

What Next?
Publicis Groupe
"What Next?" explores the evolving landscape of business, leadership, advertising, and the future of work. Hosted by Rishad Tobaccowala, the podcast dives into how globalization, technology, and demographic shifts reshape how we create, consume, and communicate. Rishad Tobaccowala engages with CEOs, creative leaders, and visionaries to discuss innovative strategies, technology’s impact on media, and leadership challenges in the future of work. Hear unique insights from academics, futurists, and media innovators on navigating today’s business world.
Episodes
Mentioned books

Jun 3, 2023 • 37min
Democratising Happiness
Former McKinsey partner, co-founder of Happiness Squad and author, Ashish Kothari, is on a mission to “democratise happiness” and help a 1 billion unlock their full potential through integrating the art and science of happiness. In this episode, he predicts the crisis on stress, anxiety, and burnout in organizations will get a lot worse before it gets better in 2023, that organisations will continue to see suboptimal returns from and slow progress from ‘flourishing programs’ unless we drastically change course, and that the rise in AI technologies will further cause the urgency and pull to elevate human consciousness and need to evolve our adult development. In order to thrive versus just survive, he shares a practical set of ideas that you can start to implement right away to unlock your full potential and live with more joy, health, love, and meaning. In his words, you can “ACHIEVE MORE” not by “DOING MORE” but by “BEING MORE”. Further Reading Links:https://happinesssquad.com/https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashishkothari1/https://community.happinesssquad.com

May 27, 2023 • 37min
It’s the person, stupid
Teresa Barreira, Publicis Sapient CMO & CCO, explains why the individual Is the new ‘mission critical’, how non-branded content marks the next wave for brand building, and declares the marketing funnel to be dead. She also argues that marketers should embrace generative AI as a competitive way of augmenting their own work and redefining their craft. Further Reading Links:https://www.publicissapient.com/impact/never-done-filmhttps:/www.publicissapient.com/news/publicis-sapient-and-oscar-winning-director-ben-proudfoot-launchhttps://www.adweek.com/agencies/publicis-sapient-captures-its-impact-in-3-documentary-films/https://www.linkedin.com/in/tbarreira/https://www.teresabarreira.com

May 20, 2023 • 42min
Irresistibly Yours
HR legend, Josh Bersin, Founder & CEO, The Josh Bersin Company, shares insights from his recently published book, Irresistible: The Seven Secrets of the World's Most Enduring, Employee-Focused Organizations. He argues that to survive the global talent war, the managerial mindset needs to shift to human-centred leadership, especially as your employees embody your brand and are your best conduit to customers. Further Reading Links:@Josh_Bersinhttps://www.linkedin.com/in/bersin/https://joshbersin.comhttps://www.amazon.com/Irresistible-Secrets-Enduring-Employee-Focused-Organizations/dp/1646871103/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_product_top?ie=UTF8

May 13, 2023 • 32min
Behind the Shopify Store Front
Shopify’s Deann Evans takes us behind the scenes of its dramatic growth across 175 countries. She also explains how its ‘Chaos Monkey’s’ have eradicated 320,000 hours of internal meetings resulting in a productivity increase of 25%, what it’s like in a 100% ‘work anywhere’ company, and why no one ever joined Shopify to sit in meetings.Further Reading Links:https://www.linkedin.com/in/deannre/

May 6, 2023 • 24min
Mad, bad and creatively dangerous to know?
Rishad revisits Madison Avenue’s ‘creative revolution’ with Andrew Cracknell (former agency ECD and author of “The Real Mad Men: The Renegades of Madison Avenue and the Golden Age of Advertising”) to ask, “what can we all learn from the original Mad Men (and women) of that golden age of advertising?”Further Reading Links:https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-cracknell-7288b444/?originalSubdomain=ukhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9HO0ZTlCYM

Apr 29, 2023 • 27min
Facing up to the Future
In this episode, Rishad talks with leading futurist Andrew Curry, Director of The School of International Futures. Andrew shares some helpful approaches used by futurists to improve business outcomes, considers how his own work has changed over the past 20 years, and talks about developing futurist capabilities in the next generation of leaders. Further Reading Links: https://soif.org.uk/https://twitter.com/nextwavefutureshttps://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-curry-802198/ https://soif.org.uk/app/uploads/2020/06/NGFP_Futures-Manifesto_2020_web-1.pdf Note: This interview was recorded in 2020, so a good opportunity to see if Andrew’s predictions materialised!

Apr 22, 2023 • 27min
Leading from the Front
What can business leaders learn from military leaders? In this episode, Rishad talks exclusively with Colonel Kevin W Farrell, PhD, (USA Retired). We learn about the advantages of Back Briefing, Red Teaming, and what it’s like working with Brad Pitt as a military advisor! Further reading Links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevin-w-farrell-ph-d-9800302/ https://battlefieldleadership.com

Apr 15, 2023 • 38min
Scaling Identity: The New Orange
Do you know your ‘Buppy’ from your ‘Backboner’ from your ‘Devout’? Esther ‘E.T.’ Franklin, Global Chief Strategy Cultural Fluency Officer at Spark Foundry, unpacks the many aspects of the identity conversation and how marketers are missing growth opportunities due to wildly blunt audience assumptions. Further reading links: https://www.linkedin.com/in/estheretfranklin/

Apr 8, 2023 • 41min
Being creative about creative leadership
Kat Gordon, Founder/CEO, of The 3% Movement, predicts that the job of the future is the “Creative Entrepreneur in Residence”, WFH will become just W, and introverts and empaths will rise as the next creative leaders. Further reading links: https://www.3percentmovement.com/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17D7LEH6tlo Susan Cain’s Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking https://tinyurl.com/2p89a4tu

Apr 1, 2023 • 40min
AI + Talent = Growth
Arpit Jain, Global President of Marcel at Publicis Groupe, unpacks the truth of the AI powered “people experience and growth platform” - Marcel, which was an AI hip before AI was hip.He explains how human intelligence can work in complementary ways with artificial intelligence to better collaborate for better business outcomes, to super charge talent mobility, and to achieve personal and career growth. And how this growth juggernaut is supercharging Publicis Groupe. Further reading links:https://www.linkedin.com/in/arpit-jain-423b2515/https://marcel.ai/public/article/2021/september/what-is-marcel-


