Johannes Leonardo appoints Steve Zaroff as chief strategy officer

Johannes Leonardo has named Steve Zaroff its new chief strategy officer, reporting directly to Jan Jacobs and Leo Premutico, co-founders and creative chairmen of the independent agency. Zaroff succeeds Mark Aronson, who left the agency in September. The strategy team at Johannes Leonardo is composed of about 20 people and is a blend of brand planners, communication strategists, media thinkers and digital strategists. Zaroff leads the team and will focus on refining and scaling the agency’s strategy department as it continues to grow and develop new capabilities. Wealth of strategy experience Zaroff fervently believes new ideas happen when different thinkers and perspectives collide around a problem. His vision for the agency will be to create the conditions for more of these healthy collisions to organically occur. "An agency of this size that has that diversity of thinking within the strategy group is exciting,” said Zaroff of JL, which currently has 180 employees. “You often find that you need a big agency to bring that together, so I’m excited to find that here and be able to build not just the team, but find new ways to bring those people and types of thinking together.” Subscribe to Ad Age now for the latest industry news and analysis. Zaroff isn’t new to the title. He has over 25 years of experience in the role at Ogilvy, McCann North America and Publicis Groupe's Sapient. While working at McCann in 2016, he was a key leader who at the time helped the agency double in size and win top honors as the most-awarded creative agency at Cannes Lions and the most-awarded effectiveness agency at the Effies. Zaroff was most recently founder and president of Other Strategy, a “creative provocation agency bringing outside perspectives to brands and agencies determined to change,” according to a press release. Other Strategy counts among its clients Johnson & Johnson and LeSportsac. “Steve is a proven leader, a powerhouse force in advertising and someone constantly challenging his own assumptions about the impact an advertising agency can have,” said Premutico. “With so many new opportunities emerging, we're confident Steve is going to help us redefine the discipline inside and outside our walls.” Hiring spree Zaroff is the latest in a series of new hires and promotions at JL. Earlier this year the shop elevated Emily Wilcox to managing director from head of account management. The shop also appointed Nicole Holland chief talent officer in July and brought on Julia Neumann as chief creative officer in June. Johannes Leonardo has seen steady expansion of business with brands like Kraft Heinz, Volkswagen and Adidas. In April, Facebook (now Meta) hired the agency to help develop creative strategy and narrative for Instagram. Last month, Ad Age reported that JL is one of the agencies in the hunt for the KFC account. See Ad Age’s 2021 Year in Review here.

Johannes Leonardo appoints Steve Zaroff as chief strategy officer

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