10 Sannah Rogers
Managing partner, Zenith UK
Responsible for creating greater synergies between planning and activation, notably in digital performance, Rogers leads on some of Zenith’s top accounts.
9 Alex Steer
Chief product officer, Wavemaker UK
Colleagues praise Steer’s “unique combination of engineering and strategic skills and inexhaustible energy” that he brings to clients from Nationwide to Netflix.
8 Paddy Adams
Chief strategy officer, Manning Gottlieb OMD
An understated thinker who took on a bigger role this year. Adams’ team has picked up a hatful of planning prizes for John Lewis & Partners and Specsavers among others.
7 Dino Myers-Lamptey
Founding partner, The Barber Shop
Myers-Lamptey is one of a wave of ex-agency executives to have set up independent businesses. He describes The Barber Shop as a strategy agency and consultancy that combines media and creative thinking. He has already been working with clients, including sports news site The Athletic, and showed he is a good sport by boxing at Media Fight Night.
6 Jed Hallam
Chief strategy officer, Initiative UK
The ex-Mindshare planner has been adding brainpower and lateral thinking to the revival of Initiative UK’s fortunes. His work has included a report into the state of UK culture and how brands can tap into today’s new demographic tribes – a useful service for clients such as Amazon, Lego and Carlsberg.
5 Jen Smith and Sally Weavers
Founders, Craft Media London
The dynamic duo showed pioneering spirit two years ago when they set up their strategic communications consultancy with an agile approach that combined the best in media and creative thinking. Their team won gold at the Media Week Awards for its Which? work.
4 Simeon Adams
Creative partner, Goodstuff Communciations
A strategic brain who has brought creative invention to some of Goodstuff’s double Grand Prix-winning work on Hiscox’s “Honeypot poster network” and Dunelm’s “Inviting home lovers back to mine”. Adams is also the wise-cracking front man for the Goodstuff media showcase, which brings together creative agencies and media owners and has become an annual fixture.
3 Geoff De Burca
Chief strategy officer, MediaCom UK
De Burca has been the key strategist on Tesco, including its Cannes Lions-winning “Food love stories”. It is a sign of the bench strength in the agency’s planning team that he was ready to step up to CSO after Steve Gladdis moved to an EMEA role. De Burca, a former Naked Communications exec, is credited with putting digital data more at the heart of MediaCom’s planning.
2 Vicky Fox
Chief planning officer, OMD UK
Fox is an inspirational and focused leader who champions the role of “cross-channel, cross-customer journey optimisation”. Her connections planning team was shortlisted for agency team of the year at the Campaign Media Awards and produced strong work for brands such as McDonald’s and Barclays. Fox was promoted to chief planning officer in the autumn.
1 Mike Florence
Chief strategy officer, PHD UK
“Flo” has been an innovator through his strategic thinking about bridging brand and performance, which has won over clients from legacy players to disruptors. He was judged the top media planner in Campaign’s inaugural Agency of the Year awards earlier this year and has been supporting the expansion of PHD Manchester, which landed Stars Group this autumn.
This article was originally published by Campaign.