Wunderman Thompson makes further changes to North American leadership
Pictured from left: Melissa Dorko (named chief growth officer), Liz Valentine (named CEO of Wunderman Thompson West), Carrie Philpott (hired as president of Wunderman Thompson Atlanta).
WPP's Wunderman Thompson has made several key leadership changes in North America, including promoting Swift CEO and Co-Founder Liz Valentine to chief executive of the network's west region. Isobar Chief Growth Officer Melissa Dorko was poached as the chief growth officer of Wunderman Thompson North America and Carrie Philpott, the managing director of Interpublic Group's Huge Atlanta, was hired as president of Wunderman Thompson Atlanta.
Wunderman Thompson West includes its California, Seattle and Denver offices, the network's mobile business and Swift, WPP's social shop in Portland, Ore. Valentine maintains her position as CEO of Swift and her appointment follows that of Joe Crump being named CEO of Wunderman Thompson East, which is its New York headquarters, and Ian Sohn to CEO of Wunderman Thompson Central, which spans the agency's Chicago, Austin, Minneapolis and Memphis hubs.
(Publicis Groupe also recently restructured most of its creative agencies in the U.S. into east, west and central regions. Andrew Bruce became CEO of Publicis Communications West, Andrew Swinand was named CEO of Publicis Communications Center and Jem Ripley was hired as CEO of Publicis Communications East.)
"Melissa, Liz and Carrie are hands down some of the best and brightest minds in the industry," Wunderman Thompson North America CEO Shane Atchison said in a statement. "Each of them will be a key part of Wunderman Thompson's success going forward—I can't wait to see their impact on our business."
Dorko will be responsible for new business outreach and development. Before Isobar, Dorko was vice president of North American business development for Sapient Razorfish (now part of Publicis Sapient).
In addition to continuing leading Swift as CEO, Valentine will be given oversight of the strategic vision, growth, operations and client relations of Wunderman Thompson's California, Seattle and Denver offices.
At Huge Atlanta, Philpott is credited with driving business growth for clients such as Turner Sports, Lowe's Home Improvement, UPS, PGA of America and CNN.
The appointments continue to solidify the North American team of Wunderman Thompson, the new network formed through the merger of Wunderman and J. Walter Thompson late last year. Earlier this year, Wunderman Thompson North America named Michael Steiger as chief talent officer, Robyn Tombacher as chief operations officer, Brandon Geary as chief strategy officer, Adam Foulsham as chief financial officer and Jason Burby as chief client officer.
