Conquering creative: Deloitte Digital Australian boss Esan Tabrizi on how marketers missed digital amid brand, advertising focus; 1,400-strong team; CX, personalisation lessons and the push for creativity

Agency executives have long dismissed the big consulting firms’ attempts to embrace creativity and creative services for their end-to-end professional services offerings, but Deloitte Digital is hard to ignore. It has 1,400 people across its operation, encompassing tech, customer experience, strategy, product, growth and more, and it has now arguably conquered creative – topping Campaign Brief’s The Work list earlier this year. Head of Deloitte Digital Australia Esan Tabrizi says advertising is not his team’s end game, but rather being a full-service provider of customer outcomes – which may include advertising – are his focus. But creativity and creative thinking is now at the top of Deloitte Digital's agenda. In this conversation, Tabrizi also unpacks how marketers missed the boat on tech over the past decade, leading to the rise of Chief Digital, Chief Customer and Chief Growth Officers. But the next generation of gun CMOs, he says, will be much more tech savvy, and won’t get caught up in the tech stack wars. And perhaps most interestingly, current CMOs can learn from government on CX and personalisation - who would have thought?

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