ADGEEK
Why agency relevance may matter more than scale
Rishad Tobaccowala offers a global agency perspective on consolidation, AI and future work, while arguing for storytelling, provenance and emotion as sources of relevance.
The conversation
Rishad Tobaccowala considers the advertising industry after a period of consolidation and rapid AI development. He questions whether scale by itself creates relevance and argues for the continuing value of storytelling, provenance and emotion.
The conversation covers agency positioning against consultancies, agentic AI, smaller teams, more flexible workforces and a pitch approach based on perspective rather than presentation volume. These are Tobaccowala’s assessments of possible industry directions, not settled forecasts.
Key Takeaways
- Tobaccowala questions whether agency consolidation alone solves the industry’s challenges as AI changes how work is produced.
- He argues that agencies should strengthen storytelling, provenance and emotion rather than imitate consulting firms.
- The conversation considers agentic AI, smaller teams and more flexible workforces as possibilities for the agency model.
- Tobaccowala describes a pitch approach built around perspective and provocation rather than presentation volume.