12439: No Brother Or Buddy.

Campaign reported Havas Worldwide London CEO Russ Lidstone is leaving the White advertising agency as it undergoes a restructuring. Chances are, Lidstone was not a blood relative of the Bollore family or a buddy of Havas Worldwide CEO Andrew Benett. Sorry, mate!

Lidstone exits Havas amid restructure

By James Swift

Russ Lidstone, the chief executive of Havas Worldwide London, is leaving the agency amid a restructure designed to increase collaboration with its sister agency, Havas Work Club.

Havas Worldwide London and Havas Work Club are going to come together in the newly formed Club Havas Partnership in London.

The new structure is being put in place to make it easier for Havas Worldwide London and Havas Work Club to organise themselves into client-centric teams.

Daniel Floyed, who is the global brand director of Havas Worldwide London, and Martin Brooks, the joint chief executive at Work Club, will become Club Havas’ co-managing partners.

Floyed will also lead Havas Worldwide London, effective immediately, replacing Lidstone who is leaving the agency. Lidstone was not available to comment.

Havas Worldwide and Havas Work Club already share clients including Pernod Ricard, Iglo and Reckitt Benckiser, and the new structure is designed to make it easier for the agencies to pool talent and resources.

The two agencies will continue in separate offices until 2017, when they will move into a single site in King’s Cross, but in the meantime staff can move freely between the two, as client work demands.

Brooks told Campaign that the new structure was “a formalistion of what we have already been doing for some time”.

He added that, instead of “crashing the two agencies together”, like has been the case with some agency acquistions, Havas was keen to build its partnership with Work Club on “clients, people and culture”.

Andrew Benett, the global chief executive of Havas Worldwide and Havas Creative Group, added: “This unique structure is a smart way to more fully leverage Havas Work Club’s creative and strategic talent, while also giving the team complete access to the broad capabilities and talent of Havas Worldwide London.”

Lidstone has been at Havas since 2006 (when it was known as Euro RSCG London). He joined as chief strategy officer and was promoted to chief executive in 2009. Before joining the agency he was head of planning at JWT.

Havas acquired Work Club, in May 2014, locking the partners of the digital agency into a six-year earn-out that could be worth £30 million, if all targets are met.

Work Club became part of Havas Worldwide London and was part of Havas’ global “innovation inside” strategy, aimed at making digital innovation a core part of the business.