Leo Burnett assigns new roles to Santosh Padhi and Nitesh Tiwari

Leo Burnett recently made two significant senior level changes in its existing set-up. Santosh Padhi, creative director and national head, art, Leo Burnett, has been promoted to executive creative director and national head, art. Nitesh Tiwari, creative director, Leo Burnett, has been promoted to the post of executive creative director.

Padhi and Tiwari now fill the post of executive creative director, which was vacated by Agnello Dias, aka Aggie, when he left the agency last year to join JWT. Both Padhi and Tiwari will continue to report to KV Sridhar, national creative director, Leo Burnett.

Padhi, who has been with Burnett since 1999, comments on his new role, “My job will now be to enhance the creative reputation of Leo Burnett and bring more focus to experimentation as far as creative ideas and techniques are concerned. I will also be looking beyond execution at the overall development of various brands.”

Padhi joined Burnett in 1999 as senior art director. He went up the ladder quietly, becoming group head, then associate creative director, then creative director, followed by his most recent designation, creative director and national head, art.

Tiwari’s mandate will be to handle all the Mumbai brands. Tiwari joined Leo Burnett in October 2003 and has worked on Tide, Heinz, Hitachi Atom, HDFC Standard Life Pension Plans and Creamfills Alpenliebe, among other brands. He will have a bigger role and will lead the creative function in Mumbai.

Speaking on the need for two executive creative directors, Sridhar says, “After Aggie left us, the post was lying vacant. Mumbai is a huge market for us, contributing 70 per cent of our business. We need a rich and varied leadership at a senior level here to address our rapidly growing business and the growing needs of our clients.”

Leo Burnett also plans to hire some creative directors and art directors over the next month or so.

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