Param Saikia, the 40-something COO of Publicis India, thrives on chaos. He describes his current assignment at Publicis as the best in his entire advertising career. The reason? When he joined Publicis a year-and-a-half back it was in the throes of chaos - people were leaving with unfailing regularity and internationally aligned businesses were unsure of pitching tents with it.

Those days of uncertainty are over now. The agency has picked up growth at 40 per cent and is looking to touch Rs 140 crore in billings 2003-2004. "We have managed a turnaround almost unheard of. Nobody can take away that reality from me," says this uncharacteristically media shy advertising professional, who has put in close to two decades in the industry. In this interview to Sumita Vaid Dixit of agencyfaqs!, Saikia delineates the changes implemented at the agency in the last year-and-a-half and the task ahead for Publicis in India.

Q. How would you describe the last one-and-a-half year at Publicis? What were your initial challenges as chief operating officer?

A. This probably has been the single most fascinating one-and-a-half-year in my entire advertising life. When I joined this place, many of our international clients were not willing to work with us. Whether it is L'Oréal, Nestle, Hewlett Packard, Allied Domecq - they are all very top end clients, but they were all unsure of the capability and the talent base of Publicis. Therefore, the immediate task was to demonstrate the agency's ability to service them.

And then there was this sudden merger with Ambience. Right in the middle of the changes that were taking place at Publicis, there was this realignment that was taking place at the top management level. The board and the management changed. We had to find ways to work with each other. One good thing about the merger is that there has been an influx of talent into Publicis. Today we have some of the best people who have come from various agencies.

Q. How have the global mergers and acquisitions of Publicis Groupe worldwide enhanced the problems and prospects of Publicis in India?

A. The merger with Ambience has changed the bulk of Publicis' operations in India. This merger has helped us reduce our problems substantially. With the combination of Publicis and Ambience, we are among the Top 10 agencies in India. Being a Top 10 agency gives us a lot of financial stability. Also there is great management talent that Publicis now has access to. But the global merger of Leo Burnett and Saatchi & Saatchi has not been much help. As far as we are concerned, they are competition.

Q. Was it easy - the coming together of Publicis and Ambience?

A. It was absolutely smooth. The team at Publicis had big ambitions and Ambience was an agency that we all held in high esteem. We were clear about what we wanted to do and so were they. While we do not share any resources, there are some common corporate resources that both Ambience Publicis and Publicis have access to.

Q. You mentioned in a recent interview to agencyfaqs! that Publicis is looking "to keep clients really happy and put Publicis on the advertising map as a high quality agency". How do you plan to do that?

A. Nestle already rates us as one of the top two agencies in creativity. I do believe we have one of best creative teams in Delhi. What really ruins your relationship with your client is when you try to short-change them, when you are dishonest with them. And we are very clear we do not want to do that.

Q. What are the steps you have taken to improve the creative product?

A. Our fundamental product is creative; there is nothing else we can sell. Creative is not about mass media campaigns. I see us giving creative solutions, whether it comes out as a mass media campaign, as an event, or as a piece of strategic thinking. I would like us to be creative across that whole band. That is what we are heading for - providing creative media solutions, creative direct marketing events.

I won't say that we would be among the Top 3 or Top 5; but in terms of the quality of work I would like Publicis to be seen among the top three or four agencies.

Q. Awards are the widely used currency to measure an agency's creative mettle. Do you subscribe to this currency? Internationally Publicis, Leo Burnett and Saatchi are among the top grossers at awards ceremonies. What's holding back Publicis in India?

A. I think that is a fair judgement; but what I think is really important is that awards should come for 'relevant' work. What I mean by relevant work is that the creative solution applied to a certain brand should actually have worked towards building the brand's sales. The award should be for mainstream work, not for something you have not seen or heard of till it wins an award. These are what we call 'patli gali' ads. These are actually messing up the awards.

I guess, the yardstick by which ads are allowed to enter awards needs to be changed. There should be stricter norms defining what is mainstream work and what is not. The work should be a commercial success for it to qualify for the awards. When that happens I would be fully gung-ho about awards.

This is not to say awards are not important. They are important because they give you recognition for the quality of work that is possible.

For us the journey has just begun. Nothing is holding back Publicis in India; it will take some time for our work to emerge.

Q. How would you assess the performance of the agency in terms of billings and revenue? What are the objectives for the coming (calendar) year?

A. The big thing is that a huge turnaround has been affected at Publicis in such a short period of time. When I joined the agency, we recorded billings of Rs 40-50 crore (2001-2002); now we are close to achieving our target of Rs 140 crore for 2003-2004. We are a force to reckon with today; people want to join Publicis.

In about two months of my joining the agency, Nestle moved the Maggie business to us. In the last year or so, HP has moved its entire business to us. (Part of the HP business is with Saatchi & Saatchi, Bangalore.) Today we have quadrupled our business from HP. From just one brand of L'Oréal, we have the entire Garnier range today. Again from January 2004 we would handle L'Oréal's Synergie range. In effect, the part of the L'Oréal business that is not handled by McCann-Erickson and was splintered among different agencies, has moved to us.

Q. Are you thinking of setting up an office in Bangalore? That might help you pick up the HP bit that seems to be eluding Publicis...

A. We have a lot of business in Mumbai and Delhi - our two key centres. Till we have our core right, there is no point expanding and stretching our resources. Our focus was to get the internationally aligned businesses and simultaneously inculcate an ability to handle the business in terms of talent, processes, resources and knowledge. Of course, that required huge upgradation in terms of manpower. Which also meant looking at advertising in a completely different way.

Q. You just said Publicis' approach to advertising was different earlier. Could you elaborate on this point?

A. It is just that the agency did not have sufficient knowledge of clients, brands, clients' markets, their consumers. But the fact is, the whole business of advertising is based on knowledge. It is also important that the talent pool you have should be able to convert that knowledge into ideas, strategy, advertising etc. The first step towards implementing that change in the agency required adjustments such as changing the way art is perceived, strategic planning is perceived and things like that.

Q. Did the agency mindset bother you in the early days?

A. Not at all. I knew where I was joining. I had encountered a similar situation when I joined Trikaya Grey (now Grey Worldwide). Great brand name, but Trikaya Delhi had lost a lot of equity. The same thing happened when I walked into McCann-Erickson, which was just beginning its life. That really interested me. Once McCann-Erickson became a big agency I started getting bored. Euro-RSCG was also fantastic in that context. I like chaos. Publicis was the best in that respect. Here was an agency that presented tremendous opportunity to create something.

When the structures are solid in an agency, you are either carrying on a legacy or managing incremental growth. All my four assignments have been fantastic for me in that respect.

Q. After the turnaround, how would you best describe the strengths and weaknesses of Publicis in India?

A. We have two strengths. One, we are young, so nothing is cast in stone for us. Two, we are very open in terms of looking at people, structures, solutions etc. Because we are small we are flexible enough to adapt and change fast. The energy levels are very high. That is a huge strength.

Our weakness would probably be our size. We are a small-to-medium agency. The breadth of experience in terms of the clients we have handled is still not that much. We have a small clutch of clients and we need a bit more time.

Q. Where do you see Publicis headed now that you have turned the agency around and put together a strong team?

A. Until you have all your aligned clients with you, you do not have much of a face to go outside and tell people that you want to handle their business. I think we are putting the foundation of a good agency in place. I like the way things are shaping up, the culture is developing, the focus, the kind of attitude our people have. Our people are very collaborative and very transparent.

If someone is upset with another person, the attitude is such that the problem is sorted out in the open rather than behind one's back. What really frustrates me is when the attack is on the person and not the issue. This is really sad and eventually affects work. These may seem trivial matters, but to ensure smooth functioning of an agency they need to be tackled in time.

We have gained substantial business and yes we have lost some business too. The problem is when you lose business you also lose equity because these clients say bad things about you. So our focus is on developing business without getting overly greedy. That is because we are not here for the short run. We are clear that the growth we have registered has to be managed well and stabilised before we start pitching aggressively for new business. In any case, we are happy to be growing at 40 per cent. It is just that we have worked out our priorities in that manner.

Q. Talking about aligned businesses, they could become one's undoing as well. It did set Euro-RSCG and McCann-Erickson back at different points in time. Please comment.

A. You do live with the fact that one day you would have to give up a business because internationally the business may move to another agency. You must look at them like this. The aligned businesses can fuel the growth of your agency. Once you have added that valuable fuel, the agency should diversify and expand. You need to put a good mix of businesses together so that when one of the aligned businesses move you know that the agency is not going to be affected substantially.

That is the reason why we have two agencies - Publicis and Ambience Publicis. So that the aligned business gets distributed between two agencies. As a result, the dependence on aligned businesses is not so high and none of the agencies are vulnerable anymore.

January 5, 2004
New Delhi
You can write to Param Saikia at
param.saikia@delhi.publicisindia.com