Great Minds

In this final episode of Great Minds, Otis Williams, the founder and last surviving member of The Temptations, takes us on a journey through the legendary group's history. From his early days in Texarkana to the vibrant music scene of Detroit, Otis shares how the group evolved from the Distants to Motown superstars. He reflects on pivotal moments, including the addition of David Ruffin and Eddie Kendricks, their breakthrough with "My Girl," and the challenges of navigating fame, racial discrimination, and industry changes. With personal anecdotes, insights into their global impact, and reflections on the group's enduring legacy, this episode is a must-listen for music lovers and Motown enthusiasts alike.

On this first episode of two, Great Minds is pleased to be joined by Shelly Berger, manager of legendary American vocal group The Temptations. Shelly discusses the early days of the group, their Detroit origins, their place in popular culture, and what made (and continues to make) their music so special. Don't miss this part one of two! It's a must-listen!

On this very special episode of Great Minds, we're pleased to welcome the legendary Smokey Robinson to the show. Smokey walks us through his incredible career in this must-listen episode.

Longtime friend of Advertising Week and Founder of creative agency Gravity Road, Mark Eaves, joins Great Minds for a lively discussion about his career, the industry, and much, much more. This is a don't miss episode of Great Minds.

Victoria is the founder and CEO of GingerMay, a multi-award winning global B2B PR and digital marketing agency for blue-chip, technology, advertising, media, and fast-growth disruptive businesses. GingerMay works with leading global companies including Comcast, Global and Oath. Our numerous industry accolades are driven by our reputation for rigour, remarkable thinking, and strong relationships with clients and journalists.

Rachel Shechtman is a fourth-generation retail entrepreneur and founder of STORY, a concept store known for its editorial, ever-changing approach to retail. Prior to opening STORY, Rachel built a career in consulting, founding Cube Ventures in 2002 - an independent firm known for its skill of strategically combining business models. When Rachel launched STORY in 2011 she did so with the belief that retail held the potential to be about more than the transaction - it could serve as a channel for branded, community-based storytelling – retail media. STORY offered the point of a magazine, changed like a gallery, and sold things like a store. After seven years and 44 different ‘themes', in April 2018, Rachel sold STORY to Macy's Inc. where she served as Brand Experience Officer until July 2020. During her time at Macy's, Rachel successfully launched two new businesses for the brand and built a 150+ person cross-functional team specifically and strategically designed to operate, perform and generate effective results efficiently and nimbly within the larger, traditional operation. Rachel has been recognized as Fast Company's 100 Most Creative People in Business, Fortune Magazine's 40 Under 40, Crain's Under 40 and Ad Age's 50 Most Creative. The AAF inducted Rachel into its Advertising Hall of Achievement and in 2018 Shechtman was named a Henry Crown Fellow by the Aspen Institute. Rachel sits on the Board of Directors of the National Retail Federation (NRF) and CAMP, an experiential family retail concept and media company.

Dan Amos is chairman, chief executive officer and president of Aflac Incorporated and the second longest-serving CEO in the FORTUNE 250. Under his leadership as CEO, Aflac Incorporated's total return to shareholders1 has exceeded 15,446%, compared with 3,075% for the Dow Jones Industrial Average, 2,812% for the S&P 500 Index and 1,471% for the S&P 500 Life & Health Insurance Index. In 2000, Dan launched the popular Aflac Duck advertising campaign, transforming Aflac from a successful supplemental insurance company to a top international brand. Under Dan's leadership, today, Aflac helps provide protection to millions of policyholders through subsidiaries in Japan and the U.S. by paying cash fast when policyholders get sick or injured. For nearly seven decades, insurance policies of Aflac Incorporated's subsidiaries have given policyholders the opportunity to focus on recovery, not financial stress. In Japan, Aflac is the leading provider of medical and cancer insurance. In the U.S., Aflac is the number one provider of supplemental health insurance products.2

Sarah Mehler is a creative technology executive with more than 20 years of leadership in the experience design ecosystem. After graduating from the Design and Media Arts program at UCLA, she began cultivating close partnerships with leading brands and accomplished decision makers to grow the bounds of what's possible through human-centric technology. As the Founder and CEO of Left Field Labs, Sarah has combined industry-leading vision with an empathetic approach to deliver experiences that achieve successful business objectives and meaningful human impact for companies like Google, Amazon, Meta, Verizon, and Sony. Their areas of specialization include: experiential, immersive, and digital products and platforms. Sarah strives to bring out the best in her teams while modeling a graceful commitment to the greatest possible good in every situation.

Ahead of Advertising Week New York 2024, taking place at THE PENN DISTRICT, Great Minds welcomes Skylight CEO Stephanie Blake back to the show. Skylight is a placemaking and venue development, management and consulting firm committed to creating bespoke venues in storied places.

Longtime Advertising Week friend Tim Armstrong joins Great Minds to discuss Flowcode, his latest endeavor.  Flowcode is the #1 trusted QR provider for instant conversions and real-time data.

Jon O'Donnell is Founder & CEO of Viral Tribe Entertainment, a next generation podcasting platform powered by talent and technology, triibe.fm Viral Tribe is reshaping the podcast experience both for the those who create the content and those who consume it. Their mission is to bring talent and their fans closer together in what will be the most interactive next generation podcasting experience on the market.

Jessica Ling is the Senior Vice President of Global Brand Advertising at American Express. Since joining American Express in 2019, Jess has held several senior marketing roles spanning both brand and performance marketing. Previously she was the Senior Vice President of Marketing Strategy and Prospect Marketing responsible for the U.S. prospect acquisition marketing engine and powering global content, brand, and experiential programs for the Global Commercial Services business. Prior to American Express, Jess was Head of B2B Marketing at Verizon Media, where she spent over six years leading a cross-functional B2B marketing organization focused on accelerating growth for Verizon Media's commercial business. Her team owned end-to-end marketing strategy and execution that focused on building deeper customer connections, improving market perception, and empowering a sales organization with the goal of generating impactful revenue.

As president and CEO of Index Exchange, Andrew is responsible for providing strategic direction and market vision to the company and leading the brightest minds in advertising technology across North America, Europe, and APAC. With a sharp focus on delivering benefits to the world's leading media owners and buyers as they tackle the world of automation, he's built Index Exchange as one of the most efficient and transparent ad exchanges in the advertising ecosystem. A respected industry thought leader, Andrew is a sought-after source for his expertise and opinions on programmatic and the media industry at large, as well as the imperative need to transact with transparency.

Malcolm joined Cheil Worldwide at the beginning of 2015 as the Network's first ever Global Chief Creative Officer. Having built and led teams responsible for award-winning firsts as diverse as Foot Locker's Sneakerpedia, Dove's Campaign For Real Beauty and Samsung's #BeFearless VR experience, Malcolm is a recognised industry influencer and speaker. A two time Cannes Lions Jury President, Clio Awards and LIA Awards Jury president, Malcolm was recently named one of AdAge magazine's "World's Top 10 Digital minds" and named by TechCity Insider as one of the UK's leading Digital Innovators. His international industry accolades number more than 500, including Cannes Lions for Film, Print, Media, Outdoor, Cyber, Glass and Mobile. Prior to joining Cheil, Malcolm was European Chief Creative Officer and a member of Sapient's global leadership team where he helped build the company to in excess of a billion dollars in annual revenue, putting Sapient amongst Fortune Magazine's 40 fastest growing companies in the world. M&CSaatchi, Saatchi&Saatchi, Ogilvy and SapientNitro have all won Agency of the Year titles during his creative leadership. With Cheil Worldwide, Malcolm has steered the network into the industry's Top 10 Creative Network rankings and has seen the Network win their first Glass Lion at Cannes, first Innovation award at AdFest, Gran Sol at El Sol Awards, Grand Prix at Dubai Lynx, Gold at the International ANDY awards, collect their first WEBBY awards, create the Most Viewed Ad in the World on YouTube and post record new business success with Samsung along with winning global accounts including Etihad Airways, adidas, PZ Cussons, Abbot and UN Women. A Kiwi, Malcolm is a former member of the NZ Yachting Team, recognised by KEA as a ‘World Class New Zealander', former board member of the UK's Institute of Contemporary Art, Patron of the Royal Academy of Arts, C.A.L.M. and a member of the Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences. Malcolm lives in London with his Australian wife and English daughter.

On this episode of Great Minds, we're pleased to welcome Tom O'Keefe, Creative Chairman, and Jeff King, CEO, of the newly merged BarkleyOKRP. BarkleyOKRP is a new advertising agency formed by the merger of two prominent agencies, Barkley and OKRP. The merger creates one of the largest independent agencies in the United States, with offices in Chicago, Denver, New York, Pittsburgh, and Kansas City. BarkleyOKRP aims to be independent enough to create bold work while having the capabilities to build whole brands.

Chuck Leavell was a member of the Allman Brothers Band throughout their commercial zenith in the 1970s, he subsequently became a founding member of the band Sea Level. He has served as the principal touring keyboardist and musical director of the Rolling Stones since 1982. As a session musician, Leavell has performed on every Rolling Stones studio album released since 1983 with the exception of Bridges to Babylon (1997). He has also toured and recorded with Eric Clapton, George Harrison, David Gilmour, Gov't Mule and John Mayer.

Jamila Wignot is an award-winning documentary filmmaker. Her body of work includes, the Emmy-nominated MAKERS: WOMEN IN BUSINESS; THE AFRICAN AMERICANS: MANY RIVERS TO CROSS, hosted by Henry Louis Gates, which won a Peabody, Emmy, and NAACP awards; TOWN HALL a feature-length co-production with ITVS about the Tea Party movement; and for AMERICAN EXPERIENCE the Peabody Award-winning, "Triangle Fire" and Emmy-nominated "Walt Whitman". Wignot's producing credits include “The Rehnquist Revolution,” the fourth episode of WNET's series THE SUPREME COURT which was an IDA Best Limited Series winner and STREET FIGHTING MAN, character-driven documentary, currently in post-production, about the daily lives of three men surviving in the neighborhoods of post-industrial Detroit.

Alex Collmeris the founder and CEO of VidMob, the world's largest video creation platform. As the web transitions to a video-driven medium, Collmer recognized the need for businesses to have access to the world's best video creators who could produce quality content for a variety of platforms that was affordable. VidMob has raised $95M from top-tier investors like BuildGroup, Acadia Woods Partners, Macanta Investments, and Interlock Partners.

Jason founded ACCOMPANY to leverage the economic engine of the fashion and lifestyle industry towards positive impact for global communities in need. Jason brings with him 3 key areas of expertise – strategic image-making for global fashion retailers, leadership experience growing a small business, and a passion for applied ethics surrounding the needs of marginalized and exploited communities. Since 2006, Jason has been integral in growing YARD – a strategic image-making agency in New York – and now leads their expansion efforts as Chief Growth Officer. Jason has established and led relationships to strategically craft and design communications platforms, brand identities, multi-channel advertising campaigns and targeted retail promotions across a range of clients in fashion, retail and socially conscious lifestyles, including John Varvatos, Tumi, Kenneth Cole, Perry Ellis, Converse, Timberland, Equinox, Method, Shea Moisture and Smartwater. Simultaneously, while completing an M.S. in Global BioEthics at Columbia University, Jason published in 3 academic journals and in 2 national conferences his research on the under-acknowledged risks of low-income women and the ways in which unregulated fertility markets treat them like commodities. ACCOMPANY is Jason's merger between these disparate pursuits – the fun of growing small businesses, the reward of creating compelling lifestyle brands, and the conviction that vulnerable populations with less opportunity deserve a fair chance at prosperity.

Issa Jouaneh is President, Connections, at Emerald, and is responsible for leading the strategic oversight and growth optimization of the company's core business, comprised of 140+ leading events, trade shows, and conferences. Issa joined Emerald in March 2021 as Executive Vice President of Emerald Xcelerator, leading the company's market diversification strategy through new shows, partnerships, and sub-expo launches. Issa has over 20 years of experience leading multidisciplinary, cross-functional teams across a wide range of industries. His professional journey includes leading technology, application, and web development teams at Electronic Data Systems and a 14-year tenure at The American Express Company and American Express Global Business Travel. He ultimately served as Senior Vice President and General Manager, leading American Express Meetings & Events globally, where he successfully led the transformation of the business, tripling its size and reaching over 2,400 employees in 25+ proprietary countries. Issa holds a Bachelor of Mechanical Engineering from McGill University and a Master of Business Administration from Schulich School of Business at York University.

Heidi Dangelmaier is an inventor + designer + scientist (Quantum Physics & Artificial Intelligence). She has a track record of inventing first to market mass-appeal products, technology, entertainment & brands. Her gift at activating mass-scale growth in the female market is peerless. She's generated billions in revenues for many global brands. She's the most recognized leader at the frontiers of Market Growth X Gender X Design.

Robert E. (Bob) Hope is a veteran of the public relations and event marketing business. He is co-owner and president of Hope-Beckham, an independent agency based in Atlanta. Hope and longtime friend Paul Beckham started Hope-Beckham 25 years ago. Clients have included Chick-fil-A Foundation, Turner Broadcasting, Belk, The Coca-Cola Company, Southern Company, Home Depot, Comcast and a variety of sports teams and leagues as well as non-profit organizations. He is author of two books – “We Could Have Finished Last Without You” about his early days with the Braves, and “Greater Late than Never” about people who achieved their life's success after age 50. Will Rogers once said there are two kinds of people on earth – those who march in the parade and those who sit on the curb and watch. If you march, you have only one view your entire life. However, if you sit on the right curb, you see marvelous things. Bob Hope has spent his life on a marvelous curb observing remarkable people and events. He started working for the Atlanta Braves while in college and became the team's director of public relations and promotions at age 24. He managed the Major League Baseball All-Star Game at age 25. And he was with Hank Aaron during the chase to break the all-time home run record of Babe Ruth. When Ted Turner bought the team, he was promoted to vice president at age 29 and worked not only for the Braves but also the Turner-owned Atlanta Hawks and for Turner's TV station, handling marketing for the Braves and the TV station. He left Turner to work on sports, particularly the Olympics, for The Coca-Cola Company and then decided to go into the public relations agency business so he could work for both Coke and Turner, which led to a career in New York in a top job of the world's largest public relations firm. Along the way, he has been involved in many Olympics, including Atlanta. He helped several cities with their campaigns to land major league sports franchises – Charlotte in the NBA, Miami, Denver and Washington in Major League Baseball, Ottawa in hockey, and Atlanta in the WNBA. He also attempted to open the doors to girls and women as baseball players, creating the Colorado Silver Bullets professional baseball team of elite women athletes, which traveled the world for four years playing against men's amateur, college and minor league professional teams. The team was managed by former Braves star pitcher Phil Niekro. His involvement with the Silver Bullets led to a 14-year stint on the board of Billie Jean King's Women's Sports Foundation and six years as the only male on its executive committee. The WSF is the chief lobbying organization in favor of equal education opportunities, including sports, for women in colleges and universities.

With 20 years of tech experience, and after witnessing the explosion of marketing data and its potential to inform business decisions, Alexander saw a clear gap in the market that he was determined to fill. This led to the founding of Adverity, an intelligent marketing analytics platform, which he co-founded with colleagues Martin Brunthaler and Andreas Glänzer in 2015.

Rob Prazmark, Founder and CEO of 21 Marketing, returns to Great Minds to discuss his book The Olympics Don't Take American Express and more!

On today's episode of Great Minds we're pleased to welcome Andrew Essex, Senior Managing Partner of TCS Interactive, working with companies all over the world. Andrew discusses his career path from Droga5 to Tribeca to present.

Scott Donaton, CMO of Versus and longtime friend of Advertising Week joins us for this special episode of Great Minds. Scott discusses his roles at IPG, Digitas, Hulu and more, leading up to his current role at Versus.

On today's episode of Great Minds, we're pleased to welcome Chris Slade, drummer for several of rock's greatest bands, including Manfred Mann's Earth Band from its inception in 1971 to 1978 on eight albums, The Firm, and AC/DC,  for which he drummed from 1989 to 1994 and performed on the 1990 album The Razors Edge.

On this episode of Great Minds, we're pleased to welcome Yaniv Makover, CEO & Co-Founder of Anyword. Yaniv is an entrepreneur, with vast experience in numerous fields, dating back to his beginnings at Nokia, to his time at his company Keewee, to the present at Anyword.

iHeart Media's CMO Gayle Troberman joins Great Minds to discuss her career - from her days at Microsoft to present.

On today's episode of Great Minds, we're pleased to welcome Josh Gross, Chief Creative Officer at Energy BBDO. Josh walks us through his incredible and unique career, from his days at powerhouse agency Crispin Porter + Bogusky to his present role at Energy BBDO.

Chris Moscardi is a marketing strategist, creative director, and MBA with a passion for bringing scalable, sustainable growth to B2B companies particularly in tech, infrastructure, and engineering. Chris's goal is to bring sustainable development to the forefront of public consciousness using creative storytelling, the influence of marketing, and the levers of business.

On this episode of Great Minds we're pleased to welcome Ron Poulsen, bassist and founding member of PANGAEA. Ron discusses his career in this music business, from his beginnings to present.

Dr. Aaron Mair is an Environmental Justice pioneer intersectionally working in the spaces of, Health, Environment, Voting Rights and Disparities over the last 40 Years; a 35 year veteran urban environmental activist; regional and national Environmental Justice organizer and strategist from the State of New York.

A wise rabbi once said: “Judaism is a great product, but the marketing sucks.” As a Jew and a branding professional, Archie was in full agreement. She's on a mission to re-brand Judaism so that it's easy to get right to the good parts, no Hebrew required. JewBelong.com is the heart of the rebrand. It's filled with meaningful, fun, free, easy-to-use Jewish rituals and information that will never leave anyone who's new to Judaism, or who is Jewish but didn't get a ton of Jewish education, feeling left out or confused or… JewBarrassed.

As a member of the senior leadership team, Fabio plays a pivotal role in shaping the newly formed EFG (ESL FACEIT Group). Together with his team, they drive brand partnerships, ticket sales, fan engagement, merchandising, advertising, and marketing.

Jessica Donohue is an executive dedicated to working with institutional investors and allocators as their partner, enabling their mission/vision and creating better outcomes for them and the people they serve. Jessica has a proven track record leading client management/ solutioning, organizational transformation, product innovation, and client service/operations. Jessica is a corporate spokesperson with print and broadcast media. She's a decisive problem-solver, and a neurodiversity and disability inclusion champion.

On the eve of ClimaTech 2024 we speak with Yvonne Hao, Secretary of Economic Development for Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Yvonne was a longtime senior executive who co-founded Boston investment firm Cove Hill Partners, and was tapped by the Healey-Driscoll administration to helm the state's chief economic development agency.

Mr. Walker is a Nuclear Physicist and was the project lead and manager for constructing the new Rolls-Royce Nuclear Chemical Plant; he was the UK Subject Matter Expert for the UK Nuclear Material Recovery Capabilities and was the technical project manager for constructing the UK reactor core manufacturing facilities. Mr. Walker was also seconded to Rolls Royce where he modeled configurations of RR's Zero-Power reactor to inform confidence limits for the UK's successor submarine's mechanical design and worked for the Rolls-Royce Nuclear Thermal Hydraulics Engineering team investigating reactor channel thermal performance to inform new reactor designs and support the safety case for reactors in current class submarines. Mr. Walker's professional engineering experience includes nuclear reactors, mines, submarines, chemical plants, factories, mine processing facilities, infrastructure, automotive machinery, and testing rigs.

On this first ClimaTech Edition of Great Minds, we're pleased to welcome Joe Curtatone, President of the Northeast Clean Energy Council, ahead of the ClimaTech 2024 event, June 3-5, 2024. More information on ClimaTech can be found at https://advertisingweek.com/event/climatech-2024 

On this episode of Great Minds, the amazing Luvuyo Madasa returns! In case you missed it, Luvuyo joined us to close out Season 2 of Great Minds - be sure to listen here: https://advertisingweek.com/great-minds-luvuyo-madasa/

On this episode of Great Minds we're pleased to welcome Chris James of The Burrito Brothers to the show. Chris discusses the rich history of The Burrito Brothers band, as well as what they're up to now.

In early 2020 Bosko Milekic co-founded Optable with the goal of re-architecting digital advertising in the post-cookie world. Prior to Optable, Bosko co-founded AdGear, an advertising technology platform that was among the first ad platforms to integrate real-time bidding protocols. He has spent close to 20 years developing advertising technology, as a software developer, product manager, and entrepreneur, and throughout that time has lived through several major re-inventions of digital advertising infrastructure, from the emergence of advertising exchanges and real-time bidding to, more recently, the deprecation of web browser third-party cookies and the adoption of privacy enhancing technologies in digital advertising.

Debbie Wosskow OBE is a multi exit entrepreneur, board advisor and investor, now focused on diversity, health and wellness and economic empowerment. She is co-founder of WJV LLP, the boutique investment and strategic innovation firm that supports and empowesr female founders by connecting female run and diverse VC's with investors focused on purpose and returns. Debbie is also Co-Chair of the government backed Invest in Women Taskforce.