know, moving to California from Alaska, I
remember kids walking to me and you know, deep live
in a very, very different and I think, you know,
struggling with being different was the real thing. And then
you know, my parents believe along in classical music, and
I had to pick up traditional instrument and then end
up in the jazz band. And I assure you, being
(15:53):
in the marching band in California, wearing a buttoned coat
and top hat and leading the band out onto the
football field was no cooler then than it is today.
Probably I was sponsors and academic and you know, probably
a very awkward teenager, which is amazing. Now I see
my son in the same age group. You just joined
high school this year and he plays his guitar and
(16:15):
it's in this rock band program where they had to
play two hours a day with some amazing musicians and teachers,
and his first day of school, I was ten times
more scared for him than he was. And I'm realizing
he has so many more tools than I had at
the time, and you know, ultimately it's just loving high
school and it's wonderful to see him out slightly different
experience than I had. That's amazing. I heard a story
(16:37):
about you as an early entrepreneur. I heard that you
had one business where you picked up reptiles and sold
them to kids at school. Yeah. I've always been under
the salesperson. I like having a little bit of money
in my pocket with it outside of Sacramento, and there
was a time in the bacon field between us and school,
and obviously see lizards all over the place on the
(16:58):
way on the way to school, and so I started
to them, I doing little shoe box and then sell
them in school until I got in troubled for selling
lizards at school, and then I would stop that. In
oh which case, at that point, I think Costco had
just started coming out and they talked to my dad
who buying those hundred packs of fitsy pops, And I
started breaking down hundred packs and selling to the pops
at school next. So it's kind of a catch me.
(17:19):
If you can't situation with the administration of the school,
what lessons from that child do you still use today?
I think the importance of family. I think the importance
of sitting down together. My dad actually started a computer
technology company in the late nineties and we started his
own copy've never gone before in the Air Force. Retired
(17:40):
twenty seven years there. The courage took him to start
his own company. It's still something like, you know, respect deeply,
but the transition from family sitting down and dinner every
night to my dad working until midnight or wanting it
was profound and thinking about, you know, my own life
now and I'm traveling so much for work, and how
I tried to stay connected to my son and my family,
(18:01):
you know, as my parents get older, and how you
prioritize those types of things that you're gonna be there
for each other. And you can get really tied up
and work or making money or promotion or even just
great ideas, but ultimately coming back to the family and
relationships and making sure that you know that's not strong.
Nothing else in your life is going to be strong.
You took a gap here between high school and college.
You went on do you see San Diego? You decided
(18:23):
you did not want to be a doctor, you did
not want to be a lawyer. Who was there any
guiding light that that made college exciting for you? I
grew up a lot in college. When I got to college,
I really just realized I like learning a lot collect economics,
about local science, aspects of biology and science just really
(18:43):
became very comfortable with myself, and you know, that allowed
me to start thinking about things that you know, I
hadn't really done a spouse to people before. I knew
about dad being a military and my mom school teacher,
and had a lot of exposure to the business world
and what was happening, and certainly the booming opportunities of
the Internet, oology and what that was bringing, and to
meet professors who would talk about those types of things
(19:04):
and how corporations were structured, and you know, it's just
really an amazing time in my life. After school, you
went to Japan taught English. What lessons did you pick
up from that that that are still with you today? Empathy?
I mean I applied to the Japanese English Teaching Programs
JET programs, what they call it pretty competitive program that
(19:26):
the Japanese government puts out over for a year or
two years. I want to fully pay program where they
put you up in housing and they kind of see
these English teachers all through the country of Japan to
really just teach. In my case of well middle school kids.
I ended up up in the north place called Yonazawa,
which is about a hundred thousand people. I was one
of three English speakers in town. I lived in one
(19:48):
of the thatched roof places. It was incredibly difficult to
get around. An amount of kindness that I was shown,
and the amount of people that would as I was lost,
not just point me in the direction, but walk me there.
I think about it when I see tourists all the
time now, whether it's you know, anywhere I'm at in
the world, but New York or San Francisco. You know
that just that a little bit of after trying to
(20:09):
help somebody feel like you're looking out for and that
you know you care and that you want them to
have good experience when they're in your country doing math
and magic. I talked to a lot of people, and
there's always something in the research that goes, wow, that's unexpected.
And the unexpected in your case was you began your
career ge Capital, and knowing you and thinking about you
(20:29):
at G Capital seems so out of place. Tell us
how you wound up there and what that was in
terms of the stage of your career building. Yeah, so
I came back. My dad at the time, like I said,
he started a computer networking company and they's sold in
a lot of computers and technology to corporations and offices
and things like that. He knew someone Compact. They introduced
me to the general manager in San Francisco. I was
(20:52):
sleeping on my college roomates floor trying to figure out
what kind of job I was gonna get when I
came back. They have Capital I T Solutions and they
were a big computer and services reseller, and so I
went in, got a job. There's customer service, and I
rode the Jade church down every morning and six an't
a suit and time and got to know the technology
(21:13):
side of the business. And then after about a year
they launched a big services group, and the services group
sort of the first thing was accountable or anything remotely
you know, to Internet. And that's when things were just starting.
It's one of those weird things that happened to Levi.
Strouss company went into a review to outsource all their
services and we're going to their restructuring and I got
(21:34):
to know the guy there, and g had just launched
the service, and you know, we're probably not particularly prepaired
to take on anything of Levi size. And I sold
this account for thirty seats across the United States and
started working out of Levi for the next two years.
And you know, at the time, then after I really
(21:55):
started following low the coding and the Internet, that a
company called us Web, somebody from company went over there
and come over and look at these guys. I mean,
I couldn't believe it. Bob, I walked Hadler, there's free
coffee there's free food you guys are giving away. Harley
Davidsons during the Christmas party, like, what is happening here
that I'm not a part of? And I went over
(22:15):
there is a strategy account leg and that kind of
kicked off the next fifteen years of my career. You
survived the dot com bust, You went through various iterations
of the company until it became Razor Fish and was
eventually acquired by publicists. What surprised you most about how
digital laboratizing evolved? I mean you were there really at
(22:38):
is practically the beginning. How did the reality contrast with
your early view? I mean it's not all from Silicon Valley,
just the boom the bus stories when they continue to repeat,
when you see how things can get so big so
quick and then gets so small so quick. I'll never forget.
One of the iterations of the name was March First
after Us, which was kind of the biggest internet consultancy
(22:58):
at the time. Bob or Ours remember as we were
going through it, I think Francisco Partners are just put
in a hundred and fifty million dollars to keep the
company afloat. And I saw Bob in the hallway and
said the boy the way you know just about this house,
like should I be concerned? It's like everybody else seems
to be concerned. And he goes, don't worry, Christian ships,
this big don't go down. Well there forget that quote.
(23:21):
And two days later we filed for bankruptcy and people's
paychecks started pat saying there were people who were having babies,
and it turns out that Bob had stopped paying the
premiums on our health insurance, so they were getting bills
handed to them for twenty plus thousand dollars thinking the
insurance when the in fact didn't have insurance. Disciples that
(23:41):
we've gone through are just really tremendous, and the uncertainty
that you deal with in some of those moments are
something else could really comfortable with. I mean, I'm not
kidding when I said, remember we used to take our
paychecks and we'd go on those check cashing places to
see if we could get them cashed, to see where
you could get paid during those soume periods. I think
fast forwarding today's workplace, you know, it's evolved so much.
(24:03):
I think the role of government has changed so much.
Sadly for the worst. I mean, people have really started
looking at their companies is one of the most stable
things in their lives and the responsibilities that come without.
When we think about equality, opportunity, the way we treat
each other, and the way we think about values and
the way we hold each other accountable, is accountable and
(24:24):
I contrast, that's when I started run, really was just
talking my paycheck would cash. And it's a whole different
world right now. I'm going to jump into it a
little bit. Let's start with the first and which is
the dot com bust, the beginning of the century, the
big recession of O E O nine. You live through
both of them, the pandemic, business downturn, and now we
are in a period of some uncertainty. How do the
(24:45):
learnings from those three help us navigate this and what
do you see as a result of that. I still
believe my primary job is to provide employment for our
people in a sense of safety and security, so that
they can make plans for their lives with mind. I
think that what we have to do is make sure
that we plan for the uncertainty. Who no one knows
what's really coming. I don't know if China's going to
(25:06):
open backed up next year. We have to make sure
that we're listening to our clients and well provide them
the flexibility that they need. And ultimately, you know, I
have to predict the future just slightly better than everybody
else so that I can do the right things for
employees and our clients. Will say, every one of those downturns,
you don't realize when you're coming out of it. It
gets better much more slowly than it gets worse. And
(25:30):
I think that one day you wake up and you realize, well,
actually everything's okay. You rise up out of challenging times
kind of inch by inch. I don't find it ever
happens overnight. And I think just making sure that you know,
you investment in things during these time periods that are
really important to you. Maybe you postpone a couple of
things that are nice to have, and you communicate. You know,
I've been very front of our employees about it. Would
(25:52):
you be really careful right now? It's not the time
to make big bets. Let's stay close to our clients.
Let to make sure we understand what's happening. You know,
let's forecast a little more often than we used to
they're really trying to ensure you know what's coming. You
are a strong advocate of diversity, how do you make
it a priority and make inclusion a part of your
culture and operations? And what are the hurdles to making
(26:14):
all of our not just your company, our senior management
ranks in American business reflect the diversity of the communities
we serve. Well, would you never do enough? That's simple.
Truth is you have to believe in diversity. You know,
it's not a target or goal. You know, the best
leaders they're building really diverse and inclusive teams are those
that understand ever seeing inclusion is good for you and
(26:38):
never see it comes from a lot of different formats.
I mean people who have come from different backgrounds, who
weren't growing on Madison Avenue, whose parents didn't work in
the industry. Those interesting people to bring into the business.
People are experiencing the way marketing and advertising works around
the world right now, and you bring them in, you
put them in leadership positions, and you start having different conversations.
(26:59):
Let's talk about the media for a minute. You probably
are the biggest supporter of media with your add dollars,
and it's changed enormously we've seen the biggest TV network
today has dropped below reach for the month. I'm in
the audio sector here we are on a podcast the
Death of Peace and Quiet, meaning people are filling up
(27:20):
all those open spots now with audio, radio, playlist, podcasting
or exploding. But that has shifted in the mix. I
mean when I got into the business, TV was the
big reach medium radio was second, and newspapers and magazines
have big reach. How do you change your outlook on media?
You know, you were there when people thought digital meant nothing,
(27:40):
and now here it's number one in terms of media choices.
How do you change those allocations? How do you get
people to constantly watch and move things. One of the
things that I'm most excited about running Group down is
that you know, we are the biggest and you know,
when I looked at about that, man, I didn't want
to about this known as big, big is not always good,
(28:02):
as we know, so you know when I largest opportunity
about our size is to actually force the industry to
take responsibility and to actually be better than we are.
And we came out with a mission statement about making
advertising we're better for people around the world, and I
think that is the opportunity for media right now. I
think we can make it less interus of I think
(28:23):
we can be more respectful and how we run personalization.
I think we have to really look at ethical use
of data. We've got to look at the platforms when
the best in and ultimately we talk about shifting dollars,
you know, I think it's up to us to represent
the real cost of media to our clients. It's not
just a reach and frequency the equestion, right, you gotta
look at what is the management's commitment to d E
(28:46):
and I what is our commitment to responsible journalism? And
how do we score all these types of things in
a way that we can tell a client, Okay, this
is what you say that you care about these things,
then this is the real score. It's you know, their
prices of twelve, but they actually cost sixteen, right Or
on the flip side, hey, here's a company that deeply
(29:07):
cares about these types of things and they're charging a
little more for that, but you're getting something that really
represents who your company values are. Now you can kind
of walk the walk. And so in terms of shifting dynamics,
whether digital or mobile or audio, I mean obviously we're
talking on a podcast today. There's always new formats coming
and going, and it's up to us to help our
clients kind of guide that a complicated ecosystem, and I
(29:30):
think ultimately, you know, we've shown the willingness to move
dollars away from those that won't take responsibility for their
actions in the world and to reward independent journalism or
other partners, and they do stuff up and take that responsibility.
If you could go back in time and give your
twenty one year old self some advice, what would that
advice be. I listened to your pen Horror. It's podcast.
(29:51):
Take my advice. It is somewhat similar. I wish I're
worried less so worried about everything. I do feel like
worrying about all the small things along the way has
over the taxed me in some capacity, and the things
that way working out and maintaining positivity, continuing to learn,
continue to be curious, and putting yourself around interesting people
(30:13):
and opportunities. It's a good formula for things to kind of,
let's say, take care of themselves, but good things generally happen.
How do you deal with that in your work today?
How do you encourage people to be aware but not
to let it get into worry or do you think
worry is a positive attribute for them? I think an
aspect of worrying is good. I mean healthy paranoia. Competitors
(30:37):
would love to have our clients most of the time irrational.
Sometimes you're irrational, and you know, what does that look like?
And how do we defend our our business and how
we make sure our clients are growing and feel appreciated.
That's always a fear, you know. I think we're minding
people about what we've come through in the last three
years and the strength and the resilience in the business
(30:57):
and our global leadership and the relations ships we have
a clients and foundations and technology and are incredible partnerships
and media and I trust them all come together again
to figure things out when the next top time gets
to us. We in each episode by giving a shout
out to our influences. This podcast is about both sides,
about those who see the world with numbers, analytics, and data,
(31:20):
the math side, and about those who have the magic,
the creativity, intuition, showmanship. As you think about it, who
gets the shout out for the math side and who
gets the shout out for the magic side. Well, I
started saying, I believe the tour intrinsically intertwined. Any great
artist has a good basis and math, And if you
look at great musicians, as you know, are generally pretty
(31:42):
good at math. But in terms of the two, you
know Andrew Shaver, who was one of the founders of Essence,
It is one of the sharpest minds that I've ever met.
He's gone on he's fighting climate change at at a
company called Counteract now or they're looking at carbon removal
and investing in small companies there. But Andrew was one
sort of taught me when we come to the problem,
let's see if software can do it first. Let's see
(32:04):
if we can automate something first, Let's build something first.
And just an incredibly brilliant guy, and I have every
confidence in the world that he'll be making a positive
change on our climate in the coming years. In terms
of the creatives, I have to give a shout out
to Lorraine to at Google for many, many reasons, but
not the least of which she's been a steadfast supporter
of of me and Essence and our growth with them
(32:25):
as their primary marketing partner over the years. But also
someone who always makes time for creativity, always talks about
the bigger ideas, always pushes for getting out of the
optimization loop that can just drive you into micro conversations.
And it's always reminded me about you know, hey, we
want to be famous, we want to be good, we
want to push for better things in the world. And
(32:47):
lives it and talks it and delivers it and continue
to believe they'll push for for positive impact in the world.
And I think that Lorraine is a great voice for that,
and it does it in a very creative, elegant and
amazing way. You been a pioneer in digital advertising marketing.
Your proven c HEO can can navigate and even harness
change and our evolving a company, and I would argue
(33:08):
in an industry at enormous scale. Christian, thanks for sharing
your valuable lessons and insights today. Thank you for having me.
Here are a few things I picked up in my
(33:29):
conversation with Christian. One take risks, as Christian says, you
don't want to be the status quote. You want to
be the change maker. Even if the path feels uncertain,
keep pushing to create something new, to trust and positive intent,
set high standards and no matter what happens, assume that
your team wants to do their best. This assumption builds
(33:52):
trust among colleagues and strengthens corporate culture. Three Plan for
uncertain Christians or Vibe the dot com bust and came
out the other side as a stronger leader. He's realized
that uncertainty is inevitable, so it's important to pay attention
to the world around you and lean into your strengths
during challenges. I'm Bob Pittman, Thanks for listening. That's it
(34:24):
for today's episode. Thanks so much for listening to Math
and Magic, a production of I Heart Radio Show is
hosted by Bob Pittman. Special thanks to Susan Ward for
booking and wrangling our wonderful talent, which is no small feel.
Our editors are Derek Clements and Emily Mariott, our producer,
Morgan Leavoy, our executive producer Nicky Eator and of course
(34:47):
Gayle Raoul, Eric Angel Noel and everyone who helped bring
this show to your ears. Until next time,
You're listening to Math and Magic production of I Heart Radio.
I think it's a really important behavior. If people realize
I think it's okay to fail, comes out a silking
valid and fail fast, get smarter quick. We don't want
to be a traditional player in the space. We want
to be the provocatur Hi. I'm Bob Pittman. Welcome back
(00:25):
to Math and Magic. Stories from the Frontiers and Marketing.
On each episode, we explored the interaction of the two
keys to successful marketing and business, the analytics, the math,
the data, and the creative and the magical ideas created
to respond to identified needs or opportunities. Today we have
someone in the middle of the transformation of the advertising
(00:45):
and media business to reflect the possibilities and full potential
unleashed by technology. He's a pioneer of digital advertising and
sits a top Group M at w PP, the world's
largest advertising and marketing holding company. He's Richtian Jewel, the
global CEO of Group M. Christian was born in Guam,
a military family kid who moved a lot from New
(01:07):
Hampshire to California. He wanted to be a pilot, but
his dad told him he was too tall. As a
young man. He had a great curiosity that opened the
world to him. He was a digital pioneer who survived
the dot com bust and emerged as a senior leader
of razor Fish, including its time as a part of
Microsoft and then Publicists. He went on to be the
global CEO for Essence before his current mission. He's been
(01:31):
in small and entrepreneurial and he's been at the largest
and has a unique perspectives as a result. He's known
for being a keen strategist, a transformation expert, and a
strong culture builder. He mountain bikes, plays golf skis and
is still tall. Christian Welcome, Thanks for having me. Before
we get started, I'd like to give everybody a quick
(01:52):
view of you in sixty seconds. Ready. Do you prefer
cats or dogs? Thoughts or early riser or night owl?
Early riser? The wire or the crown? The wire? T
shirt or tie T shirt? Hiking or fishing, Hiking to
a good fishing spot, Michigan or Alaska? Alaska? Trombone or
(02:14):
trumpet trumpet? Work life balance or work life integration? Favorite band?
What have I've been listening to? Billy Strings? If you
weren't working in marketing, what would you be doing teaching
childhood hero my dad favorite brand from your childhood, Alexander
Colure has made these great sweaters and I thought they
(02:35):
were so cool. Never had one pretty expensive back in
the day marketing campaign you're most proud of. I love
the Nike work that we did. Guilty Pleasure Pringles ideal
Sunday afternoon, walking the dog with my son. First concert
Paul Sign and Rhythm of the Saints. My mother took
me first job washing dishes at Pasta Fresco outside Sacramento, California. Okay,
(02:58):
the last one. If you could time trap, would you
go back to the past or go to the future future.
Let's get started way back in one we launched MTV,
one of the first cable only networks, and at that
time Nielsen just measured viewing a broadcast TV. You can
imagine the advertiser's reaction. Great idea, come back to me
(03:18):
when you've got some numbers. But a couple of folks
saw this as an opportunity to get a jump on competitors.
Roger and Rico was running Pepsi at the time and
was hell bent on moving his share against Coke. He
saw these young people watching MTV so in the absence
of any ratings, he buys us. Coke, on the other hand,
said we have no interest until you have measurement, and
Coke sat on the sidelines for over five years. In
(03:40):
that time, Roger moved the market share of Pepsi against
Coke the most it's ever been moved before or after.
And this example, Pepsi picked performance, even though it's harder
to quantify. Coke chose measurement. In the next decade, when
we took the Internet to the mass market, I was
at a o L at the time in the nineteen
nineties and is reminded over half the traffic of the
(04:02):
Internet in the US came through a o L in
those days, and we did have the data, metrics and performance.
Yet the major agencies at that time ignored digital l abvertizing.
Even though a o L had gone from few million
dollars in advertising to billions of dollars in that five
year period, eight percent of the ad revenue did not
come through agencies. This lack of adoption really opened the
(04:23):
door for all those digital only agencies that sprung up.
You are part of that and later had to be
acquired at much bigger prices. When it became obvious how
huge the digital tam was becoming. So two decades later
and two examples of dislocation at a time of change,
and here we are in You're now not the new guard.
(04:45):
You are the establishment. You're the global CEO of Group M,
though we're fifty billion billings thirty five thousand employees worldwide,
and you're evolving Group M to continue to be a
major leader. So here's the question. How are you evolving
the business, the structure and the culture to take advantage
(05:05):
of your unique data and enormous scale, and how do
you avoid the pitfalls like the ones I just mentioned
to make uncomfortable change acceptable to your organization. You know,
I talked about the early days of people taking risks
without actually understanding the full metrics or measurement or the
(05:26):
things that today we would take for granted. In terms
of putting a media deal together. I think there's always
an element in advertising and marketing about, you know, early
movers and those who are willing to take a chance
in the reward that can pay off with that. Early
days of the Internet, there were a lot of failures.
You know, I lived through a lot of it. I
mean I started on the Internet in company called us
(05:46):
Web and tragically bought my first house on my first
commission check I think in two thousand one, roughly five
days before the company filed for bankruptcy as March first,
and which was a rather trying moment for myself. When
you look at that, it's not even just about two
thousand one. If you look at even more recently, I'm
like women in Jeff Katzenberg doing Queeby and the amount
of money they're able to raise and then subsequent decline
(06:10):
to that business. So you're always in this place where
you're trying to make the right decisions about which media
partners to work with and which sort of creative outlets
are going to bring the most connection between brands and consumers,
and I think there's never a perfect formula for it.
Relative to home structuring group them, you talk about structure
and culture and let's stay culture first, actually, because I
think that's one of the biggest things coming out of
Microsoft and publicists and going in to run Essence, which
(06:33):
the time is about three people mostly in the UK,
founder led organization, really shaped my view on culture and
the power of culture as a true economic differentiator for
a business. Tell then people talk about culture. They put
mission revision on the walls and you see them around
your office and like, okay, great. But the very first
management meeting I had with the three founders of Essence,
(06:54):
we run it out of the little room and soho
LOFs in New York. And I was already for the job.
I started as a us CEO only, so I built
these plans and growth targets and key accounts and management
team structures and what we were going to do and
technology implementations. And I walk into this room and they're
already there, and there are four chairs facing each other
(07:17):
with no table in between, no screens, a little coffee bar,
and Matt Isaac's who was to see you at the Times,
has had a seat and before you can even know,
stending okay, I'm ready to show you, guys what I
think the North American plan should be. And he goes, no,
no, no no, We've got three hours just to talk about
how you're doing, what we think this thing might look
like and feel like over time. I don't know if
you've ever done that, really, just sit there with no
(07:38):
table in a square with four people that you don't
really know that well well you're trying to impress them
about your knowledge of the business or what have you.
But it's extremely uncomfortable. There's no barriers and there was
no preconceived notion. And we sat there and sort of
hashed out an understanding of what Essence was and how
we wanted to treat each other as a management team,
and how we wanted that to show up in our people.
(08:00):
And I sum it up now and I've brought it
to group. I'm as well. It's assuming positive intent at
every turn, and I want everybody Group Time to feel
like this is the place where their expression is welcome,
where creative ideas are welcome, where they can disagree with management,
where they can speak up, and where they're trusted, and
where it's an environment of positive intent. When you took over,
you flew something like over two hundred thousand miles to
(08:23):
meet people all across group him. Were you doing those
kinds of meetings like you did with the founders of
Essence where you just sat and talked as opposed to
show me your presentation. Yeah, I have an odd entrance
point in the group them, right, we sold Essence into it.
So I was a turnout CEO. So I was sort
of a witness to the management team for three years.
(08:44):
When I took over the job about three years ago. Now,
one of the first things I did was just get
the management teams together, and I said, we're gonna do
things differently. We're gonna trust each other, we're gonna listen
to each other. We're going to build a strategy together,
and we're going to share that strategy with all thousand
employees so that they know what the purpose of Group
(09:06):
M is, what the purpose of the agencies are, how
we can count our technology division. Up until that point,
Group M was a collection of companies, and so trying
to sit down and talk about the future of this
industry and media is becoming technology driven. It looks more
like software than it looks like manual planning in media deals,
and we're going to get really good at automation and
(09:27):
and understanding technology. And that means investing hundreds of mens
and dollars and doing it once, not doing it in
sixty different methods with different partners in every market around
the world, and getting people aligned to that type of thinking.
It requires a singularity of culture and understanding of how
we're going to hold each other to account. In Even
(09:47):
during the lockdown, you hosted a video series called The Regroup.
What was that tool for in this cultural transformation? It
was the way to stay connected, in a way to
burn forward a lot of diverse voices from around the
world with us, and I was talking to people in
Pakistan and in India and in Europe, across the US,
and to remind people of who's on the other end
(10:08):
of the phone or the team's call. In this case,
we really want to go wide and deep into the organization.
We want to hear employee stories, We want to hear
about the client work they were excited about. Between the
reaction to that and your two hundred thousand miles of
traveling and the listening tour, what revelations came out of
it that you probably wouldn't have gotten had you not
(10:28):
done those. I would say the amount of strength and
some of our markets around the world, the amount of
relationships with you know, the publisher's side and the client side.
You know, when you go to market like India and
we're close to market share, it's just a massive market
with incredible strength from Group M and w PP there
and it's just really really impressive to see the kind
of clients that they work with and the programs they
(10:51):
are able to put in place. And then when you
go to other markets where we're still growing and learning,
you know, just incredibly diverse business. You know, I think
our on was forty two as and employees and eighty
two different countries. I mean, it's just continues to grow
in the strength even at that scale is really really impressive.
You talked about some elements of corporate culture here and
(11:11):
your values positive intent, trust, listen to each other, accountability,
what else is important to you and that value system
that builds up the corporate culture. Risk taking. I think
that we really have to be willing to change ourselves
and to realize that the way we've been doing things
is not the way that will be successful doing things
going forward. The migration in the digital, migration into programmatic
(11:34):
I mean I really rapidly accelerated our investment in programmatic channels,
pushing out a home into digital formats, looking what we're
doing connected television, new partnerships like the Netflix Microsoft partnership.
How do we embrace those in a way that we're
not scared of holding onto things in the past that
we're really successful with, but realizing you know, will find
ways to be successful in these new markets, and our
(11:56):
clients count on us to lead them into these new opportunities.
And I think it's a really important behavior of people
who realize that it's okay to fail, you know, and
it comes out of silicon value and fail fast, get
smarter quick, And we don't want to be a traditional
player in the space. We want to be the provocateur.
I suspect coming into your job, you found that probably
(12:18):
the appetite for that risk taking and the fear of
failure probably was at another level than you needed. How
did you change that? How did you get people comfortable
with that? What's really important? And the key thing that
I did was I did that tour around the world
and we formed something called our our Synergy Strategy, which
was really just defining Group M as a global organization,
(12:41):
the accountabilities between management agencies and ambition to build a
large global shared services and media delivery organization. And we're
making great progress on it. I mean, it's showing up
in our new business wins, it's showing up in client
satisfaction scores and the other piece. And I would just
give a credit to Mark even us, you know, he
(13:01):
asked me to take over group them three and a
half years ago. I mean I never saw coming, and
I literally said, you would not want me to do
what I want to do to group them. That's the CEO.
I just said, I can't imagine what I want to
do with something that's attractive to you. I write a
whole new blueprint and I sketched out for im on
a piece of paper, and he goes go to it.
You have a complete, total authority to do ever you
need to do to make those changes. I think that's
(13:23):
what needs to do. Also more on math and magic
right after this quick break. Welcome back to math and magic.
Let's hear more from my conversation with Christian Jewel. I
want to go back in time just a little bit
to get some more context on you. You were born
(13:45):
in the early seventies, grew up moving around as a
kid in the eighties and nineties. Can you paint the
picture of those times and your life? Then? My families
from Michigan, sort of Midwestern cultures and values to family.
My mom's school teacher. My dad join the military out
of Vietnam and shows the Air Force. You know, his
first station was in Guam, and you know, I don't
remember much about it, but when they were moved to
(14:07):
New Atwer and kind of spend some time there, and
I remember a pretty traditional family, you know, my dad
it's kind of home by five, and my mom's a
teacher and be home and we dump dinner together, an
older sister and a younger brother. And we moved to Alaska.
You know, Alaska was great. We're outside a lot. We
had a camper trailer, and we spent almost all summer
out at the river fishing and pike in picking blueberries.
(14:27):
And we had a family car game called Cutthroat, which
is sort of a lot like gym and we don't
play that and pretty simple and very very nice. And
then we moved down to California. Talk a little bit
about that moving. How did all this moving affect you.
It's only in recent years I've actually come to think
about that, to tell the truth, I've seen my own
son and grow up, and I've seen the friendships that
he's developed and how close they are. You know, I
(14:49):
kind of realized the challenges and moving around so much
gring and I look back and I see some people
now that I'm close with who have friendships from kindergarten
or beyond, and I'm jealous about looks amazing to be
able to have that, And I think that's something you
don't get, you know, when you're in a family that
moves every four years, and relationships or something that probably
the most important thing in your life, and to be
(15:11):
able to maintain and sustain those It's something I've worked
on a harder at in the last fifteen years of
my life than I did before. What kind of kid
were you? How did you define yourself and what was
your own self image? I don't think I any kind
of a weirdness to try and define myself. I think
I was trying to get from point at a point
the most of the time to my childhood. You know,
part of the challenge moving out of different schools and
(15:33):
being different, you know, moving to California from Alaska, I
remember kids walking to me and you know, deep live
in a very, very different and I think, you know,
struggling with being different was the real thing. And then
you know, my parents believe along in classical music, and
I had to pick up traditional instrument and then end
up in the jazz band. And I assure you, being
(15:53):
in the marching band in California, wearing a buttoned coat
and top hat and leading the band out onto the
football field was no cooler then than it is today.
Probably I was sponsors and academic and you know, probably
a very awkward teenager, which is amazing. Now I see
my son in the same age group. You just joined
high school this year and he plays his guitar and
(16:15):
it's in this rock band program where they had to
play two hours a day with some amazing musicians and teachers,
and his first day of school, I was ten times
more scared for him than he was. And I'm realizing
he has so many more tools than I had at
the time, and you know, ultimately it's just loving high
school and it's wonderful to see him out slightly different
experience than I had. That's amazing. I heard a story
(16:37):
about you as an early entrepreneur. I heard that you
had one business where you picked up reptiles and sold
them to kids at school. Yeah. I've always been under
the salesperson. I like having a little bit of money
in my pocket with it outside of Sacramento, and there
was a time in the bacon field between us and school,
and obviously see lizards all over the place on the
(16:58):
way on the way to school, and so I started
to them, I doing little shoe box and then sell
them in school until I got in troubled for selling
lizards at school, and then I would stop that. In
oh which case, at that point, I think Costco had
just started coming out and they talked to my dad
who buying those hundred packs of fitsy pops, And I
started breaking down hundred packs and selling to the pops
at school next. So it's kind of a catch me.
(17:19):
If you can't situation with the administration of the school,
what lessons from that child do you still use today?
I think the importance of family. I think the importance
of sitting down together. My dad actually started a computer
technology company in the late nineties and we started his
own copy've never gone before in the Air Force. Retired
(17:40):
twenty seven years there. The courage took him to start
his own company. It's still something like, you know, respect deeply,
but the transition from family sitting down and dinner every
night to my dad working until midnight or wanting it
was profound and thinking about, you know, my own life
now and I'm traveling so much for work, and how
I tried to stay connected to my son and my family,
(18:01):
you know, as my parents get older, and how you
prioritize those types of things that you're gonna be there
for each other. And you can get really tied up
and work or making money or promotion or even just
great ideas, but ultimately coming back to the family and
relationships and making sure that you know that's not strong.
Nothing else in your life is going to be strong.
You took a gap here between high school and college.
You went on do you see San Diego? You decided
(18:23):
you did not want to be a doctor, you did
not want to be a lawyer. Who was there any
guiding light that that made college exciting for you? I
grew up a lot in college. When I got to college,
I really just realized I like learning a lot collect economics,
about local science, aspects of biology and science just really
(18:43):
became very comfortable with myself, and you know, that allowed
me to start thinking about things that you know, I
hadn't really done a spouse to people before. I knew
about dad being a military and my mom school teacher,
and had a lot of exposure to the business world
and what was happening, and certainly the booming opportunities of
the Internet, oology and what that was bringing, and to
meet professors who would talk about those types of things
(19:04):
and how corporations were structured, and you know, it's just
really an amazing time in my life. After school, you
went to Japan taught English. What lessons did you pick
up from that that that are still with you today? Empathy?
I mean I applied to the Japanese English Teaching Programs
JET programs, what they call it pretty competitive program that
(19:26):
the Japanese government puts out over for a year or
two years. I want to fully pay program where they
put you up in housing and they kind of see
these English teachers all through the country of Japan to
really just teach. In my case of well middle school kids.
I ended up up in the north place called Yonazawa,
which is about a hundred thousand people. I was one
of three English speakers in town. I lived in one
(19:48):
of the thatched roof places. It was incredibly difficult to
get around. An amount of kindness that I was shown,
and the amount of people that would as I was lost,
not just point me in the direction, but walk me there.
I think about it when I see tourists all the
time now, whether it's you know, anywhere I'm at in
the world, but New York or San Francisco. You know
that just that a little bit of after trying to
(20:09):
help somebody feel like you're looking out for and that
you know you care and that you want them to
have good experience when they're in your country doing math
and magic. I talked to a lot of people, and
there's always something in the research that goes, wow, that's unexpected.
And the unexpected in your case was you began your
career ge Capital, and knowing you and thinking about you
(20:29):
at G Capital seems so out of place. Tell us
how you wound up there and what that was in
terms of the stage of your career building. Yeah, so
I came back. My dad at the time, like I said,
he started a computer networking company and they's sold in
a lot of computers and technology to corporations and offices
and things like that. He knew someone Compact. They introduced
me to the general manager in San Francisco. I was
(20:52):
sleeping on my college roomates floor trying to figure out
what kind of job I was gonna get when I
came back. They have Capital I T Solutions and they
were a big computer and services reseller, and so I
went in, got a job. There's customer service, and I
rode the Jade church down every morning and six an't
a suit and time and got to know the technology
(21:13):
side of the business. And then after about a year
they launched a big services group, and the services group
sort of the first thing was accountable or anything remotely
you know, to Internet. And that's when things were just starting.
It's one of those weird things that happened to Levi.
Strouss company went into a review to outsource all their
services and we're going to their restructuring and I got
(21:34):
to know the guy there, and g had just launched
the service, and you know, we're probably not particularly prepaired
to take on anything of Levi size. And I sold
this account for thirty seats across the United States and
started working out of Levi for the next two years.
And you know, at the time, then after I really
(21:55):
started following low the coding and the Internet, that a
company called us Web, somebody from company went over there
and come over and look at these guys. I mean,
I couldn't believe it. Bob, I walked Hadler, there's free
coffee there's free food you guys are giving away. Harley
Davidsons during the Christmas party, like, what is happening here
that I'm not a part of? And I went over
(22:15):
there is a strategy account leg and that kind of
kicked off the next fifteen years of my career. You
survived the dot com bust, You went through various iterations
of the company until it became Razor Fish and was
eventually acquired by publicists. What surprised you most about how
digital laboratizing evolved? I mean you were there really at
(22:38):
is practically the beginning. How did the reality contrast with
your early view? I mean it's not all from Silicon Valley,
just the boom the bus stories when they continue to repeat,
when you see how things can get so big so
quick and then gets so small so quick. I'll never forget.
One of the iterations of the name was March First
after Us, which was kind of the biggest internet consultancy
(22:58):
at the time. Bob or Ours remember as we were
going through it, I think Francisco Partners are just put
in a hundred and fifty million dollars to keep the
company afloat. And I saw Bob in the hallway and
said the boy the way you know just about this house,
like should I be concerned? It's like everybody else seems
to be concerned. And he goes, don't worry, Christian ships,
this big don't go down. Well there forget that quote.
(23:21):
And two days later we filed for bankruptcy and people's
paychecks started pat saying there were people who were having babies,
and it turns out that Bob had stopped paying the
premiums on our health insurance, so they were getting bills
handed to them for twenty plus thousand dollars thinking the
insurance when the in fact didn't have insurance. Disciples that
(23:41):
we've gone through are just really tremendous, and the uncertainty
that you deal with in some of those moments are
something else could really comfortable with. I mean, I'm not
kidding when I said, remember we used to take our
paychecks and we'd go on those check cashing places to
see if we could get them cashed, to see where
you could get paid during those soume periods. I think
fast forwarding today's workplace, you know, it's evolved so much.
(24:03):
I think the role of government has changed so much.
Sadly for the worst. I mean, people have really started
looking at their companies is one of the most stable
things in their lives and the responsibilities that come without.
When we think about equality, opportunity, the way we treat
each other, and the way we think about values and
the way we hold each other accountable, is accountable and
(24:24):
I contrast, that's when I started run, really was just
talking my paycheck would cash. And it's a whole different
world right now. I'm going to jump into it a
little bit. Let's start with the first and which is
the dot com bust, the beginning of the century, the
big recession of O E O nine. You live through
both of them, the pandemic, business downturn, and now we
are in a period of some uncertainty. How do the
(24:45):
learnings from those three help us navigate this and what
do you see as a result of that. I still
believe my primary job is to provide employment for our
people in a sense of safety and security, so that
they can make plans for their lives with mind. I
think that what we have to do is make sure
that we plan for the uncertainty. Who no one knows
what's really coming. I don't know if China's going to
(25:06):
open backed up next year. We have to make sure
that we're listening to our clients and well provide them
the flexibility that they need. And ultimately, you know, I
have to predict the future just slightly better than everybody
else so that I can do the right things for
employees and our clients. Will say, every one of those downturns,
you don't realize when you're coming out of it. It
gets better much more slowly than it gets worse. And
(25:30):
I think that one day you wake up and you realize, well,
actually everything's okay. You rise up out of challenging times
kind of inch by inch. I don't find it ever
happens overnight. And I think just making sure that you know,
you investment in things during these time periods that are
really important to you. Maybe you postpone a couple of
things that are nice to have, and you communicate. You know,
I've been very front of our employees about it. Would
(25:52):
you be really careful right now? It's not the time
to make big bets. Let's stay close to our clients.
Let to make sure we understand what's happening. You know,
let's forecast a little more often than we used to
they're really trying to ensure you know what's coming. You
are a strong advocate of diversity, how do you make
it a priority and make inclusion a part of your
culture and operations? And what are the hurdles to making
(26:14):
all of our not just your company, our senior management
ranks in American business reflect the diversity of the communities
we serve. Well, would you never do enough? That's simple.
Truth is you have to believe in diversity. You know,
it's not a target or goal. You know, the best
leaders they're building really diverse and inclusive teams are those
that understand ever seeing inclusion is good for you and
(26:38):
never see it comes from a lot of different formats.
I mean people who have come from different backgrounds, who
weren't growing on Madison Avenue, whose parents didn't work in
the industry. Those interesting people to bring into the business.
People are experiencing the way marketing and advertising works around
the world right now, and you bring them in, you
put them in leadership positions, and you start having different conversations.
(26:59):
Let's talk about the media for a minute. You probably
are the biggest supporter of media with your add dollars,
and it's changed enormously we've seen the biggest TV network
today has dropped below reach for the month. I'm in
the audio sector here we are on a podcast the
Death of Peace and Quiet, meaning people are filling up
(27:20):
all those open spots now with audio, radio, playlist, podcasting
or exploding. But that has shifted in the mix. I
mean when I got into the business, TV was the
big reach medium radio was second, and newspapers and magazines
have big reach. How do you change your outlook on media?
You know, you were there when people thought digital meant nothing,
(27:40):
and now here it's number one in terms of media choices.
How do you change those allocations? How do you get
people to constantly watch and move things. One of the
things that I'm most excited about running Group down is
that you know, we are the biggest and you know,
when I looked at about that, man, I didn't want
to about this known as big, big is not always good,
(28:02):
as we know, so you know when I largest opportunity
about our size is to actually force the industry to
take responsibility and to actually be better than we are.
And we came out with a mission statement about making
advertising we're better for people around the world, and I
think that is the opportunity for media right now. I
think we can make it less interus of I think
(28:23):
we can be more respectful and how we run personalization.
I think we have to really look at ethical use
of data. We've got to look at the platforms when
the best in and ultimately we talk about shifting dollars,
you know, I think it's up to us to represent
the real cost of media to our clients. It's not
just a reach and frequency the equestion, right, you gotta
look at what is the management's commitment to d E
(28:46):
and I what is our commitment to responsible journalism? And
how do we score all these types of things in
a way that we can tell a client, Okay, this
is what you say that you care about these things,
then this is the real score. It's you know, their
prices of twelve, but they actually cost sixteen, right Or
on the flip side, hey, here's a company that deeply
(29:07):
cares about these types of things and they're charging a
little more for that, but you're getting something that really
represents who your company values are. Now you can kind
of walk the walk. And so in terms of shifting dynamics,
whether digital or mobile or audio, I mean obviously we're
talking on a podcast today. There's always new formats coming
and going, and it's up to us to help our
clients kind of guide that a complicated ecosystem, and I
(29:30):
think ultimately, you know, we've shown the willingness to move
dollars away from those that won't take responsibility for their
actions in the world and to reward independent journalism or
other partners, and they do stuff up and take that responsibility.
If you could go back in time and give your
twenty one year old self some advice, what would that
advice be. I listened to your pen Horror. It's podcast.
(29:51):
Take my advice. It is somewhat similar. I wish I're
worried less so worried about everything. I do feel like
worrying about all the small things along the way has
over the taxed me in some capacity, and the things
that way working out and maintaining positivity, continuing to learn,
continue to be curious, and putting yourself around interesting people
(30:13):
and opportunities. It's a good formula for things to kind of,
let's say, take care of themselves, but good things generally happen.
How do you deal with that in your work today?
How do you encourage people to be aware but not
to let it get into worry or do you think
worry is a positive attribute for them? I think an
aspect of worrying is good. I mean healthy paranoia. Competitors
(30:37):
would love to have our clients most of the time irrational.
Sometimes you're irrational, and you know, what does that look like?
And how do we defend our our business and how
we make sure our clients are growing and feel appreciated.
That's always a fear, you know. I think we're minding
people about what we've come through in the last three
years and the strength and the resilience in the business
(30:57):
and our global leadership and the relations ships we have
a clients and foundations and technology and are incredible partnerships
and media and I trust them all come together again
to figure things out when the next top time gets
to us. We in each episode by giving a shout
out to our influences. This podcast is about both sides,
about those who see the world with numbers, analytics, and data,
(31:20):
the math side, and about those who have the magic,
the creativity, intuition, showmanship. As you think about it, who
gets the shout out for the math side and who
gets the shout out for the magic side. Well, I
started saying, I believe the tour intrinsically intertwined. Any great
artist has a good basis and math, And if you
look at great musicians, as you know, are generally pretty
(31:42):
good at math. But in terms of the two, you
know Andrew Shaver, who was one of the founders of Essence,
It is one of the sharpest minds that I've ever met.
He's gone on he's fighting climate change at at a
company called Counteract now or they're looking at carbon removal
and investing in small companies there. But Andrew was one
sort of taught me when we come to the problem,
let's see if software can do it first. Let's see
(32:04):
if we can automate something first, Let's build something first.
And just an incredibly brilliant guy, and I have every
confidence in the world that he'll be making a positive
change on our climate in the coming years. In terms
of the creatives, I have to give a shout out
to Lorraine to at Google for many, many reasons, but
not the least of which she's been a steadfast supporter
of of me and Essence and our growth with them
(32:25):
as their primary marketing partner over the years. But also
someone who always makes time for creativity, always talks about
the bigger ideas, always pushes for getting out of the
optimization loop that can just drive you into micro conversations.
And it's always reminded me about you know, hey, we
want to be famous, we want to be good, we
want to push for better things in the world. And
(32:47):
lives it and talks it and delivers it and continue
to believe they'll push for for positive impact in the world.
And I think that Lorraine is a great voice for that,
and it does it in a very creative, elegant and
amazing way. You been a pioneer in digital advertising marketing.
Your proven c HEO can can navigate and even harness
change and our evolving a company, and I would argue
(33:08):
in an industry at enormous scale. Christian, thanks for sharing
your valuable lessons and insights today. Thank you for having me.
Here are a few things I picked up in my
(33:29):
conversation with Christian. One take risks, as Christian says, you
don't want to be the status quote. You want to
be the change maker. Even if the path feels uncertain,
keep pushing to create something new, to trust and positive intent,
set high standards and no matter what happens, assume that
your team wants to do their best. This assumption builds
(33:52):
trust among colleagues and strengthens corporate culture. Three Plan for
uncertain Christians or Vibe the dot com bust and came
out the other side as a stronger leader. He's realized
that uncertainty is inevitable, so it's important to pay attention
to the world around you and lean into your strengths
during challenges. I'm Bob Pittman, Thanks for listening. That's it
(34:24):
for today's episode. Thanks so much for listening to Math
and Magic, a production of I Heart Radio Show is
hosted by Bob Pittman. Special thanks to Susan Ward for
booking and wrangling our wonderful talent, which is no small feel.
Our editors are Derek Clements and Emily Mariott, our producer,
Morgan Leavoy, our executive producer Nicky Eator and of course
(34:47):
Gayle Raoul, Eric Angel Noel and everyone who helped bring
this show to your ears. Until next time,
Host
Bob Pittman
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