McCann Sydney replaces ECD Dejan Rasic with Jerker Fagerstrom
Fagerström charged with lifting the profile of McCann Sydney creative
McCann Sydney has raided WPP agency DT for a new executive creative director, appointing Jerker Fagerström, who replaces Dejan Rasic.
Previous to that Fagerström led the creative team at DDB Stockholm and prior to that was head of planning and a founding partner at Saatchi & Saatchi Sweden.
The move reflects a desire by the Sydney office to compete with the output of the Melbourne agency, with incumbent Rasic understood to have left several weeks ago.
McCann Sydney managing director, Adam Lee, said Rasic had left the agency to pursue other projects and that Fagerström would offer the agency’s creative output a new perspective.
“There was a very immediate aligning of minds in terms of what we valued most and what we wanted to get of the agency moving forward,” Lee said.
“I’m also a big fan of diversity in backgrounds and the fact Jerker has come from being an officer in the armed forces back in Sweden, then coming into an ECD role after having been a planner is a benefit to our company.”
Jerker said coming from DT he had learned a lot about another side of the the business and he was keen to break down the boundaries he saw in Australian advertising between above and below the line advertising.
“The one thing that fascinates me with Australian advertising is this fascination with this imaginary line between above and below that no one else in our industry enjoys,”Fagerström said.
“It’s something I have never adhered to and never appreciated myself.
“McCann is doing great, innovative work across creative, digital and media and it is an immense privilege to be part of this team.
“I am a huge believer in the potent combination of creative and technology and I look forward to working with existing and new clients to help them create great work that works.”
Lee said one of the challenges being set for the new ECD was to bring the creative output of Sydney in line with the Melbourne office of McCann, which has been on an award-winning run over the past five years, kicked off with the record-setting Dumb Ways to Die.
We make no mistake that we need to increase the profile of the work coming out of the Sydney office,” Lee said.
“McCann Melbourne has done a stellar job over the last five years off the back of dumb ways to die and Tiger Air and V-Line.”
“I want to be competing with them in terms of creative output; that is absolutely our goal. And then on top of that there is some more fundamental business metrics.”
Well done McCann’s on securing Jerker Fagg, and congrats all round.
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Interesting hire- a guy who isn’t actually a creative himself (he’s an ex account management guy), brought in to run a creative dept at McCann. He was at DT Sydney for a year and a lot of similar noise in the press at the start seemed to produce nothing creatively of note under his watch.
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The MD is blaming one of the most awarded creatives in Australia for the agency not doing good work? It takes more than a talented ECD to do great work, you need an MD who can control suits, knows what great work looks like and can persuade clients to buy it. Get a new MD and things might change
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Jerker Fagerström is the best name in the world.
I can’t believe someone gets to have that on their business card and hand it out to people.
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Congrats mate. Best of luck in the new role.
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Do you honestly believe that the CD has been your problem? Problems can’t be fixed until they’re recognised.
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DT is in DeepTrouble.
For years DT has run around, parading their substandard work as ‘the future’ while thumbing their noses at the old school ‘creative’ businesses that would soon be out of business.
But how the tables have turned. You see, countries like India and Pakistan have a whole generation of young tech heads who are very capable at doing the commodity-digital work (ie what DT does). Only their costs are a lot cheaper. And cost is the driving factor when clients decide who will build and maintain stuff that is all the same, no matter who made it.
That’s why most digital agencies are turning to old school creative ideation, and notions of storytelling, as the ‘secret ingredient’ to take them out of the digital commodity business. They need to give clients a reason to pay premium prices (in the global pricing context) – an offering of a special ingredient you cannot get in Pakistan or India. ‘Plus good sir, you’ll need the strategy and local insight to make this secret ingredient really come thrive. And it just so happens we can deliver this to you too.’
Thankfully most digital agencies have always kept a sense of ‘ATL ideation’ in their DNA. Isobar (VJs) always has done it well. Same with R/GA, Razorfish. Of course, Sputnik was ahead of its time, they intertwined both arts up front to global best in class standards.
But not DT.
They always laughed at the ‘dinosaurs’ who were on the sinking ATL ship. (ATL in itself is going down, but the methodology behind it is now what digital agencies need to keep them from competing against India’s booming tech scene.) But now it is DT whose ship is sinking.
The hiring of Jerker Fagerstrom was seen by many as DT trying to just ‘buy’ into creativity. He is a true master. He was also their first national ECD, in the pure sense, he would fix the mindset and culture so ingrained. But many suspected it wouldn’t work out. DT is in the commodity business, one guy can’t change that.
And it seems his sudden departure, just 18 months after arriving from the European leagues (the high priced international transfer if you will) – and no work to speak of in those 18 months (what has DT done inin the last 18 months?) confirms what many have been thinking.
Prologue.
Another hot rumor. Just a rumor. But possibly with WPP coming in, look for DT to be rebranded under AKQA in the near-future, who of course, could be the world best at mixing digital and ideation.
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You can hypothesise all you want. I worked at DT and culturally the business is fucked which in turn makes it near impossible to focus on doing good work. Scrap the management there and start over. Actually employ people who know how to run a business and understand process and you won’t get employees dropping like flies.
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Jerker is a great hire, congrats all around!!
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Like football teams, agencies have their great seasons and their bad ones. DT had a great run up to 3 years ago. Since then and after a succession of major losses they’ve been relegated to the “b” league. A star signing like Jerker couldn’t save them either. Time to replace coach and manager I think. Unless being a “b” league agency is more their thing.
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As someone that worked at DT before and during Jerker joined, its a stretch to call the guy a star. The creative output never lifted and we lost clients.
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