More than ever, we will have to gear up our organisations to be
prepared for the unexpected.
I am convinced that going through 2001, I will be challenging more than
once our offering and the organisation supporting it.
Two years ago, I wrote in the same column that I believed the only
operations that could deliver totally integrated communication
programmes to their clients were the ones in which all the
communications disciplines were developed under one bottom line.
At the time, integration for most people meant the same colour coding
from bunting to print ads.
Integration for Euro RSCG means the ability to re-deploy. And this
ability will be the most valuable asset of our organisation in the years
to come.
We have to make sure that the structures we put in place are flexible
enough to accommodate the succession of changes we will have to go
through.
It means fewer operations managers and more discipline leaders working
in teams in the same organisation.
From delivering integrated communication programmes, to delivering
interwoven communication programmes, agencies shouldn't think of 'having
an Internet division' but look at how they could integrate digital
communications into everything they do, because in fewer years than we
all think, all communications will be digital.
Understanding how the Internet fits into and affects other
communications media is a role that we are embracing at Euro RSCG.
It is more than just integrated communications, where creative relates
across different media.
It is 'interwoven' communication, where one media's creative is
dependant on the other. Soon, we will develop TVCs, websites and direct
marketing as one execution rather than three.
The media revolution is driving dramatic change. It is fragmenting
audiences and creating vast new opportunities. This revolution is
changing how we interact with each other and with the consumer.
For our industry, the impact will be neither in B2C or B2B, but in C2B.
Our role will move from accessing consumers and translating their needs
to giving them access and moderating the dialogue.
Our ability to listen to people should improve through the use of
interactive media, and so should our ability to learn.
In 2001, we will expand the direct marketing e-learning programme that
we have put in place in the last quarter of 2000 to other communications
disciplines, starting with interactive, and allow more than 300 of our
employees as well as our clients to access them.
We are moving into the creative economy. It is an economy based on ideas
rather than physical capital.
Companies that embrace the notion of creating value through ideas,
through strategy, will be those that profit the most in the coming
decades.
Those who dare to be first will be rewarded. I will conclude with an
abstract from our worldwide vision summarising our attitude towards
change.
"The people of Euro RSCG embrace the great opportunity of the times we
live in. Times that demand the courage of new ideas and new
solutions.
Times that greatly reward those who are first with those ideas and
solutions.
Our agencies and our people are committed to applying new organisational
concepts and information technology in ways that make us the leading
network of the new century."
