WPP’s new boss Cindy Rose seems to have made a pretty good impression, even though she doesn’t officially take over until September 1 (interesting that she doesn’t seem to have been lumbered with gardening leave by Microsoft.)
In a welcome video leaked to Adweek (which seems to have at least one pretty goood source in WPP) she says she is “super-excited” (as they often are over there) to take over at WPP although there’s lots of hard work to come (and hard decisions about jobs of course, which she says she won’t “sugar-coat.”)
7,000 or so have already gone at WPP with, presumably, more to follow as the company tries to match its headcount (hitherto comfortably the biggest of the ad holding companies) to declining revenue and under-pressure profit. Predecessor Mark Read has already done the heavy lifting to the extent that employees and the world outside are expecting the worst. Now all Rose has to do, and it’s a big ask, is decide who’s staying and who’s going. Some clients will inevitably be unsettled by departures of people they trust.
It’s not all in her hands of course. There may be one or more bidders in the wings who could emerge if she seems to be getting a grip on things. She needs to do something big: maybe forming the oft-mooted WPP Creative while finding a way of keeping some legacy brands, a sleight of hand arch-rival Publicis has seemingly managed. She could even surprise the world by bringing back some of the ones Read has merged: A second coming of JWT or even Wunderman might win some positive headlines. At the same time you do wonder quite what Grey, now reporting to Ogilvy, is still doing there.
So WPP is going to need more than transatlantic charm and the right noises to get back on track. But, in what, mercifully, is still mostly a people business, both will help.
