Devika Seth Bulchandani is a known name in the world of advertising. Currently serving as the North American President for McCann WorldGroup, where she has been for the last 26 years, she is slated to take over as Chief Executive Officer of Ogilvy North America and the global chairwoman of advertising soon. Besides advertising, Devika has done commendable work to promote social change and gender equality, especially as one of the movers behind the ‘Fearless Girl’, the bronze sculpture placed across the New York Stock Exchange.
When asked about how it all happened and the message it sends across, Devika said, “There is a very interesting dynamic going on in the world. One thing that we are seeing all over the world is that trust in governments is declining. But, at the same time, we are seeing consumers and people expecting companies, corporations and brands to make a much bigger impact in society. What we do is to work with a lot of brands and clients to figure out what is at the intersection of what they do, from a business perspective, and how that can actually create some aspect of social or societal change.”
“The Fearless Girl was with one of our clients, State Street Global Advisors. They are an asset management company and had some research which said that when you have more women on corporate boards, companies do better. I just want to pause for a moment and say this is not about having women because it is the right thing to do, but because they are actually effective when it comes to business results. They had the data to prove it and they came to us to say that they needed to do something and draw attention to this fact so that more companies would get women on corporate boards. As opposed to doing a print ad or digital banner, which is what you would do for an asset management company, we went about it differently. It was going to be one of the few things that an advertising agency did that is never going to be taken away. Most of what I do, my grandchildren will never hear about but the Fearless Girl is going to be standing there even when my great grandchildren are around,” she added.
Emphasising the message behind the campaign, Devika expressed, “We started by putting the Fearless Girl across the Charging Bull. The bull is a representation of the masculinity that prevails over all of corporate America and the world. And here is an 8 or 10-year-old girl and she has her hands on her hips in this power stance, looking the bull in the eye to say, ‘I’m here and we have a position in the same sphere as you do.’ I’m really proud to say that more and more women now have seats on corporate boards. That is the result of this dialogue. Advertising today is not just about promoting a product but it is about creating conversations around issues that we need to address as a society and as a world.”
On being asked how advertising has changed amid the pandemic, Devika said, “I think it was March 12 when US went into lockdown. The following Sunday, I got a call from somebody on our team as everyone on the team wanted to do something. We came up with a campaign called ‘I stay home for’. It was just a hashtag. We got Kevin Bacon involved because he does ‘six degrees of separation’. And then people were just holding up signs that said ‘I stay home for’, with things like ‘I stay home for my kids’, ‘I stay home for my mom’, etc., and it got a lot of traction. So, advertising, communication, ideas and creativity can play a massive role in all aspects of behaviour change—be it for making people buy a product, which is traditional advertising, or be it making for people to do something that is good for them or raising awareness about a bigger social issue like the role of women in corporate boards. It runs the gamut.”
Reflecting on how one should see the conversation on social media in respect to hate speech and making one’s own voice heard, Devika said, “What happens very often is that we start to think about the medium first rather than the objective. The minute you start with the medium, you are doomed for mediocrity somewhere. At the end of the day, you have to think about what the objective is and what we want human beings to do. If I want to get from South Delhi to North Delhi, I can take a car, a bicycle, a scooter, an auto or hitchhike. It’s all going to get me there. The question is about what is the right method, how much time do I have, what I am trying to achieve. We tend to forget this when we think about the whole digital revolution.”
But how does one manage the noise along the way? Devika said, “That’s what I have to think about when I think about a campaign. Am I trying to create noise, what is my objective, do I want to get somewhere really fast or, while I am getting there, do I want 20 other people to hitchhike with me? It is the objective that really matters and I think we don’t pay enough attention to it. Every medium has a role. Just because a new medium comes up, we tend to think that it is the only thing that everybody cares about. That’s not true. We have done very successful things for clients that have a Gen Z audience with TikTok, but we have also done really successful things for clients with the most archaic medium called a bronze statue. It is possibly one of the most famous advertising ideas of all time. You have to think about what the objective is and what you are trying to achieve, before you think about what the right medium is.”