Yoni Block, CEO of Interlude, Israeli rock star, Member of Y&R's Spark Plug program

Yesterday you may have read this AdWeek piece on Spark Plug, Y&R’s internal/external initiative to “embrace innovation in the digital space.” It’s a progressive idea, bringing outside companies inside the four walls of our agency. I’ve had the opportunity to play a role in this project, acting as a sort of liaison between the outside companies and Y&R and the Y&R account teams.  As you can imagine, such a proposition isn’t necessarily an easy thing to pull off. It’s new and different and scary for some (because it’s new and different), but at the heart of it, it’s an acknowledgement that things move quickly and providing new, innovative ideas to our clients is our number one priority.

As Y&R’s global CEO, David Sable, says in the article, [advertising has] “always been an innovative industry. It’s [all about] understanding that that’s in the industry’s DNA.” Today, innovation is coming at us faster than ever. The role of the agency partner is evolving and only those agencies that can adapt to, and harness, innovation will have a future.

The agency’s role then becomes how to understand these innovations and marry them to creative storytelling through the filter of the client’s brand. No easy task and not something that a small, specialized agency, no matter how good at their discipline, is likely to be able to do.

Savvy readers will recognize the title of this post as the title of the legendary book by David Ogilvy.  But this time the Advertising Man in question is not Mr. Ogilvy, but me. What do I have in common with the Madison Avenue legend? Well, mostly nothing (accept this I suppose), other than I too, now work at a Madison Avenue ad agency, Young & Rubicam.

And so now I, with apologies to Ogilvy, will offer my own confession. Yesterday we had an “all hands on deck meeting” for the entire NY office. Without divulging the details, I will say that I was absolutely blown away by some of the work that was shared. It was, as was the entire meeting, really energizing. I’ve never worked at a “big ad agency” before but have always held such agencies in high regard. Yesterday those feelings were justified. Y&R North American CEO Carter Murray and Y&R New York Chief Creative Officer Jim Elliott both spoke passionately and eloquently about the people and the work of Y&R, and what it means to work at an agency such as this.

I found myself thinking, “I want to do good work, better work. I want to do work that these people, my new colleagues, will be proud to be associated with.”  Maybe that’s corny, or maybe that’s me with a new job, but I was truly inspired by the people and the work.

Y&R New York is an agency in transition. There’s new leadership and an energy pervades the building. I’m extremely excited about some of the projects I’m going to be working on, some client based, some agency based. I’m looking forward to sharing some of them with you when the time is right.