Focus on Partnerships, Not Paychecks: Why Agencies Must Reinvent Themselves

Episode notes

In this week's episode of Adspeak by ADWEEK, host Alison Weissbrot, Executive Editor at ADWEEK, leads a BrandWeek panel featuring Nadja Bellan-White , Group CEO at M&C Saatchi, Coltrane Curtis , Founder and Managing Partner at Team Epiphany, and Kern Schireson , Chairman and CEO at Known. Together they discuss the need to redefine agency-client partnerships. As budgets tighten and AI reshapes workflows, they explain why legacy and fee-based models are no longer viable. Instead, success hinges on empathy, trust, and aligned incentives tied to outcomes. The panel shares practical strategies, from embedding test-and-learn budgets to understanding board-level pressures and deploying agile “tiger teams.” They emphasize deeper specialization, real human connection, and shared accountability as the foundation for resilient, high-performing partnerships in a rapidly evolving marketing landscape.