SevenTwenty Perth appoints former Mark M&C Saatchi MD Glynn Honey as head of effectiveness

SevenTwenty in Perth has appointed experienced senior executive Glynn Honey (pictured) to a new role as head of effectiveness.

Honey has been in the marketing industry for 25 years, the last 15 in senior executive roles in the UK, US, Asia and Australia. He has had an extensive career in digital and was previously MD of M&C Saatchi’s digital agency, Mark. He was also the MD of Isobar in 2009 and has led digital and media strategy for blue-chip clients including Google, Optus, Commonwealth Bank, Red Bull, HSBC and Heineken.

He recently returned to Australia after a successful three-year stint in South East Asia, where he ran media agency Maxus for GroupM.

Honey will work with CEO Allen Smith to steer SevenTwenty’s pivot into a talent and commercial effectiveness practice. He will also champion SevenTwenty’s ‘Cognitive Culture’, an AI driven platform / dashboard that measures the sentiment and culture of an organisation in real-time.

Smith said Honey’s appointment and the company’s pivot was a response to the changing business environment, and aimed at providing an even more relevant service for SevenTwenty’s clients.

Says Smith: “The talent market has been disrupted due to automation and AI – none more so than the current industry sectors we service, where a significant percentage of the world’s jobs will be replaced and automated within the next five years. It no longer makes commercial sense for organisations to hire more people when in reality that is sometimes a barrier to success and profitability.”

Smith added that many industries still operate on outdated commercial models particularly around hiring and managing talent.

“These approaches are no longer relevant in our age of disruption. Some people argue we have evolved with new tools and software but in reality, that is not an evolution of thinking but rather enabling us to do ‘more of the same’ more efficiently. We will look to offer sourcing the right talent as a free value-add service where possible, and adopt a commercial model where we are held more accountable for cultural effectiveness and improving our clients’ bottom lines. 2018 is a time for change and we look forward to leading it.”

Honey said it was quickly apparent he and SevenTwenty CEO Allen Smith had a shared sense of purpose after their initial meeting.

Says Honey: “We both came from industries- recruitment and agencies – that had become synonymous with negative sentiment, lack of perceived value and diminishing relevance for our clients. Both outwardly ‘eulogise’ the need for change whilst resisting or paying lip service to any change in our own tired models. We both wanted to disrupt those models and bring some pride back into those great services.

“Our shared purpose was to focus on driving effectiveness in everything we do, applying precision data, appropriate technology, strategic analytics and value based transparent thinking to every client and talent interaction. Using our shared experiences, pains, skills and humanistic values, we are determined to bring back the value in our partnerships and meet the change our clients, talents and consumers in general are now demanding. To meet this need for a new, relevant way of thinking we have a few surprises up our sleeves that could really have a positive impact on the way we all interact and even think about talent, purpose, culture, growth and success. I’m looking forward to making a real difference.”