In 2021, 73% of Agency Leaders Were White. In 2022, It Was 90%.

According to the 2023 Diversity in Agencies Survey Report, 73% of agency CEOs, owners and C-suite employees identified as white in 2021. In 2022, that number jumped sharply to 90%. Black representation among agency leaders fell from 5% to 0.75%, while leaders who identified as Asian or Hispanic dropped from 12% to 1.5% and 10% to 5.3%, respectively.

The report also found that Black industry representation as a whole still lags well behind U.S. Census population data of 13.6%. About 6.4% of the industry identified as Black in 2021, with a small uptick to 6.9% in 2022.

“Without intentional DEIB efforts, agencies will continue to see a slowdown in progress, or even a regression to the numbers we saw in 2020,” said Tahlisha Williams, evp of talent, equity and learning solutions at the 4A’s. “It is disappointing to see that the industry still does not truly understand why DEIB is vital.”

At Cannes, 4A’s and CEO Marla Kaplowitz hosted an executive roundtable where industry leaders discussed a number of topics, beginning with what agencies are doing to advance DEIB internally.

A three-legged stool

At FCB, the agency views DEIB as a three-legged stool: the workforce, the workplace and the work. If one of the legs is out of balance, the stool is off.

“The third piece of the work is where we’re seeing it impact the way that people are operating within the company beyond just thinking of it as workforce and workplace,” said Vita Harris, global chief strategy officer at FCB.

The agency doesn’t use words like sexist, homophobic or racist—it goes a layer deeper when talking about issues to get to the root of the problem, Harris said. FCB’s DEIB strategy is formalized in what it calls the Inclusive Manager’s Toolkit, which allows employees to check the guide to handle a situation they don’t know how to deal with or aren’t comfortable talking to someone else about. FCB makes the guide available to any agency or company, not just FCB employees.

Amber Guild, CEO of McCann New York, said organizations need to change the behaviors and practices to allow people to do their best work. That starts with leadership, Guild argued, adding that agencies need to invest in leadership just as any other craft and not treat it as simply managing people. Companies must “help people to lead with conscious inclusion—that changes the environment for everyone.”

At Wunderman Thompson, North America CEO Audrey Melofchik said the WPP agency has been focused on building out its BRGs (business resource groups) for different groups of employees. “We’ve made a shift that has made a big difference, which is now they’re leading the work,” Melofchik said.

Opening a pipeline

According to the 4A’s survey, the industry made some strides in the overall diversity of the workforce as different groups saw small gains in representation. Most notably, people who identify as Hispanic or Latinx increased from 9% to 12% of agency employees.

Agencies that have put DEIB at the center of their companies have benefited from a strong stream of diverse talent. TDW+Co is a shop founded by Tim Wang, who said his agency is made up of 95% minorities, more than half of them women including the CEO.

“In this time of reckoning, where people are looking for purpose and looking for a place where they find meaning and want to work for a cause that’s something they can identify with, we’ve actually been having talent come from all over who want to come to TDW+Co just because of the safe space,” Wang said.

Many agencies have begun dropping degree requirements to find people with different backgrounds and skill sets. Walrus CEO and co-founder Frances Webster is a believer in “tearing down the paper ceiling” in job descriptions because “it limits us.”

During the pandemic, Havas created open houses that allowed anyone to take training modules and gain invaluable experience understanding how agencies function. Once in-person internships returned, Havas ensured 50% of all fellows and interns came from underserved communities.

“Those roles will go into the rest of the industry because there simply aren’t enough immediate jobs out of those programs,” said Stephanie Nerlich, CEO North America and global chief client officer at Havas.

Maintaining a pipeline isn’t just for agencies—it can be for other small businesses. Dentsu hosts women- and minority-owned small businesses to learn from Dentsu experts, including its risk management and legal teams.

“These are small businesses that often had no access to those kinds of tools and that expertise. We gave them access to ours,” said Abbey Klaassen, president of Dentsu Creative. “They can help advance their own organizations, their own businesses, and hopefully it lifts up the entire ecosystem.”

Creating a healthy environment

Agencies are struggling with retention: 64% of Black employees have spent two years or less at their current agency. For Asian Americans, it’s 62%, and for Hispanic/Latinx employees, it’s 58%. That’s in contrast to white employees, where only 46% are in their first two years at an agency. Even though agencies are increasing their number of BIPOC staff, they aren’t succeeding at retaining them.

Agencies like Minneapolis-based Colle McVoy looked outside of the city during the pandemic to find new talent. As a result of the working world going virtual and hybrid, president Jessica Henrichs said the agency completely revamped its onboarding process to ensure new employees could get up to speed within the first 90 days. The agency also provided new training for managers on how to lead remote teams.

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For Transmission, an independent, minority-owned b-to-b agency, attracting talent of any type has always been a struggle. As president Ricky Abbott put it, “it’s not always the sexy part of the industry.” He said the shop has had to grow senior leaders from different backgrounds from “the ground up.”

Ultimately, DEIB needs to come through in the work to create real lasting change in the workplace.

“Bringing the work into the formula does take it away from the periphery and bring it to the center of what you do every day,” FCB’s Vita Harris said, adding that identifying bias in the work allows employees to better deal with situations in the workplace.