• by Richard Whitman , Columnist, October 17, 2013

In San Francisco yesterday,The 3% Conference kicked off. The purpose of the conference is to call attention to the fact just 3% of creative directors are women and to address how that can be changed. Ironically Adrants is in San Francisco covering the conference and noted former BBH U.S. Founder Cindy Gallop gave the opening keynote in which she told attendees that most creative work targeting or featuring women is "being played back through the male gaze." Gallop's call to action was not to help women find ways to make it in a man's world but for the industry to change its old boy's club ways to better suit the needs of women without, of course, excluding the needs of men. Some agencies, such as VML and Eleven have put programs into place that focus on encouraging more women to join the advertising ranks and to ease their way back in after having taken time off to raise children. And in terms of improving the creative process, The 3% Conference Founder Kat Gordon suggested female representation/diversity issues should be addressed upfront in the creative brief so there are no "where are the women/men" issues later in the process.

Public relations firm Edelman, which is big on content creation for its clients with its Creative Newsroom approach, has reached out to advertising agency talent to bolster its content needs. The PR shop has hired former BBDO New York EVP of Integrated Productions Drew Vogelman as its director of creative production in New York. Of its Newsroom offering, Edelman President and CEO Mark Hass said, “Content and storytelling are at the heart of how we help our clients build meaningful relationships with their audiences. Through our Creative Newsroom we partner with them to produce real-time content and plan compelling narratives to ensure they maintain and deepen those relationships over the long-term.”

MRM New York has bid adieu to VP Account Director Tina Braun and Senior Integrated Project Manager Danielle Penn. Reports state it was the agency that asked the pair to leave. Both Braun and Penn have many years of experience with Braun having spent a decade at McCann Erikson and MRM in various account management roles and Penn spending several years at mcgarrybowen as senior digital project manager. AgencySpy has been told the cuts are the first of several to come. 

Agency buys pod people! Boston-based Connelly Partners has announced a merger with Lexington-based Pod Design, a seven person shop that specializes in viral marketing, app design and mobile games. Terms were not disclosed but Pod Design employees will relocate to Connelly's Boston offices. Of the merger, Connelly Partners President Steve Connelly said, “I have been relentlessly pursuing Pod Design and my friend Steve Curran for a long time, and I’m elated that we’re all now part of the same family. This gives us even more digital and development depth than we had before.  But the big win is our ability to provide clients with best-in-class digital engagement experiences.” The merger is the second in recent months for Connelly Partners which teamed with travel and hospitality agency ISM in August.

In sad agency news today, Joseph Crowley, founder of Buffalo-based ad agency Crowley Webb and Associates died October 14 at the age of 78. Crowley co-founded the agency in 1986 with John Webb. Crowley, who it seems, was a goofball of sorts, had no office phone and enjoyed giving out public pay phone numbers of nearby payphones to take calls.

Carat Global Network has hired Sanjay Nazerali as chief strategy officer. Nazerali comes to Carat from BBC where he was global director of marketing, communications and audiences (whew, what a title). Prior to BBC, Nazerali held positions at MTV Europe and led the Viacom Europe Marketing Council. In his new role, Nazerali will be charged with strategy, insight and thought leadership across all global Carat properties.