Today Havas Worldwide announced the biggest in a series of shifts within its New York office — and we now know who will replace CCO Darren Moran, who left in September.
Moving forward, the agency will have two creative leads: ECDs Israel Garber and Jason Musante have been promoted to the shared roles of Managing Director/Group ECD.
Garber is a Havas veteran; after beginning his career with FCB New York and MVBMBS, he joined EuroRSCG in 1996 and moved up to the GCD position before officially becoming a Havas Worlwide New York ECD in 2007. Garber most recently served as ECD on the Keurig/Green Mountain and Liberty Mutual accounts and helped lead new business efforts.
Musante, who spoke to us in 2011 upon joining Co: Collective as its content lead, jumped to Havas in 2014 after two years leading the Google account at Anomaly. Previous positions include six years in McKinney’s creative department, two years working under Gerry Graf at Saatchi New York, and one year working on GE as a digital chief creative at BBDO.
On the business side, Havas promoted three to the managing partner position: Tim Maleeny, Sean Lyons, and Matt Weiss. The trio will retain their previous titles (SCO New York, global CDO, and global CMO, respectively), while managing the Liberty Mutual Insurance, Keurig Green Mountain, TD Ameritrade, IBM, Hershey’s, and Dos Equis accounts.
The first two came to Havas amid an early-2013 restructuring: Maleeny joined the agency after spending nearly four years as senior partner/head of account planning at Ogilvy, and Lyons (an eight-year veteran of the R/GA organization) was hired around the same time. Weiss has been with Havas a bit longer than his two fellow partners; his role as global CMO officially began on February 1st, 2013. Prior to that gig, Weiss was chief of staff at KBS+ for nearly three years after an extended period with McCann that saw him manage the MasterCard and Coca-Cola North America accounts; he also spent seven years as McCann Worldgroup’s chief growth officer.
These promotions (which come with requisite pay bumps) follow the hiring of a new strategy/innovation leader at Havas Media and a round of mid-January layoffs that saw more than a dozen employees leave the agency.