• by Steve McClellan  @mp_mcclellan, August 23, 2012

WPP media shop Maxus has created the new post of global chief strategy officer and named Lindsay Pattison to fill it. Pattison will take on the new role, while retaining her responsibilities as CEO of Maxus UK.

Pattison will initially report to Maxus Global CEO Kelly Clark, who was just promoted to North American CEO of GroupM, the WPP media oversight arm. After a transition period, Pattison will begin reporting to Vikram Sakhuja, currently CEO of GroupM India and South Asia, who has been named to replace Clark at Maxus.

The agency said the CSO role was created as a result of the growth of the agency over the last couple of years. Last year, it won two huge and transformative accounts: consumer goods giant S.C. Johnson and NBC Universal, adding close to $2 billion in new billings to the agency’s media assignments.

Last month, Maxus was named the fastest-growing global media services agency in the world for the third consecutive year by RECMA, the Paris-based media agency billings tracker. In 2011, the agency posted 44% global billings growth versus 2010, RECMA reported.
 
Given all the growth, Clark stated: “It's time to strengthen our management structure, both to ensure our clients are well-served and to prepare the agency for the next phase of development.”

Pattison has served as CEO of Maxus UK since 2009. She takes on her new duties effective immediately. She remains based in London and now takes direct responsibility for the agency's global planning, data and insights, digital, marketing and new business functions. She will also take on a role in the agency's global client relationships, the agency said. She recently joined the World Economic Forum's Global Agenda Council for the Future of Media.

Prior to joining Maxus in 2009, Pattison was managing partner at PHD UK.  Earlier, she served at Sony Ericsson. She started her career at Young & Rubicam.

Pattison is the wife of David Pattison, one of the cofounders of rival media shop PHD, a unit of Omnicom. David Pattison left PHD several years ago and is now chairman of Gravity Road, a content company based in the UK.