The one with Cannes Lions CEO Simon Cook on what was said at the Festival’s inaugural Global CEO Forum about why creativity is an organizational imperative, the high cost of “not now”, and why “creativity” may have a brand problem.

Summary

Podcast Summary: The CEO’s Guide to Marketing – Episode with Simon Cook

Title: The CEO’s Guide to Marketing
Host: Seth Matlins, Managing Director of the Forbes CMO Network
Guest: Simon Cook, CEO of Cannes Lions
Release Date: July 23, 2025

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Introduction

In this insightful episode of The CEO’s Guide to Marketing, host Seth Matlins engages in a deep conversation with Simon Cook, the CEO of Cannes Lions. The discussion centers around the inaugural Global CEO Forum held at the Cannes Lions Festival, delving into the critical role of creativity as an organizational imperative, the high cost of delaying creative initiatives (“not now”), and the potential branding challenges associated with the term “creativity.”

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Overview of the Global CEO Forum

The Global CEO Forum, hosted under Chatham House rules, gathered approximately 50 CEOs from diverse industries including airlines, media, entertainment, technology, consumer packaged goods (CPG), beauty, retail, fashion, and quick-service restaurants (QSR). The primary focus was to explore creativity not merely within the marketing department but as a strategic lever for overall business growth and value creation.

Key Objectives:

• Define creativity within the organizational context.
• Identify who holds responsibility for fostering creativity.
• Discuss strategies to organize and empower companies to enhance creativity.

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Key Discussion Points

1. Creativity as a Strategic Business Imperative

Simon Cook emphasized that creativity should transcend the marketing silo, positioning it as a fundamental driver for organizational growth. He articulated that CEOs are increasingly recognizing creativity as essential for maintaining a competitive edge and driving shareholder value.

Simon Cook [04:03]: “We talked about the immense pressure CEOs are under to deliver incremental growth every year... exploring how to leverage creativity.”

2. The Cost of “Not Now”

A central theme of the discussion was the urgent need to prioritize creativity. Simon Cook highlighted the concept of “the cost of not now,” urging leaders to consider the potential losses in growth and competitive advantage by delaying creative initiatives.

Seth [07:34]: “What is the cost of not now? Is... a question we should all be asking ourselves...”

3. Branding Challenges of “Creativity”

The term “creativity” was scrutinized for its potential branding issues. It was suggested that “creativity” might be perceived narrowly, often associated with superficial aspects like “pretty picture ads,” rather than being understood as a comprehensive strategic input.

Seth [12:20]: “Does in fact the word creativity have a branding problem?... creativity and you think... pretty picture ads.”

4. Organizational Design to Foster Creativity

Both Seth and Simon discussed the importance of embedding creativity into the organizational infrastructure. This involves creating systems, incentives, and a culture that encourages creative thinking across all departments, not just within the marketing team.

Simon Cook [09:11]: “We were really talking about creativity as infrastructure... so that it isn't siloed or just sits at the door of the CMO.”

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Data and Insights Shared

1. Impact of Creative Marketing on Performance

An independent study presented at the forum revealed that companies with world-class creative marketing outperform the stock market by 8% annually. This compelling data underscores the tangible financial benefits of prioritizing creativity.

Simon Cook [04:53]: “World class creative marketing outperforms the stock market by 8% every year.”

2. CEO and CMO Alignment Issues

A McKinsey report highlighted a 20 percentage point decrease in CEOs who are clear about the role of marketing in their companies over the past 12 months. Additionally, 80% of CEOs and nearly 80% of CMOs believe more investment in marketing is necessary, despite a significant disconnect in understanding its strategic role.

Seth [18:25]: “There was a 20 percentage point decrease in the percentage of chief executives who said, ‘I’m clear on the role that marketing plays in my company.’”

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Notable Quotes with Timestamps

1. On Creativity as an Organizational Imperative:

   Simon Cook [00:19]: “Creativity as an organizational imperative... an essential, but often... overlooked and underutilized lever of growth and value creation.”

2. On the Role of CEOs in Fostering Creativity:

   Simon Cook [07:02]: “They could become... the architects of commercial creativity within the organization.”

3. On the Urgency of Prioritizing Creativity:

   Seth [08:38]: “... ask ourselves about all kinds of things, all the fucking time.”

4. On Creativity vs. Innovation:

   Simon Cook [11:12]: “Maybe it would be better to reframe creativity as innovation because... innovation speaks the language of CEOs and the shareholders.”

5. On Middle Management’s Role in Creativity:

   Simon Cook [25:35]: “The lack of movement is even taking a step backwards, according to the data.”

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Surprises and Observations

1. Lack of Cynicism Among CEOs

Simon Cook expressed surprise at the lack of cynicism within the room. Despite the high-stakes environment, the CEOs remained optimistic and genuinely engaged in finding ways to integrate creativity into their business strategies.

Simon Cook [22:48]: “It was encouraging to see people showing up and really engaging with something that we truly believe in, that we think creativity is essential.”

2. Disconnect Between Intent and Action

While CEOs demonstrated a strong will to prioritize creativity, there was a noticeable gap in translating this intent into actionable strategies. Data indicated that despite recognizing creativity’s importance, many organizations were not making substantial progress in this area.

Simon Cook [23:47]: “I was surprised at the lack of movement there.”

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Organizational Challenges and Solutions

1. Broad Responsibility for Creativity

A significant number of CEOs at the forum acknowledged that creativity is not solely a marketing responsibility but an organizational one. However, there remains confusion about who exactly holds this responsibility, leading to fragmented efforts.

Seth [06:45]: “... really understood that creativity was the responsibility of the entirety of the organization as opposed to just marketing’s job.”

2. Decentralization and Empowerment

The discussion highlighted the importance of decentralizing decision-making to empower middle management and frontline employees. This approach ensures that creative ideas can emerge organically and be nurtured effectively.

Seth [27:37]: “Decentralization as an organizational philosophy... pushing decisions down to those closest to the customer.”

3. Accountability and Infrastructure

Creating a culture of creativity requires clear accountability and robust infrastructure. Organizations must provide the necessary tools and create an environment where experimentation is encouraged and failures are seen as learning opportunities.

Simon Cook [25:16]: “If something has been pushed to the middle to be figured out... the whole thing falls down anyway.”

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Case Studies and Examples

1. Apple’s Creative Infrastructure

Apple was highlighted as a prime example of an organization that successfully integrates creativity into its core operations. Under the leadership of Tim Cook and influenced by Steve Jobs, Apple ensures that its creative teams are protected, nurtured, and empowered to innovate continuously.

Seth [10:22]: “Creatives only report to creatives... protected and nurtured from the top throughout the enterprise.”

2. Other Participating Companies

The forum included diverse companies such as Adobe, British Airways, New York Times, Twitch, Saudi Tourism, and challenger brands like Who Gives A Crap, each bringing unique perspectives on fostering creativity within their respective industries.

Simon Cook [15:30]: “Depending on the nature of the organization... some of the experiences that were shared, they were transferable.”

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Impact of Organizational Design on Creativity

The conversation underscored the critical role of organizational design in either facilitating or stifling creativity. Structures that promote cross-departmental collaboration, provide psychological safety, and encourage risk-taking are essential for sustaining a creative culture.

Seth [27:11]: “Middle management is where creativity, like so many other organizational imperatives, either lives or dies.”

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Future Directions

As the first edition of the Global CEO Forum concludes, Simon Cook expressed optimism about future forums. The aim is to continue providing CEOs with the tools, data, and collaborative spaces necessary to prioritize and implement creative strategies effectively.

Simon Cook [34:05]: “We continue to create these spaces and these forums where we can dig into this stuff a bit deeper so that the CEOs... have the tools, the data, the ammunition that they need to be able to act upon this.”

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Conclusion

This episode of The CEO’s Guide to Marketing offers a comprehensive exploration of the pivotal role creativity plays in modern businesses. Through the lens of the Global CEO Forum, Simon Cook and Seth Matlins shed light on the urgent need for organizations to prioritize creativity, the challenges in doing so, and the tangible benefits that such an emphasis can yield. The discussion underscores that creativity is not merely an aesthetic or marketing concern but a strategic imperative essential for sustainable growth and competitive advantage.

Final Thought:

Seth [35:54]: “... ask ourselves what the cost of not now is.”

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Listener Takeaway:
For CEOs and marketing leaders alike, integrating creativity into the core organizational strategy is essential. This episode serves as a crucial reminder to evaluate and prioritize creative initiatives to drive growth, enhance customer satisfaction, and maintain a competitive edge in an ever-evolving market landscape.

Transcript

[Simon Cook]

Foreign.

[Seth]

Hey everybody, and welcome back to the show. Today's. Today's show is a little bit different, but of course, absolutely related. Today I am sitting with Simon Cook, CEO of the Cannes Lions. Hello, Simon.

[Simon Cook]

Hello there.

[Seth]

Thanks for being with me.

[Simon Cook]

Thanks for having me.

[Seth]

So what Simon and I are going to talk about today is the Lions inaugural Global CEO Forum, which was held as of this recording about a month ago at the Cannes Lions. And Simon. Simon and the team were gracious enough to have invited me to help facilitate and moderate the conversation that took place that afternoon. So I want to kind of set it up for our listeners and our viewers so that you understand what happened. What happened was under the Chatham house rule, some 50 CEOs from around the world, from a portfolio of categories, industries from airline, media, entertainment, technology, cpg, beauty, retail, fashion, qsr. Companies enormous and smaller still came together to talk about creativity. But to talk about creativity not just in the context of marketing, but as a strategic business imperative and an essential, but often as came out more than once overlooked and underutilized lever of growth and value creation. The conversation went in a handful of areas and Simon and I are going to touch on what we heard, what surprised us, and what we think is next. But broadly, it was a conversation about what creativity is, who's responsible for it within an organization, and how to ensure that an organization is better organized to ensure that creativity is facilitated, not stifled. But with that, Simon, and thanks again for being here. Tell us why you started this. Why was there an inaugural CEO forum?

[Simon Cook]

Well, thanks for having me, Seth. Also, thanks for being there on the day and facilitating things so graciously.

[Seth]

It was not the easiest room I've ever worked.

[Simon Cook]

You did a gallant job, that's for sure. Yeah, it's a really interesting one. So if we go back a few years, we started to notice that more and more CEOs were coming to the festival than ever before. And when we spoke to them and asked them, why are you here? We were obviously used to the CMO being in town. Really interesting shift to see lots of CEOs showing up. And what they told us is that they were interested in understanding how they could leverage creativity as a growth driver. So a natural extension of that, why not pull them together? Why not host, as you said, the inaugural Global CEO Forum to explore it in more detail.

[Seth]

As you look back on that kind of overarching question, how do we better leverage creativity as a growth driver? Do you think that they were saying, okay, it has been siloed within marketing and therefore we want to kind of understand it from a marketing context and thus push it out from there more horizontally across the enterprise. What do you think was behind, really behind their inclination, which is to better understand it?

[Simon Cook]

I think the role of it within marketing is one aspect, but also the role of creativity as a, a new frontier for growth. Because let's face it, and we spoke about this on the day, we talked about the immense pressure CEOs are under that we're all under to deliver incremental growth every year. Pressure to deliver growth for shareholders especially. And what we discussed on the day was the fact that some of these old levers for growth have been somewhat exhausted, depending on the profile of your company and where you're at.

[Seth]

And what are you thinking of there?

[Simon Cook]

Well, it's transformation M and A scale efficiency. All the classics, right?

[Seth]

Yeah.

[Simon Cook]

So interesting to get together and you know, it was, it was great to see that people were really engaged with this conversation because they also wanted to explore how to leverage creativity. And interestingly, One of the CEOs told me that during their latest investor meeting that came up for the first time. So he was asked, what is your strategy around creativity? Which had not come up previously. So it's obviously a shift that we're seeing. But we also discovered on the day that world class creative marketing outperforms the stock market by 8% every year. And it was also about giving some.

[Seth]

Of these series, sorry, unpack that data point, because it's really interesting. So companies with world class creative marketing are outperforming their peers by 8% year over year as a stock increase.

[Simon Cook]

Exactly that.

[Seth]

But who sourced that?

[Simon Cook]

So that was by an independent study done by one of our contributors. But I think the point we were trying to make, because we've heard these stats over the last decade or even longer, this is fresh information, fresh data points and new ammunition if you like to do something about it. One of the things we explored in the room was this idea that I think all of the CEOs there were there because they truly believed that creativity could be leveraged. But of course, CEOs and businesses have lots of competing priorities.

[Seth]

Yes.

[Simon Cook]

So creativity marketing more broadly sometimes as we know, slips down that priority list.

[Seth]

Do you think that that goes back? And I think it was the first question that we, we asked them and we asked in fact some of them in adv, getting together a handful of questions which was, you know, how do they define creativity? Who's responsible for it? How does it express itself? One of the things I was struck by was that I would say. And it really was a really. It was a difficult room in some respects, but it was a very attentive, present and engaged room still, with only a handful of exceptions. So in a universe of 50, 90%, I'd say, really understood that creativity was the responsibility of the entirety of the organization as opposed to just marketing's job. And they looked at it as that kind of broad imperative. Were you surprised by that? I was.

[Simon Cook]

I was really surprised by it. I was even more surprised that it was seemingly not apparent to some of the CEOs that they could also play a role in this and they could become, as I think we said on the day, the architects of commercial creativity within the organization.

[Seth]

Yeah, that was your language, I think, and I quite love it. Because if it doesn't, creativity is either facilitated or stifled by organizational design, organizational incentives, the permission to fuck up. Because as one of the CEOs in the room said towards the end of the afternoon, most ideas are bad ideas. That's just the nature of ideas. Yeah, right. If you don't have the permission to have bad ideas, you're not going to have many good ideas.

[Simon Cook]

Yeah. And that led on to a conversation around urgency as well. Everyone was in that room because they signed up to the premise, understood why they had to be there. But the provocation right from the outset was around, you know, you need to go on this journey. Yeah, but what is the cost of not now? There are lots of competing priorities, but what is the cost? What is the growth that you're leaving on the table by not addressing it today?

[Seth]

Yeah. You actually ended your remarks with that phrase, what is the cost of not now? And it really hit me quite hard. I didn't know your remarks going in. Not sure I knew my own.

[Simon Cook]

You'd never know.

[Seth]

I couldn't see the scenes which our frequent listeners and watchers know. But. But that what is the cost of not now? Is. Is, I think, a question we should all be asking ourselves about all kinds of things, all the fucking time.

[Simon Cook]

Yeah.

[Seth]

And your point about that urgency that was implicit in their attendance. Right. Because it wasn't just curiosity, it was urgency. Does that take us back to what you were saying before about kind of the traditional levers of growth? There's certainly more efficacious in some instances than others, but just kind of a almost desperate search for what is next and what, in this very, very difficult and ever evolving climate, will be the unfair competitive advantage?

[Simon Cook]

Yeah, I think it's partly that. I think it's also, to your other point, the Reframing of creativity. There's creativity, there's creative marketing. A lot of people are really talking about output there. They're thinking about campaigns, they're thinking about pumping more advertising into the world. That's not what this is about. What we were really talking about was creativity as infrastructure. Really thinking about how you can embed creativity and innovation, by the way across the entire organization so that it isn't siloed or just sits at the door of the CMO or the creative department.

[Seth]

You just brought up two things that I think are worth. Worth talking about for a second One, I think your point. I'm not sure I was as clear on this as you just made it, which is creativity isn't an output, it's an input.

[Simon Cook]

Yeah.

[Seth]

And actually we did have a speaker who may not have been Chatham who talked and we're outing you Tor and you can get your permission to just to be sure and we'll edit if. If not. But, but Tor Myron from Apple.

[Simon Cook]

Sure.

[Seth]

Who was Apple being your creative marketer of the year. Right?

[Simon Cook]

Yeah, yeah.

[Seth]

In a conversation with me, opened open the forum and one of the things that we talked about was, you know, Apple today is, is well known for being, well, Apple actually and everything that surrounds that for being a, a consistently creative enterprise from product to marketing and everything in between. One of the things Tor talked about was, was how that was facilitated from an organizational perspective. How that was protected, nurtured, prioritized. Did you have any takeaways from that?

[Simon Cook]

I think it was interesting to see the takeaways and the reactions to the conversation that you were having.

[Seth]

Yeah.

[Simon Cook]

Because I think someone very adeptly observed and this is sort of cheating the system a bit, but they mentioned that for some organizations maybe it would be better to reframe creativity as innovation because when you do that, suddenly you're talking to organic growth and your organic growth strategy. Innovation speaks the language of CEOs and the shareholders.

[Seth]

One of the things we talked about to your point, and that was going to be the second thing I got to which is, does in fact the word creativity have a branding problem? Because there were CEOs who exactly to what you just said. You know, you use the word innovation, you use the word disruption, maybe even imagination, you know, get Triton cliche thinking outside the box, embrace it and understand it differently. And it's. It's. One of the things that we talk a lot about on this show is, is the danger of synonyms in business, which is I say creativity and I mean innovation. You, you Hear me saying creativity and you think, you know, jazz hands and pretty picture ads.

[Simon Cook]

Exactly.

[Seth]

One of the things that I was struck by that Tor said, which was inside Apple Creatives only report to creatives, which is to say those who understand create their own kind of language and ecosystem and self perpetuating culture of creativity. That because Tor of course reports to Tim, is protected to our earlier conversation and nurtured and facilitated from the top throughout the enterprise, which of course, you know, began before Tim with Steve, but continues to this day.

[Simon Cook]

Yeah, I think he called it a daily masterclass, which is with Steve. Yeah, yeah. But as you said, it's something that is fiercely protected. And I think we, as the conversation opened up, got to see the full spectrum of that within the room, where those people who it was clear, felt they had more to do in that area and those who were very proud of where they've got to when it comes to protecting the infrastructure that enables the kind of creative we're talking about.

[Seth]

I mean, it's a very hard thing to do.

[Simon Cook]

Absolutely.

[Seth]

Right. While it's very easy to conceptualize that one must do it and even to have kind of systems in place that if you do not live it, you know, what's that old line? A reputation is built over a lifetime, but torn down in an instant. So too a creative culture. Right. Like the moment people feel like, oh no, I'm actually. And let me see if I can find in my notes, there was a great quote from one of the CEOs about this. I really thought I'd captured this. My notes are incomplete. I have failed you yet again. But it was a great quote which is just about the cost of not taking that risk. The cost and going back to not now. The cost of not now. Right. And that reframing not just as a lever of growth, but not just as additive and accretive. Right. But is dilutive in its absence and arguably destructive, at least to value creation in its absence.

[Simon Cook]

In the questionnaire that we put out before, as you said, we put questions to the participants to get a sense of what was going to be important. So many of them came back saying they were excited to learn from Apple, at the same time wanted there to be an acknowledgment that there were a complete range of companies within that room. I guess the argument is, in a company like Apple, you would hope that creativity is at the center of the business. We also had participation from the likes of who was in the room. Adobe, Apple, as we said, British Airways, New York Times, Twitch, Saudi Tourism and then challenger brands like who gives a Crap.

[Seth]

Yeah.

[Simon Cook]

So depending on the nature of the organization, for those of our, I believe.

[Seth]

US based listeners in particular, who gives a crap is a toilet paper UK based. I was, I will confess, not familiar with them myself, but really like the CEO, he had some really interesting perspectives.

[Simon Cook]

Exactly. And regardless of the category, I think what became really clear is that some of the case studies that emerged, some of the experiences that were shared, they were transferable. You know, you could see people going, okay, well I'm, I'm not in airline or I'm not in hospitality, but I can see how that can directly apply to my business.

[Seth]

You're, you're spot on. And I've always described it as one of the great. Before I tell you what I was about to describe, I found the quote I was looking for. I knew I had it. The line was, you won't get fired for the risks you don't take, but you will for the mistakes you do make. And that ties oddly, I think, to the point you just made, which is that is human nature and that is human fear. And that is why fear is oftentimes the greatest inhibitor to creativity and the greatest perpetuator of the status quo. Right. Because status quo didn't kill me. I'm just going to keep doing it. I didn't get fired. I'm just going to keep going this way because I don't want to get fired. And what I think is so interesting about the ability to extrapolate lessons across categories, territories, markets is it was the great experience of my career, which is client side, agency side. When you're on the agency side, you realize how actually first time I noticed this, I had had a meeting with Apple, this is a long time ago. And I'd had a meeting with Degree Deodorant. Right. Within about a week of each other. And this is my first time on the agency side, consultancy side. And I was flying home from the second meeting and I was like, oh my God, they actually have so much in common in terms of the problem at that moment in time that we're trying to solve for because we're all selling to human beings. Right. Whether a $10 billion cloud computing contract or a can of soda. The architecture of the brain is the same. The reasons we buy are largely the same. And yeah, that kind of cross pollinization was really kind of palpable in the room.

[Simon Cook]

But to your point earlier around system and operational design, some of those challenges are exactly the same. You know, McKinsey were there they talked about how the gap between CMO and CEO in terms of metrics, what is important to those respected parties. That gap is only widening.

[Seth]

Yeah.

[Simon Cook]

Which is alarming.

[Seth]

Yeah, no, it's. It's quite terrifying. And in fact, I'm gonna have McKinsey on the show, I think.

[Simon Cook]

Okay.

[Seth]

In a next week or the week after. But again, forgive me for those who are watching as I look. Oh, yeah, the data. And McKinsey has released this data. They previewed it at the forum and then released it subsequently. There was a 20 in the last 12 months. There was a 20 percentage point decrease in the percentage of chief executives who said, quote, I'm clear on the role that marketing plays in my company. Really, to me, that is a shared responsibility between the CMO and the CEO, although mostly on the CEO, because you get to walk into the cmos office and say, why aren't you doing what I. You know, why aren't you delivering against the objectives I laid out for you? And what the fuck are you in fact doing if not that? And so it's just. It's one of my other favorite points. And I will talk about this with the McKinsey team in more detail, but 80% of chief executives and just under 80% of CMOs from. From their reporting said they should be investing more in marketing. If the CEO is telling us that they don't know what the CMO and marketing does, why do 80% of them want to invest more in what they don't know, which is its own form of divide and kind of dissonance? That doesn't make any sense intuitively.

[Simon Cook]

I think what you actually said in the room is, what is the other 80 or 85% doing? Should they be fired, sir?

[Seth]

Yes, I think I might have said that. I think I might have. Well, actually, that was a different data point.

[Simon Cook]

Oh, really?

[Seth]

Yeah, sorry. It was. You know, I just want to say to our audience, it's like you're here with us, isn't it? How raw and real it is.

[Simon Cook]

This was, I think, who owns the customer? Because that came up a lot.

[Seth]

Yes, you're exactly right. Something like only 15% of CMOs in that study said they own the customer and they took a customer centric view of what they did. And I asked the McKinsey folks, I was like, well, should the other 85% be fired? Because if you're not thinking about the customer and you're not customer centric, what the actual fuck? However they did, I believe, correct me and say it's actually to your earlier point, it's not that I don't take a customer centric view, it's that the responsibility for the customer, there is no holistic view. It's been bifurcated, trifurcated. Owned by a Chief Customer Officer. Chief Revenue Officer, Chief Data Officer. Right. And it is disintegration. Yeah.

[Simon Cook]

They distilled it down to this great point, which was when everyone is in charge of the customer growth and acquisition, no one owns the customer.

[Seth]

Yes, yes. Well, actually it takes me to this other point, which are the costs of dysfunction. Right. Which we've been talking about. But there's such clear data. You cited one data point earlier on the 8% over performance versus peers. The McKinsey report is filled with clear evidence of business building, commercial impact of not just alignment, that kind of goes without saying, but of creativity. Well applied broadly across an enterprise, not just in marketing. And yet despite the data, it is so often siloed. And despite the data, if not in the room where we were, certainly as we look out more broadly across the corporate marketplace around the world, it isn't yet an organizational imperative in the way it should be. Which once again brings us back to what's the cost of. Not now. One of the folks in the room said that your creative intelligence is fast becoming your moat. Was that actually that might have been you?

[Simon Cook]

That was me at the top of the day. Yeah.

[Seth]

Yeah. See, it was so Chatham House that it didn't come attributed. What were there things that surprised you?

[Simon Cook]

One of the things that really surprised me was the. The lack of cynicism in the room, actually.

[Seth]

Yeah.

[Simon Cook]

You know, number one, it was encouraging that we had 60 powerful CEOs, billions.

[Seth]

Of dollars, billions of dollars in budget, trillions in market cap.

[Simon Cook]

Yeah, yeah. And influence and, and everything that comes with that showed up, number one, because they bought into the premise but then were actively engaged. And I think the counter to that, if I'm thinking about what surprised me more broadly, was it was encouraging to see people showing up and really engaging with something that we truly believe in, that we think creativity.

[Seth]

The festival is well titled.

[Simon Cook]

Well, there you go. It's kind of in our wheelhouse. But then to accompany that, going back to the disconnect that we're seeing with some of the internal operations, is that the. I was surprised at the lack of movement there.

[Seth]

Yeah.

[Simon Cook]

So the will is there. The lack of movement is even taking a step backwards, according to the data.

[Seth]

You know, it reminds me of a quote that somebody shared with me very early in my career, which is vision without action is nothing but a hallucination. Right now I'm a fan of a good, well protected hallucination recreationally. In business there is no upside to hallucinations any more than there is in AI. In fact, like in AI, it's kind of dangerous, you know, I want to share one of the lines that, that I haven't stopped thinking about. We were talking about the organizational imperative, talking about how one might, if you haven't yet, create that space, that permission, that culture for creativity to thrive, for innovation to thrive, et cetera. Somebody made a comment, they said, middle management is where ideas go to die. Well, before I tell you what I thought of that and what I've been thinking since, did you have any kind of visceral reaction to that when it was said? Did you shake your head? Yeah, that's my experience too. Or was there any kind of a implicit pushback on it?

[Simon Cook]

I think it's. I think there's a lack of accountability that is inherent to that statement. Say more, because I think it does sit with the leaders of the business to identify that and do something about it.

[Seth]

A lack of accountability amongst them. Sure, yeah, absolutely. I completely agree with that.

[Simon Cook]

If something has been pushed to the middle to be figured out or solved without the right direction, infrastructure, as we keep saying, all the tools to make a success of it, then the whole thing falls down anyway.

[Seth]

Yeah, I couldn't agree more. I will say that that was where I got. It wasn't where I started. My first reaction was as a former agency person, I'm like, oh yeah, it's true, right? Like the number of people, if you represent, if your client is a broad a company across brands, you know, a big global enterprise, the number of people who can say no to an idea is, is almost infinite, while the number of people who can say yes, you can count on, you know, sometimes two fingers. And so middle management is often not where ideas go to die, but where they end. And to, however, to your point about accountability, the job of middle management, and even kind of the phrase I recognize, I want to put it in quotes because it sounds implicitly pejorative and it ought not be, is in fact only to surface what they think is in the best interest of the pipeline to do what they think is in the best interest of the business. And to your point about the absence of accountability, if they are not clear on how they are responsible for moving the business forward, then yeah, it's not where good ideas go to die, it's where bad ideas go to die. Right. That's their job or an element of their job. But I've really, I've continued thinking about it because I think maybe that's the opportunity which is to ensure again in quotes, middle management is where creativity, like so many other organizational imperatives, either lives or dies.

[Simon Cook]

Yeah, I think it's. It also follows quite a archaic view of how companies work as well, that you have senior leadership up here, which pushes a problem to middle management to figure out versus giving the permission for middle management and the tier below, by the way, to have such a culture of innovation that ideas bubble up organically.

[Seth]

It's interesting to your point. I've been reading a book lately. It was written about 15 years ago, maybe not quite called the Outliers and it. The author will forgive me for not remembering their name. But the Outliers took a look at, I think, nine chief executives who based on their definition, the author's definition, had completely outperformed their peers in a given time period on shareholder equity created value created. And I knew a handful of the chief executives I'd never heard of the others, that their results were remarkable and only sad that I did not have the opportunity to invest in them. One of the clear through lines was decentralization as an organizational philosophy, which is very few people kind of at the quote unquote corporate level. Now these were, with a handful of exceptions, not global enterprises, so it's worth saying that, but decentralized, pushing decisions down to those closest to the customer, the market, the consumer. I don't know that it's made me rethink my own management perspectives and philosophies, but it's certainly making me think about them anew. Well, I have a team of just me, so we're very, we are both top heavy and very decentralized. Were. Were there any other. There were like a couple of other things that leapt out to me, some verbatims, anything that, that resonated with you.

[Simon Cook]

I think about, you know, some of the other speakers and, and many thanks to all of the speakers that took part in our inaugural forum. It became really clear or certainly I saw eyes light up or people lean in when they were genuinely speaking the language of the CEO rather than some of the arguments that we may have heard previously or that might resonate more with a cmo, for example. And I thought Interbrand did a really good job of that when they talked about the analysis that they'd done of I think 50 of the biggest companies in the world, how they are performing when it comes to their creative output. This Time, not necessarily infrastructure and how that output. In other words, those campaigns or examples of creativity are outperforming competitors when it comes to EBIT and when it comes to market cap, which is not always the way this kind of thing is presented. So I think very refreshing for a CEO to sit up and say, okay, now you're talking.

[Seth]

Well, I think what they spoke to, what you're talking to now is the imperative to, and it really should go without saying, but it does not. The imperative to make a business case first, second and always. Because what do we. What is marketing but a business strategy? That's all it is. By the way. I don't think that's easy. But yeah, unless there's a commercial case, you're just, you're not speaking. You know, what's the first rule of comedy and marketing? Know your audience.

[Simon Cook]

Yeah.

[Seth]

And too many marketers do not know their audience. And they go in talking about things that just don't matter. And you know, I've been thinking a lot. We talk about culture as marketers constantly, by the way, appropriately, I can't think of the last time I heard five marketers in a month talk about commerce, talk about commercial returns, talk about commercial efficacy. And because the art and practice, even in its own silo, which it should not be, it should not live, marketing, should not live within marketing alone, we can confuse the strategy that is the business strategy as our own objective. And in that moment, things get lost.

[Simon Cook]

Agree with you. What did you find surprising? What stood out?

[Seth]

I think I don't know that I would describe this as surprising, but I love the illustration where one of the chief executives said, and I am quoting, creativity is solving regulatory issues in 50 countries with imagination. Right. There was another who talked about the efficacy in how creating a culture of creativity meant staff, found staff satisfaction scores going up, the ability to recruit and retain talent, improving the relationships with customers becoming more facile and better, and all of their quality metrics going up. Which again takes us back to, you know, the earlier point, which is, despite the data, anecdotal and, and quantitative, fewer are embracing it than are understanding it. And I wonder if it's, I wonder if it's what I said earlier about the status quo, which is, you know, chief executives, they're just people too, just like us. And they don't want to get fired. They don't want to get, you know, crushed. They're not out there taking unmitigated risk. Well, they may take unmitigated, but certainly not on strategic risk, at least in Their own minds. And I wonder if. If they too, just hold to a status quo because, you know, you referenced this early. Right. You know, the. The lever that is change and transformation that typically fails more often. Transformation exercises fail more often than they succeed because it makes sense on paper. But then it comes down to the people who have to execute it. And there isn't a lot of people management. Janet Bayless, bcg, talks a lot about that.

[Simon Cook]

I think that's why this. Perhaps this is why so many of them showed up. They know that we talked about some of the exhausted levers. They know how difficult that can be.

[Seth]

Yeah.

[Simon Cook]

And when the metrics coming through, when the data points coming through are so compelling on what, as you say, not what it can do for your business and your growth, but how it can affect the internal organization, which in turn.

[Seth]

Affects the business and the growth.

[Simon Cook]

Exactly. Is pretty compelling.

[Seth]

Yeah, it's super compelling. All right. With that, a final question for you. Year one is. Is done. Feels like three years ago, but it's only four weeks. What's next? Will there be a year or two?

[Simon Cook]

Do you know what? I think so. This started with an appetite. We saw more CEOs coming to Cannes Lions than ever before. This year was about creating a forum and a space where they could address the issue that was coming to us indirectly. And I think it's important that we continue to create these spaces and these forums where we can dig into this stuff a bit deeper so that the CEOs, especially the CEOs, have the tools, the data, the ammunition that they need to be able to act upon this. And hopefully they will.

[Seth]

Yeah. I thought it was fantastic, in particular as a Year one event.

[Simon Cook]

Thank you, sir.

[Seth]

We ought never expect year one to look like Year three. That would be foolhardy. And I'll end the show by kind of quoting you on the record, as opposed to everybody else who is Chatham, your point earlier about creativity as an input, not just an output. Now in the world of marketing, creative output had creative input. We all understand that. But as an organizational imperative, as a growth imperative, to use your, as the chief executive, as an architect of commercial creativity. And I think, as I applauded it earlier, I would again urge all of us, all the time, both professionally and oftentimes personally, to ask ourself what the cost of not now is.

[Simon Cook]

Yeah, love that. Well, thank you for playing your part. Thanks for wrangling us on the day as well.

[Seth]

Oh, it was. It was a privilege to be part of it. And thanks for being with me for this conversation and to our listeners and our viewers. Thanks for hanging out with Simon and me on what's. I'm not gonna lie. An absolutely stunning show offy day here in London.

[Simon Cook]

The weather is shiny and bright out there.

[Seth]

For once, just Chef's kiss. If you are a fan of the show, please, you've heard me say it before. Smash that subscribe button, give it five stars and please give it a review because that is how others just like you will find it. We appreciate you, I appreciate you and see you next time.