Olly Taylor promoted to Havas Creative Group Australia chief strategy officer
Olly Taylor has been appointed chief strategy officer at Havas Creative Group Australia, a newly created role that will see his remit expanded across the group, covering Host/Havas, Red Havas, One Green Bean, Havas Commerce and Havas Labs.
Taylor will lead the strategy across Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane, with his responsibilities also covering the development of IP and processes across paid, earned and owned media.
Olly Taylor, new CSO for Havas Creative Group Australia
On his appointment, Taylor said that he was hoping to carry on delivering strong work in his expanded role.
“It’s no secret strategy runs through my veins and after many years as CSO with Host and Host/Havas I’m truly excited by the opportunity to now lead our Creative Group strategy across brand, creative comms, data, CX, CRM, digital, PR, social and more. Alongside the team, I’m looking to forward to developing integrated strategies that deliver great work, meaningful impact for brands and results across the board. With such great brands in the Havas Creative Group the opportunities are plentiful.”
Taylor has been chief strategy officer at Host/Havas for 18 years, originally joining Host Sydney in 2003 as the agency’s first planning director.
Prior to joining the agency, Taylor was a planner at Fallon London. He began his career at DMB&B, also in London.
Havas Group ANZ chairman, Anthony Freedman said: “It’s rare that you have the chance to work with someone for almost two decades but it’s been a privilege to have done so with Olly. He joined Host as a young, but precociously talented brand planner and immediately made an impact, playing a key role in the agency’s success and long list of effectiveness awards. In the many years since, he’s become a complete integrated strategic thinker, a canny spotter of emerging talent, a much-respected agency leader and a very dear friend. I don’t know why we didn’t give Olly this broader role years ago…. it’s long overdue and much deserved.”
Freedman was appointed to his role four years ago, after previously founding both PR agency One Green Bean and creative agency, Host.
Last month, Taylor wrote an article for Mumbrella discussing what Australians really want from advertising, and the significant gap that exists between that, and what brands and comms are giving them.
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Calum Jaspan was news editor at Mumbrella, based in Melbourne. He was also the producer and host of the Mumbrellacast. He left Mumbrella in May 2023.
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