TBWA\Chiat\Day L.A. expanded its executive leadership team with a series of promotions.
Executive creative director Brent Anderson was promoted to chief creative officer, tasked with day-to-day operations of that department. Group planning director Neil Barrie was promoted to CSO, responsible for handling strategic direction across all agency accounts. CCO Stephen Butler takes on the newly-created role of creative chairman, and now he’s behind “driving agency vision, creative culture and development.”
Anderson, Barrie and Butler round out an executive leadership team that also includes recently-appointed president Erin Riley, global CSO Nick Barham and chief production officer Tanya LeSieur.
Anderson first joined TBWA\Chiat\Day L.A. in August of 2005 as a senior art director following three years in that role with JohnsonSheen. He then moved up within the organization, becoming executive creative director in November of 2013 after working on Nissan, Gatorade, Playstation, Airbnb, adidas and more.
“Brent is an incredible talent and has been an integral part of our progress in his time at the agency, and especially in recent years,” Butler said in a statement. “He is also a natural, effective leader, and the ideal and obvious choice to help guide the evolution of our creative product and the next wave of our agency.”
Barrie joined the agency as a planning director in September of 2012 after serving at partner and strategy director BBH London’s ZAG. He eventually handled accounts including Pepsi, Johnson & Johnson, Netflix, Disney and The Grammy Awards.
“Having worked alongside Neil for the last few years, I’m supremely confident in his ability to lead and continue to evolve our strategy department, and to further our commitment to developing disruptive strategies that fuel creativity and drive brand growth,” said Barham.
Butler was promoted to CCO in April of 2014 after serving as a creative partner at Mother London. In the past, he also worked as a creative director at BBH London handling the Levi’s account.
“As an agency of our size and scope, we needed to expand the depth of our executive team to better incorporate both vision-focused and product-focused leaders at the top. We’ve elevated Brent and Neil, who are equally distinguished for their mastery of craft as for their passion for our business and our agency, to ensure that the executive team remains as connected to the product as possible,” Barham added.