J. Walter Thompson Company took home a record-breaking 80 Lions this year at Cannes. One of the driving forces in shaping the agency’s global creative brand is Worldwide CCO Matt Eastwood, who is celebrating his two-year anniversary at J. Walter Thompson this month.We caught up with Eastwood about his post-Cannes reflections, goals and impressions. Although it takes two flints to make a fire, it helps to have strong leaders like Eastwood at the helm.
This month marks your two-year anniversary at J. Walter Thompson. When you joined J. Walter Thompson in 2014, you referred to the agency as “a diamond in the rough…an incredible gem that needs polishing.” What did you mean by that? – J. Walter Thompson is probably one of the most famous brands in the entire industry. But my feeling when I arrived was that we’d forgotten that it was brilliant creative work that gave us our fame. I knew it was in our DNA, but I felt we’d taken our eyes off the ball a little. So, I felt like this “gem” just needed a little polishing again. Our creative brilliance was just waiting to shine through once more.
At Cannes 2016, J. Walter Thompson Company earned a total of 80 Lions, a historic award performance for the network. How did we do it? What kind of creative “polishing” helped us nab those wins? – I’ve said it many times as I’ve travelled from throughout the network – Passion Trumps Talent. Talent is vitally important, but it’s passion that truly differentiates the good from the great. And, for me, it was passion that helped us achieve this historic performance at Cannes 2016. But it wasn’t just the passion of a few isolated members of the creative department, it was the passion of the entire company. An entire organization focused on reconnecting with our spirit of creative excellence.
I’ve also said “Make a plan and take action.” You can’t just long for greatness, you need a concrete plan. Across every region we set ambitious Cannes targets, which we broke down further by office. Every office had an individual plan of how they would achieve their creative targets. And, as a result, we had some amazing results from some surprising places – Costa Rica won 5 Lions, Bangkok won 6 Lions, Amsterdam won an incredible 17 Lions and New York won 6 Lions (something they haven’t done since 1971). It was amazing. All in all, we won 80 Lions across 23 offices. This wasn’t just one office doing well, this was the entire network doing well.
Now that Cannes is in the rear-view, what are your goals moving forward? What needs to be done to ensure the agency maintains momentum? – My goal now is to prove that this year’s success was not a fluke. It’s not a one off. I want to show the world that this is the new (old) J. Walter Thompson. We are well and truly back. It’s certainly not a time to take our foot of the gas. I have already begun working with regions and offices on their Cannes Plans for 2017. My aim is to do even better next year.
This year, you returned to the Cannes main stage to give a keynote talk about the importance of passion in the workplace. What does passion in the workplace look like? How does passion translate to success? – Passion is the strongest indicator of your potential. Yes, you need to have a brain in your head. But I much prefer passion over talent. Passion over pedigree. Passion over a well-tailored suit. And I want passionate people on my team. People who are passionate about anything are usually more passionate about everything. Passion lights a fire under you. It makes you want to know more. It makes you want to succeed. A passionate person understands that it might not happen on the first try. Or the tenth. Or the one hundredth. But a passionate person knows that the answer is out there somewhere. The same is not necessarily true for talented people.
Sometimes talent can actually be a trap. We’re often told from a very young age that we’re good, the best, that we’re smart or capable. Or we’ve noticed that some things come quite easily. And if we’re not careful we become complacent. Things are easy enough that we don’t feel we have to try. And we lose, then, the ability to work hard. Or the drive. Sometimes when things get tough, talented people give up. Or back off. Or shrink. Or run. Passionate people, however, keep moving. Because they simply cannot not.
Besides creative work, what are you passionate about? – I’m extremely passionate about interior design and architecture. I read magazines and books about it. I read blogs about. For years, I even wrote a blog about it: http://thingsihaveseen.squarespace.com.
