Leo Burnett’s Britt Nolan Looks to Build Existing Relationships Through Creativity as President

Britt Nolan returned to Leo Burnett last July to build momentum for the storied Chicago agency. The creative mind behind Allstate’s “Mayhem” spent two years at DDB as its North America chief creative officer but returned to Leo Burnett, a place where he built and solidified his creative reputation, as both president and CCO of the Chicago office. His boomerang Burnett status sees Nolan wanting to build on the shop’s creative reputation with long-standing clients while fashioning a fresh creative base with new clients. In the newly created dual role for the agency, Nolan is charged not only with partnering with Leo’s CEO Andrew Swinand to revamp the agencies creative approach and overseeing a creative agency, but also managing operations for the agency’s Chicago office. Energizing a creative powerhouse Leo Burnett built itself into a creative powerhouse since its founding in 1935 in Chicago, and Nolan has assembled his career on great creative. His major projects during his previous 10-year stint with Leo Burnett included "Van Gogh BnB," Samsung’s "Ostrich" spot and the introduction of Mayhem, the Allstate spokesperson he co-created with partner Mikal Pittman. Nolan told Adweek he hopes to build on the agency’s past successes while garnering new respect moving forward. “If you want to have a truly great creative agency, it doesn't come just by building a great creative department. The whole agency has to be aligned behind the ambition and the work,” Nolan told Adweek. “We are a creative company. A big part of the reason that I came back was for the opportunity to not just lead the department and not just do some great work, but lead the agency and truly build a great creative company.” Adding strategy to the creative fold On taking his new president role, Nolan said that bringing a knowledge of strategy was key, because strategy and creative are inextricably linked. Learning how to implement strategy came from a valued co-worker. “One of the most important things that ever happened to me in my career was deciding to share a desk with Emma Montgomery, who was our CSO the last time I was at Leo, and is now CEO of Leo Burnett Australia,” Nolan said, adding that sharing ideas on both strategy and creative helped them both and ultimately helped push the client’s business forward. Nolan was prompted to return to Leo Burnett because the agency is over its previous growing pains. “Comparing it to the last time that I was here, we were building a lot, we were kind of shaping our point of view, creatively and strategically. We were breaking things and building new things and we were really hustling. And that's a really different job,” he stated. Now, he said that he and his team are able to make strategic choices without the business of reinvention because Leo Burnett Chicago doesn’t need to be rebuilt; it’s now about focusing on the work. Another reason Nolan came back was because parent company Publicis has strengthened its infrastructure, meaning that Leo Burnett now has access to all the integrated capabilities and systems in the Groupe like Epsilon, the company's first-party data treasure chest. “Once you have all those capabilities, which I think now are table stakes, you realize that nothing replaces creativity as the differentiator…I feel very fortunate to be coming into a context that's got a lot of that stuff figured out,” said Nolan. Another focus moving forward is to be creatively proactive with clients. That means not just answering client assignments but also helping clients realize how to use creativity to grow their business. “It’s on us to know their business and to know what's going on in the world so well that we're always bringing them ideas. So we're literally charging every team with having an agenda for proactive thinking and making it a part of the way we do business—we're always going to keep our brain switched on,” said Nolan. Good clients are key to success Leo Burnett lost one of its longest running clients in 2020 when Allstate left after 60 years with the agency, choosing Droga5 to lead its creative account. That, however, drives Nolan to find another insurance company that the agency can help elevate through great creative. “I would really love something in the insurance space. Personally, I have a lot of heart for the category. But I just think it continues to be a category where there are brands who are doing a lot of good work, and it's work that everybody sees,” said Nolan. Regardless, Leo Burnett still has plenty of big clients for its teams to work with, especially on the consumer side. Nolan is excited to work with the Kellogg’s brand, which has a long history with the agency and is a brand he said has “big creative ambition.” He also counts Bank of America and Campbell’s as other brand relationships he wants to continue to nurture, along with Wingstop. “Wingstop has been on an upward trajectory since they started…super passionate fan base, and they're scrappy marketers. They're entrepreneurs, they want to move fast, they want to do interesting things, and they've got big ambitions,” Nolan stated. Leo Burnett was a part of the recent Dunkin’ pitch, which ultimately went to Anomaly, but Nolan was proud of the work that the team put in and is optimistic that the agency will land more creative new business in the future. “I subscribe to the belief of you can't predict you can only prepare. The plan [moving forward] is to build the most foundationally, strong and most adaptable agency that we can, for whatever direction we need to go. Part of what I love about this place is I think our foundations are really strong. Our foundational point of view—our job is to create value for human beings—that’s just really strong,” Nolan concluded. Leo Burnett’s Global CCO on How Creativity Connected People Through the Pandemic