WPP has promoted Marie-Claire Barker to global chief people officer, replacing Lindsay Pattison who stepped down after 16 years with the ad holding company last year. Barker (left) is currently occupies the same role at WPP media operation GroupM, currently in the throes of a massive restructuring which is leading to layoffs in the UK, US and around the world.
Layoffs began in the US last week and have started in the UK this although WPP/GroupM has so far declined to say how many people are affected. Globally GroupM employs around 36,000. In the UK group redundancies require a statutory consultation period ranging from 30 to 45 days.
Barker (left), who is based in New York, is an HR lifer who has spent 15 years in various WPP roles. Pattison was a former CEO of media agency Maxus, now part of Wavemaker after an early WPP reorganisation. EssenceMediacom, Mindshare, Wavemaker and performance marketing agency Nexus are being rolled into a new entity, WPP Media, under returning GroupM CEO Brian Lesser.
Pattison will be thanking her lucky stars she left when she did, leaving the promoted Barker to face some pretty heavy mood music.
An “HR lifer” at WPP sways and sashays to the heavy mood music. Girl’s got this.