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Susan Treacy's avatarPerson

Susan Treacy

EVP, Executive Creative DirectorEnergyBBDO

Chicago, IL

Member Since November 2021

Skills

Advertising
Creative Strategy
Creative Direction

About

Susan got in the advertising business to let her creative spirit out and to tackle big, complicated marketing problems. She always begins from a place of respect for our consumer’s time and intelligence with brand acts, content, and ideas they want to engage with emotionally. Leading innovative teams at top creative agencies BBDO, Leo Burnett, FCB, Fallon and TBWA/Chiat/Day, she developed creative platforms to build meaning into multinational brands at P&G, Kellogg’s, adidas, Levi's and Citi. She facilitates design thinking work sessions and creative problem solving sprints to solve brands' toughest problems. She believes purpose-based brands earn their share of voice through authenticity, transparency, and credibility, not simply large budgets. An advertising industry thought leader, Susan's work has been recognized at Cannes, One Show, and Effies. She is also is a regular judge with the industry shows as well, including Jury Chair for Writing at D&AD. When not working, she's an eternal student of the food world and ever-evolving digital landscape. In 2021, she founded Foodscrolling, a food advocacy idea lab, that uses the team's marketing expertise to promote healthy in-season, local foods.

Published content

The art of listening: Unlocking innovation and creativity

article

If you find yourself hearing but not listening, there are some strategies to adopt to make sure you are truly understanding.

Diving deep: Tips for choosing one creative solution out of a sea of ideas

article

The most effective creative processes from tech startups, innovation, and marketing are iterative, with incremental learnings that are the bowling gutter bumpers messily leading you to a mind-blowing idea. 

Is creativity a gift or a skill? Thinking of new ideas can actually be practiced

article

Once you have a mountain of ideas, you may find that then, out of nowhere, lightning can strike.

The creative genius of diverse teams

article

However you bring different kinds of teams together, employees find it energizing and even mind-opening.

Navigating The Dynamics Of A Remote Workplace

expert panel

Remote and hybrid workplace environments are here to stay. Prior to the COVID-19 global pandemic, most executive leaders were accustomed to managing their employees in-office on a daily basis. Now, in the new and ever-changing virtual work world, some leaders are struggling to maintain culture and team growth like they once did.  In a candidate-driven market and with the “Great Resignation” still looming, many company heads understand that offering more job flexibility, real work-life balance, and substantial growth opportunities are key to staying ahead of the competition and attracting the best talent.  To help supervisors and staff gain confidence as they continue to navigate a growing remote or hybrid business environment, 16 Fast Company Executive Board members share strategies remote managers can use to help their virtual talent develop a thriving career and stay connected with one another.

Company details

EnergyBBDO

Company bio

The “Energy” in Energy BBDO starts with our energized people, who are not just strategically and creatively talented, but are also driven “what’s possible” problem solvers and “we, not me” collaborators. Their energy radiates to our clients and agency partners to enable powerful collaboration in service to work that energizes brands—building new brands and reinvigorating stale ones. The Work. The Work. The Work. This is the BBDO mantra, reflecting our unwavering belief that in the absence of great work, nothing else matters. We’ve long believed that the best work needs to attract attention and define the brand. We achieve our best work by tapping into meaningful aspects of people’s lives to build a distinctive idea that lifts the brand above the cluttered marketing landscape. Said simple, our work is effective, because it's powerfully brand-defining. Today, our work comes to life in a multitude of communication channels. There’s never been a better time to tell evocative brand-defining stories, or to create experiences that deliver a brand-defining idea to people in surprising, innovative ways. Stories like these live across a variety of media platforms and screens, connecting with people throughout their day. With Flare, our in-house production studio, we have the capability to create these stories more efficiently than ever before. Brand-defining experiences don’t rely on existing channels, they create their own. With a team of technologists, designers, UX, data analysts embedded into our creative teams, we’re inventing new, engaging ways to connect with people everywhere. In the past two years, our energized people led five of our clients’ brands to win Effie Awards for creativity that drove their business success—part of our role in making BBDO the world’s most awarded agency network for creativity and effectiveness and AdWeek’s 2015 U.S. Agency of the Year.

Industry

Marketing & advertising

Area of focus

Full-service creative agency
Best-in-class, global strategic and creative leadership

Company size

201 - 500

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