Omnicom diversity chief Kirya Francis: inclusion requires nuance
The Media Leader Interview
Kirya Francis talks to The Media Leader about the challenges and the rewards of working as chief diversity officer for Omnicom’s Advertising Collective.
Kirya Francis is a Black, female, college-educated GenX-er. But there is so much about her identity that is missed by merely ticking boxes. She also enjoys cooking, travel, and reading, and though she lives in Austin, she has family in Houston and New York.
Those facets of identity have “more of an impact on who I am as a person,” she says.
And her background is only one reason why Francis, Omnicom Advertising Collective’s chief diversity officer, has been tasked with promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion at 13 different advertising agencies – an assignment that requires nuance and perspective as much as it does patience.
“There’s not a one size fits all,” she said to The Media Leader in an interview over Zoom.
“The challenge I have is that 13 agencies have 13 goals. Some have reached maybe their Hispanic goal, so there isn’t really a need to do any impact in recruiting for that area, whereas another agency may not have as many Hispanic employees, so that would be something that is important to them.”
Francis has been at Omnicom as their Advertising Collective’s chief diversity officer since January of 2021. Previously, she spent 20 years at Austin-based and Omnicom-held ad agency GSD&M, where she worked as VP/director of media & research technology before increasingly taking on diversity and inclusion roles, later becoming VP of diversity & inclusion, as the agency began holistically considering its practices.
Eventually, she left GSD&M to focus her sole attention on promoting DE&I throughout the holding company, an area she is deeply passionate about.
“I always say I’m very fortunate in that I get to merge my passion with my profession. Not very many people get to do that. And so I know I’m very privileged to be able to do something that I know impacts people in a positive way.”
Now, Francis is one of 40 dedicated DE&I leaders at Omnicom.
‘We can’t use a formulaic approach’
With her role comes opportunities and challenges – Omnicom owns over 1,500 agencies across its networks, of which Francis oversees 13, and they each have their own needs.
“We have to look at each individual agency,” she said.
And with such a large caseload, patience is key. Her first year at Omnicom was mostly spent merely evaluating each agency’s performance in DE&I, identifying what needed to be addressed and the best ways to go about creating change where needed.
“There’s always a feeling like you have to get everything done in the first year and it’s just physically not possible.”
But now that the evaluation stage has been completed, Francis can look toward the next phases of adjustment and implementation.
“Next year is when we’ll get more into department level opportunities,” she added.
Of course, she’s not alone in her endeavor – most agencies she oversees also have their own leaders and advocates on DE&I that provide a much-needed voice to communicate what’s working, what isn’t, and what’s needed.
And when it comes to tangible steps, Francis laid out some of Omnicom’s extant strategies for promoting DE&I in their workplace.
For one, Omnicom has six employee engagement groups, each with a focus on ensuring workers feel included and represented within the greater holding company’s leadership. They include Omniwomen for female identifying employees, OPEN DisAbility for disabled employees and their allies, OPEN Pride for LGBTQIA+, Black Together for Black employees, AcentO for the Hispanic-Latinx community, and the Asian Leaders Circle for Asian/Pacific Islander employees.
On top of that, all of Francis’ agencies have, at minimum, a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Task Force, which is meant to ensure that DE&I onboarding occurs for everyone.
“The onboarding is key in making sure that they greet with people who are part of their communities if they choose, and also at least be made aware of the employee resource groups at the Omnicom level.”
The task forces are particularly important for Francis at agencies that don’t have certain specific employee resource groups because of an existing lack of diversity – for example, at smaller agencies with only one or two Native American employees, a resource group would be unfeasible. Instead, the existence of the task force allows for advocates to take the lead on those issues.
Tangibly measuring DE&I is also complicated by how large the company is. Omnicom looks at key performance indicators that are continually reviewed to try and meet targets, but there isn’t a by-the-numbers approach that works for every agency, as Francis explains:
“For the 13 agencies that I oversee, we can’t use a formulaic approach to every single agency simply because some are further along in their journey than others, and also because of the location of where they are.”
New hybrid models, new opportunities
A granular approach is also needed as companies emerge from the pandemic into a significantly different work environment. Widespread move to hybrid models, wherein individuals only come into the office part-time (or sometimes not at all) has brought up new challenges to promoting equity in the workplace.
But the change has produced silver linings for improving diversity, equity, and inclusion in hiring, says Francis.
“Before the pandemic because everybody was in an in-work environment, you basically had to geotarget your talent. […] I think having remote or hybrid has actually increased the ability to advance diversity within the agencies because they were able to look outside of the 10-block radius of where they were located.”
However, it is still too early to project how hybrid offices will fair when it comes to DE&I, says Francis, as workplaces are still managing logistical basics such as maintaining good Wi-Fi at home and creating new seating arrangements in the office.
“[A]s we go back into the hybrid, this is where equity really comes into play. Because [we need to make] sure that people who are not in the office have the same access as people who are in the office.”
A demand for non-traditional media planning
Francis worked in media planning for 15 years before taking on her current role, and was keen to add thoughts on how the industry can and should change to not only hire and maintain more diverse perspectives internally, but to expand their audiences and their messaging externally as well.
She explained that media planners ultimately do not have the power to create advocacy themselves, as they are beholden to their clients’ needs (and finances). But that doesn’t mean there is not work to be done.
“The first thing that always has to happen, and this is what’s happening at our agencies, is an understanding of the landscape.”
“It’s about making sure that the media plan itself is reflective of the community for which that client is serving, which should reflect the US community.”
“But there are nuances to it where there are certain products and services that might be more relatable or more enticing to a consumer of a particular demographic group.”
Francis explains that with the expansion into digital rather than just traditional rating services, agencies can do more “lookalike modeling” to be able to capture and understand different sub-audiences. As one example, Francis noted that Omnicom has partnered with Equifax to look not just at race, gender, and age breakdowns, but to also understand the nuances of those communities.
“You don’t get all those nuances necessarily with traditional media planning. And so therefore, everyone’s having to level up how they’re looking at their consumer. And it’s not about just the epic or diverse communities that our agencies and our clients want to target – it’s about everyone, because everyone has a lot of nuances to who they are.”
‘It’s not always about just number counting’
Back at the office, Francis stressed that, while considering that no change occurs overnight, individuals also need to rethink how DE&I is considered.
“I think when people think about DE&I, we think about employees of color. But there are people who have neurodiversity, there are people who may not have diversity in the case of that social construct or the areas that they live in, but they still need to feel as included as everyone else.”
And to Francis, inclusion is of course more than just meeting quotas of representation. Companies must think through why and how they look to diversify.
“When it comes to diversity, equity, and inclusion, it’s not always about just number counting. It’s making sure that the people that are already there feel safe and heard. That will encourage them and others to bring people with diverse perspectives, communities, and identities into the space.”
For its part, Omnicom has sought to hold itself accountable on their DE&I progress through publicizing ongoing DE&I evaluations. Their most recent update can be found here.