BBH India's Parikshit Bhattaccharya on redefining the agency, awards, and IPL

Dressed in a grey t-shirt with the BBH sheep on it and the wallpaper behind him, Parikshit Bhattaccharya appeared to be a busy yet happy camper. 

Speaking to afaqs! over a video call, a smile or grin hardly left him, but that didn’t completely hide the busy task he took on when he joined the Publicis-owned creative agency as its chief creative officer in March 2023 after spending a decade at ad agency TBWA India. 

He joined the advertising agency’s India office when most senior folks had moved on. MD and chief strategy officer Sanjay Sharma quit in 2023 as did senior vice president of strategy and Delhi office head Radhika Burman. Then MD Arvind Krishnan, CEO and CCO Russell Barrett moved on from the agency in 2022. 

Bhattaccharya, who is spearheading the agency's rebuilding efforts, marked his one-year anniversary this month. In the past 12 months, BBH India has scored around a dozen client wins such as HDFC Ergo, Upgrad, and IHCL. Its existing portfolio includes CaratLane, Red Bull, and brands from Beam Suntory. 

Over the course of the interview, he spoke about why he joined the agency, how he’s going about rebuilding the team, and among other things, why his LinkedIn bio says ‘Chief Creative Officer and Copywriter’. 

Edited Excerpts: 

What made you move to BBH after spending a decade at TBWA? 

BBH is one of the iconic agency brands, with perhaps one of the most distinct and differentiated agency positions ever. So, when the opportunity came to redefine what it could be today, I didn't have to think much. Honestly, it was not a tough decision. 

Many say BBH is past its best in the past few years. How does it influence your work especially when you’re rebuilding the agency? 

We are trying to bring meaning to what the black sheep (agency’s icon) can represent today not only in marketing and society but also in the broader context beyond just consumers and individuals.

I am a positive person and I don't really care much about what other people think. I eat, sleep, and breathe advertising. For me, crafting a narrative for BBH here and now is perhaps one of the most exciting jobs for a creative person. 

One of the biggest reasons I joined BBH is because it is backed by the muscle of Publicis. There are a lot of people who are not ready to work with BBH and it is because they are not ready for the power of Zag.

("When the world zigs, zag" is a phrase from the agency’s first-ever ad, for Levi’s.) 

But those clients now have the advantage of an amazing infrastructure of data technology, media, and PR. It is a major backing that any creative force can aspire to have today. 

Modern solutions require a massive team of people with varied skill sets and expertise united by an idea. I feel this is more possible today at Publicis with the network’s Power Of One. 

The Power Of One is Publicis’ integrated setup and this format in India has met mixed success. Are clients exhausted with advertising’s push for integration? Are we moving to specialised setups where clients get what they want rather than being offered a, b, c, and d at the same time? 

Clients are looking for solutions, and they are looking for partners who have the credibility and the repertoire to successfully bring those solutions to life. 

They want somebody who can hold it all together, but they also desire the best expertise available today. That's precisely what we can offer.

My experience in the past year has been amazing, because every client has more than 100% receptivity, and it’s a huge calling card. 

Clients want the best of everything, all the expertise but are they generous with their wallets? 

Clients who are seeking growth know they have to make investments in ideas that can get them to, you know, grow. 

Purchase is no longer linear like how it used to be back in the day. It is now a non-linear journey, and you need partners who can help you pivot, and guide you, as you move along, as you change, because the markets are changing quickly too. It has been my lived experience that we are in an enviable position. 

The Indian Premier League (IPL) is India’s biggest media property. Do you think the kind of ads we see on it justifies the investment?

It goes up and down. Okay, we got 20 seconds to play with, but those 20 seconds can serve as a gateway to a much longer experience. How do you do that? I think creators are thinking like that, marketers are thinking like that… we're fighting with the country's most entertaining property.

Are clients more interested even now in the good old brand building and storytelling, or are they looking at something more short-lived? 

All of it is equally important, but the spiritual core of the brand is the most important thing. 

So, first is having a clearly defined point of view of the brand, and then laying out a beautiful footprint of how to manage short-term jobs in long-term mandates. 

For that, you must have a clearly defined starting point and then you need an infrastructure that helps you, again, convert every short-term opportunity, but it is also feeding into long-term brand building. 

You know what people are consuming and how they are, how lives are today. So, you plot that against your grand imperatives and then you create a beautiful symphony of ideas. 

And to create a symphony, you need an orchestra, a well-versed well-oiled orchestra, you’ve been hiring people. What do you look for in them? How do you go about your hiring process?

I look at the projects people have been part of. I hire for the learning they have had from those projects. 

Our creative team today is made up of Ashwin Palkar (ECD and head of experience), Arvind Menon (ECD), Swati Balani (ECD), and Nisheeth Srivastava (ECD) who recently joined us. They all have national mandates. 

The way we are looking at it is that everyone brings a certain uniqueness, and we needed these people to come together and have a great exchange because we are chasing excellence and want everyone’s genius to contribute to a comprehensive solution.

Why does your LinkedIn bio say, CCO and copywriter? Is it your way of saying despite the glass cabins, I know my roots and this is what I'm proud of?

That's just me trying to stay as close to the work as possible. 

That's the kind of people we want, even at the leadership level, they all have their hands dirty; they're not just showing up at presentations but are actually doing the work with the team. Know your deep skill and stay super close to that deep skill. 

Are clients, when they talk about A.I., like kids inside a candy store similar to 15-20 years ago when digital marketing was the new thing? 

A.I. is making so many things possible in the solutions space. It helps creative people, especially in taking care of a lot of stuff we do not want to do. 

We often do bespoke pieces for our clients and tell them what is spiking in tech and culture and clients often know about it and say that they were thinking on the same lines. 

As far as clients go, I feel they are really on the ball. Today, it is no longer the case where you go with an idea and the other person has no idea about it. Today, it is much more collaborative which I feel is the key to success. 

You mention success and collaboration, how do you define success? Is it an award, a client win, or revenue? 

All of it (he smiles). 

First, the feeling of all of us doing something significant together because it yields maximum gains. 

Whatever the team learns during this collaborative process, they take it forward and disseminate it to others, and this is the way any lasting change you can hope for takes place. 

It is the season of advertising awards. Are they a must-have or a distraction to doing good quality work? 

I feel awards are important. There are so many great practitioners of the business who create ideas, and it is so good to just be recognised amongst them and by them. 

Agreed but we live in a world where our need for recognition is not restricted to a metal or a Lions, it could be something that we write that blows up on LinkedIn, a verified blue tick, a dream brand collab… 

It is not one at the cost of the other. Awards recognition comes at the end of your journey. 

With a piece of work or project, the first high is when you crack the solution. The second is when the client feels it is amazing, and then you make it come into the world, and people play with it and they play back their experience… these are big highs. At the end of it, you find these amazing practitioners and they also like it and it's an amazing high. 

These highs really matter because we live for them. The pride of working in this business comes when people play back your idea and you see it having an impact on people. 

IPL or Diwali, what is more interesting to you as a chief creative officer? 

Diwali could have a bit more of IPL.