Kai Weidie Will Lead DEI for Dentsu Media Americas

Dentsu International has hired Kai Weidie as its first svp of diversity, equity and inclusion for media operations in the Americas. Weidie will lead diversity initiatives across Dentsu's media agencies, including Carat, iProspect, Dentsu X, 360i and Amplifi, with an emphasis on increasing diversity in the holding company's talent pool and introducing more support for minority new hires. She will also collaborate with agency teams to create more inclusive client campaigns. Weidie joins Dentsu from Bloomberg, where she was diversity and client partner. She previously served as McCann New York's director of diversity and engagement, and as the director of Mosaic Center and education services for the American Advertising Federation. Weidie will report to Doug Rozen, CEO for Dentsu Media Americas, and Christena Pyle, chief equity officer for Dentsu Americas. DEI Efforts Must Account for Neurodiversity “Championing meaningful progress with and for our people, our clients and the industry is at the core of everything we do," Rozen said. "As we continue our pursuit to make real change in media, Kai’s experience challenging the status quo and tackling inclusion issues head-on in advertising will lead us into an equitable future like never before." In the aftermath of George Floyd's murder by Minneapolis police in 2020, the advertising industry responded with a number of initiatives aimed at making the advertising industry more equitable, including pledges like the "In for 13" initiative to increase the percentage of Black leaders in agencies to 13%. As of Juneteenth 2021, however, more than half of the agencies who signed the commitment had pulled out. Expanding DEI initiatives Weidie told Adweek she accepted the role at Dentsu because the company is taking a new directive to diversity and inclusion initiatives. "It was really important to me that I work with an organization that’s nimble and really ready to take a fresh approach," she said. In April, Dentsu hired Kai Deveraux Lawson to lead diversity initiatives for Dentsu Creative, which includes 360i, Dentsu McGarryBowen, Firstborn and Isobar. Dentsu Americas also released its first diversity, equity and inclusion report, which described the company's diversity initiatives and provided transparency into the agency's talent demographics. As of May 2021, the company saw small gains in ethnic and racial representation. U.S. multicultural or BIPOC representation in the company was 27% in May, a slight uptick from the previous June. By 2025, Dentsu Americas aspires to reach 30% multicultural representation, with 25% of those staffers being in executive roles. Employees who identify as African American or Black make up 6.7% of Dentsu's U.S. workforce, up from 5.3% in May 2020. “Over the last few years there has been a reckoning of a higher standard, and it’s that very expectation that challenges us each day to think differently and push for more change," Weidie said. "Dentsu continues to raise the bar for inclusion not only within the organization, but in the industry. I’m excited to be a part of an organization that is truly committed to making change." Creating equitable media campaigns In May, Dentsu launched its economic empowerment offering with the aim of making its media buying business more equitable. The program, led by svp of economic empowerment Mark Prince, supports minority-owned media companies by establishing benchmarks for clients to reach diverse audiences in advertising campaigns. Weidie will collaborate with Prince on economic empowerment initiatives to distribute media dollars more equitably. "When we are ensuring that we are engaging underrepresented media owners really equitably, it helps drive the big media picture as it relates to DEI. And that’s the importance of mindful representation of historically excluded communities being really paramount, because it drives perception and plays a major role in the day-to-day lives of individuals," Weidie said. This year Dentsu also shortened payment terms for its minority-owned media partners in the U.S., meaning that within a 30-day window the company will clear these partners to receive payment. This change, which went into effect in October, is Dentsu's effort to mitigate the financial strain the industry's standard 60- to 120-day payment terms puts on minority-owned media partners. "What we want to do is really drive how underrepresented media owners have access like all other media owners, and that’s the core of economic empowerment and how we can work with all types of media owners, big, small, established, and emerging, to ensure that minority and diversified representation exists in media plans," Rozen told Adweek. This year Dentsu also launched a DEI digital partner framework called PRISM that ensures targeted audiences reflect the U.S. population, implemented a DEI RFI process for its clients, and premiered "More Than That with Gia Peppers," an audio series for Black audiences underrepresented businesses produce and distribute. “In a longer timeline picture," Weidie said, "that’s how we get more of these organizations to be big players, and be large, successful, minority-led organizations as opposed to being newer in the business or not quite having the manpower, the portfolio, that they want to have in the future." 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