How to bridge knowledge gaps within agency teams

In part two of asking agency leaders and senior executives to share how they deal with ‘knowledge’ in their business, continuous learning, collaboration and courage come to the fore. Read part one here.

Continuous learning is key

Luke Bozeat, COO, GroupM UK: “We pride ourselves on having a culture of continuous learning, to ensure our teams remain at the forefront of the rapidly evolving marketing landscape and help us stay ahead of these developments for our clients. We have an award-winning learning and effectiveness team, working in tandem with our partners, to deliver the most up-to-date training to all our colleagues across the GroupM network – everything from personal growth and career development to media fundamentals and more technical accreditations. And they’re not short on choice, either, with more than 2,000 courses to choose from, meaning our people can tailor their training to their own needs and ambitions. A recent example is the rollout of the Coursera Generative AI for Everyone programme equipping some of our teams to embrace AI as an integral part of our workflow.”

Sarah Richardson Mehler, CEO, Left Field Labs: “Our ‘invent the future’ mantra drives us to not just meet clients’ needs but to stretch toward their next opportunity. At our core, we select ambitious client business challenges that demand a radical approach and a degree of rule-breaking. Through this approach, we’re not just keeping up, but we’re leading the way in inventing how to market using the latest tools. To drive this, leadership is responsible for tech briefings and ’future-casting’ insights that get applied to both ongoing client work and upcoming pitches. This process extends beyond top-down input; teams and departments often uncover new implications that cycle back to management, which feeds into the ongoing innovation loop. We also encourage continuous learning through education stipends and promote cross-departmental knowledge sharing. It really comes down to a culture of curiosity and collaboration – with open, enthusiastic communication at the core.”

Chris Andrews, head of advertising technology, Wake The Bear: “When you’re dealing with businesses going through critical periods of change a one-size-fits-all approach isn’t going to cut it. Clients don’t pay us for information; they pay us for knowledge. The best agencies are the ones who know why they’re doing something because they know when to call bullshit and ask the question after the next one. So as low-tech (and trite) as it might sound, the best approach is curiosity and critical thinking. If you’re armed with that, then you can see past the smoke and mirrors of the shiny and new and think about how you use technology and innovation to service business outcomes, rather than waste money creating new ones and zeros for the sake of it. It means when teams read articles; listen to podcasts; and see case studies; they don’t think, ‘How do we copy that?’ They question how much better they can make it.”

Jeff Blackman, managing director, Barbarian: “Agencies are in a unique, yet challenging position as culture and technology shifts increase. At the same time as we advise our client partners on innovation, we have to continuously innovate ourselves in terms of how we bring more solutions to the table for brands. Being able to adapt and stay ahead of change is as much a state of mind as an organization as it is a practical process – both are required. We think in frameworks of inputs and outputs. One on hand, the steady inflow of data, trends and inspiration into all phases of a project lifecycle. On the other, the right briefs and outlets for teams to see their innovations come to life, whether in market for a client or as thought leadership. In the area of AI, we’ve built a dedicated task force that sets our agency standards for use, adoption, testing and education. The task force, living within our innovation practice, works closely with creative and strategy to inspire thinking and drive new ideas or angles to apply AI to client briefs. While staying up on trends and change is everyone’s job in our industry, it’s too often like a second job or side hustle. By having a steady flow of inspired inputs, and putting them in the context of the work we do, the agency builds momentum and fosters the innovative state of mind.”

Mark Wagman, managing director, MediaLink and partner, UTA: “MediaLink ensures our teams stay current on new technology, platform and marketing innovations through fostering a culture of continuous learning – including regular training, webinars and workshops available at all levels. Knowledge is shared internally using an AI-powered internal information hub, collaborative tools like Slack and peer-to-peer learning sessions. We facilitate the exchange of insights across domains by building cross-functional teams that have regular project debriefs. Partnerships with industry associations and conference participation keep us ahead of trends. And lastly, MediaLink’s culture of curiosity and innovation really incentivizes exploration and the adoption of new ideas, so all team members benefit from the latest advancements.”

Josh Okun, chief innovation officer, Gravity Global: “At Gravity Global, we ensure our teams stay current with the latest tech, platforms, and marketing techniques through continuous learning and collaborative knowledge sharing. My team and I run Gravity’s Innovation Labs, designed to ensure our teams are equipped with the latest tools and approaches to drive success. This safe space allows us to experiment and refine ideas before rolling them out to clients. As a result, we’ve developed pioneering solutions like our Client Portal, integrated AI into our media planning process, and implemented new methods to enhance agency efficiency, ensuring our clients benefit from the latest advancements.”

Collaborate to innovate

Brian Yamada, Chief Innovation Officer at VML: “VML along with our parent company WPP have invested over $300m this year alone into AI. At the heart of our AI investment is WPP Open. By leveraging cutting-edge AI models and access to vast data resources, WPP Open is the intelligent operating system built for today, and tomorrow. A truly open platform that streamlines workflows, automates repetitive tasks, and provides data-driven insights that enhance decision-making abilities and future-proof the entire marketing process. WPP Open features Creative Studio – available to all VMLers – and allowing us access to an array of the latest models. We believe access and safe exploration is a critical component of understanding and adoption. Further – we have an array of AI training initiatives. We’re continually working with our partners on ongoing education – from big tech like Microsoft, Google, NVIDIA and Amazon to the AI-driven features on the major platforms we work with such as Adobe, Sprinklr; to emerging startups such as Bria, ElevenLabs, RunwayML and more.”

Scott Goodson, CEO and founder, StrawberryFrog: “Staying up-to-date is the name of the game, folks. If you’re not constantly learning, you’re falling behind. StrawberryFrog seeks out, woos and wins challenger brands and disruptors. These brands keep us, Frogs. fresh and our ideas fragrant. We remove all the things that lead to bad creativity. We don’t just read the tea leaves, we analyze the whole damn tea plantation, monitoring cultural trends through sources like Canvas8, conduct audience research and use semiotics, ethnography, and social listening. Our agency-wide meetings include a ‘What’s Trending’ section to share these cultural insights. StrawberryFrog’s AI-powered business, MachWon, utilizes artificial intelligence to monitor change. We’re also expanding AI enablement for staff. Employees also have access to Claude for creative and productive thinking, because sometimes you need a little help breaking out of the boxes we put ourselves in."

Jay Young, managing director, Grand Visual: “We live and breathe creativity – and then apply it to OOH, staying on top of the latest tech and trends is just part of the game. We’ve got awesome partner programs that keep us tight with the big innovators, ensuring we’re always clued up on what’s new & what’s next. Inside the studio, we’ve created a constantly curious culture. We set aside monthly sessions to exchange ideas across London and New York and we actively encourage everyone to share anything they find interesting. It doesn’t need to be industry-specific – in fact, it’s important that it isn’t. The biggest ideas can start with the smallest sparks of inspiration – and the magic comes when we get to make it happen! Personally, I have to make a conscious effort to immerse myself in popular culture as I get a little older! It’s very easy to make offhand comments like ‘Oh, I’m too old for that’. When you work in media, it’s your job to understand the consumer landscape, and the best way to do that is to consume it.”

Alex Hill, executive creative director, SAMY Alliance: “For us, the name of the game is reactivity and relevancy. We always seek to keep up with trends and tools we can utilize; we adapt in the short, medium and long term internally and externally. For short-term knowledge, we run a weekly newsletter for internal teams and bespoke examples for clients with relevant industry and internal news to keep us on the pulse for the upcoming week or two. For more adaptable uses and change over the mid-term, we run ‘show & tells’ with external suppliers, and internal ‘lunch and learns’ to highlight new tech, applications and examples to inspire change in the next activation. To adapt to longer-term change, we build dedicated teams and task forces to explore new opportunities, such as AI, Social Commerce and CX, preparing us for the future. Bring it all together, and we can be reactive and prepared.”

Amy Lanzi, chief executive officer, Digitas NA: “In 2023, we set up an AI & Innovation task force that helps our team vet and stand up new tools and systems in their daily work, especially surrounding AI. In 2024, we took our inventiveness a step further and launched a proprietary generative AI platform called Digitas AI in the marketplace. It is extremely user-friendly, allowing non-technical users to create agents to help with big and small tasks, including creating creative testing personas to interactive target demographics based on proprietary audience data or crafting rich user experiences. Also, our chief solution officer drives innovation across our core capabilities, with our solutions team focused on co-creating ahead of the curve with platforms and partners. These products and partners are democratized across the full agency with the goal of full agency integration-- no siloes!”

Sam Glyn Davies, senior creative technologist, eight&four: “In our day-to-day, we’re constantly bombarded with AI products claiming to solve every problem. But, luckily our demise is no sooner than it was a year or two ago, and this finally gives us some space to breathe, and to play happily with the tools available. No one can deny that new AI and tech platforms can be incredibly useful in niche areas, especially for those spiky use cases that we often find ourselves stuck in, and we encourage our team to share their nuanced take on these new tools, as it’s the curiosity and creativity that drives adoption. Fostering a culture of engagement with a curb on one’s enthusiasm allows us to find actual solutions to actual problems. Which ultimately means we surface the right tools to help restore faith in innovation.”

David Iudica, GM of Research & Insights, My Code: “Critical components to stay in touch with new developments in our ever-evolving field that I have put into practice here at My Code are: fueling curiosity, open communication, critical thinking and collaboration, and fostering a test and learn environment. I encourage my colleagues to stay up to date with the latest developments in the media and market research space by spending their mornings reading up on the latest news and fueling their curiosity. During team meetings, we communicate with each other and share any new methods, techniques or partners we’ve been introduced to to further vet and inform our fellow researchers. Finally, we have built a culture of test and learn and developed learning environments that are facilitated by being part of a smaller and more agile company. Taking this approach develops more solid footing for our team in a persistently disrupted category.”

Sharing knowledge and being brave

Dr Alexandra Dobra-Kiel, innovation & strategy director, Behave: “There’s so much noise around building new tools that we sometimes don’t stop to see whether they are actually innovative. Are we just keeping up a pretence out of fear of not looking on top of it all? The advertising industry is a particular culprit - the market is at saturation and it’s become hard to distinguish between all the latest trends in innovation. Employees are feeling the pressure and are anxious about having to keep up. It's important to create a psychologically safe environment where everyone feels able to speak up, whether it's with their teams or with clients. To do this, managers need to be open to receiving feedback and understanding how things are really going. This means being humble enough to listen and assess whether the changes being made are actually working. It also requires vulnerability to explore any challenges these new ideas might bring and question how they affect the industry. We can’t allow ourselves to fall victim to the idea that we must innovate for the sake of it, and the more psychologically safe employees feel to challenge their clients and agencies, the greater the quality of necessary innovations will become.”

Chris May, COO, Elephant: “There are three areas we focus on at Elephant: to champion our client's innovations, be open to trying new stuff, and to get inspired. As a company that works with Apple it's in our best interest to stay on top of everything they are doing, like purchasing a few Apple Vision Pros to discuss the potential of the device from a strategic and creative perspective. Sending creatives to relevant industry events is a great way to down tools and learn about new ones. For Elephant, attendees must document the experience to share key themes and learnings with the greater team. We can all be creatures of habit when it comes to ways of working and the tools we might use, but with the rise of AI tools in our industry I’ve seen how trying a new tool can lead to positive results.”

Alicia Iveson, CEO & co-founder, Hijinks: “We’re in an industry that celebrates ‘new’, so as a small agency it has always been important for us to embrace change quickly. As one of the newer agency offerings on the block, working out how we use the latest tech to power our daily business has always been a priority. We’ve identified key beats of the creative process whereby certain tools make us all more efficient and productive – for example Google Workspace and Midjourney. Everyone is encouraged to experiment and use them as much as possible. Plus, working with global tech brands means that we are expected to be fully immersed in their business, their products and their competitors. This has really helped our team keep up with the latest trends and tools that are out there. Not a day has gone by since we launched that we haven’t spoken about GenAI, for example.”

Jayme Maultasch, managing director, client growth, innovation & partnerships, DNY: “DNY loves to play with new technology. We tend to pick select teams to beta test new tech and use new business, particularly pitches, as a closed environment to try new things and limit risk. We focus primarily on LinkedIn and X as our discovery engines, and a trusted subset of our team shares emerging best practices and our buzzy technology for exploration. We share recommended technology and new ways of working primarily through sponsored lunch and learns. These are presenter-led but informal, where we will step through technology and how to use it and share a best practice or recent example. It's worth saying that we are HUMAN; sometimes tech fails and fails HARD. We are playing with various AI-driven scribes to capture meeting notes and conversations and simplify reporting…one of those tools FAILED. It began auto-joining all of our meetings and, worse, spamming meeting notes to everyone even invited to the meeting. Even worse, it auto-created accounts for anyone who tried to open those meeting notes. So, just know some of those beta tests FAIL, and we learn from that too!”

Phil Case, president & CCO, Max Connect Digital: “We keep our team ahead of the curve by testing out the latest tech and digital platforms, seeing then implementing what performs best based on actual client data. We’re continually tweaking and adapting our digital products based on consumer trends and privacy laws while creating new technology and solutions that translate between industries. We’ve created a new platform that pulls in data from a dozen disparate platforms to give a full view of the customer journey and measure performance and a brand’s total digital footprint. We stay sharp with regular agency retreats, cross-team training, and by constantly updating our playbooks to ensure our clients get the freshest ideas and strategies. It's part of our core values, to Prove the Impossible! Innovation is in our DNA. If it is possible, we can do it. We will rise to the occasion to solve difficult challenges for our clients.”