Chris Cashen has been promoted to head of strategy at WPP’s GroupM Ireland. As part of a wider review, Cashen, who was formerly managing partner of Mindshare, will now be responsible for strategic delivery and leadership across all the agency brands – Mindshare, Wavemaker, EssenceMediacom and Invention. As part of his new role, he will be on GroupM’s management team in Ireland. He joined Mindshare in 2019 from Javelin.
He previously worked at Dentsu’s Carat and AFA O’Meara/McConnells. He is the current vice president of the Institute of Advertising Practitioners in Ireland (IAPI), and also sits on the AdNetZero council, and is a senior voice in the Irish media marketplace. He has been a regular contributor to Marketing.ie. GroupM have been building the structure around their strategy team since its specific CMO research in August 2023.
ADVERTISEMENT
A poll of 100 senior Irish marketers cited strategy as the foremost skill set they want to include to increase performance, followed closely by marketing effectiveness and measurement. The newly-expanded strategy team sees the appointment of Zoe Chandler as strategy manager. Chandler was an account manager for almost four years at Wavemaker and was recently accepted into the IAPI and Marketing Society’s Steps mentoring programme.
Portfolio
She joins Ciara O’Connor, strategy director (IAPI Future Female alumna, Rising Star 2023) and Lina Meshael, strategy director, who came from Dentsu earlier this year. GroupM is responsible for more than $60 billion in annual media investment globally, and over €185 million in Ireland where chief executive Bill Kinlay is in overall charge of operations. The group’s portfolio includes data and technology, and investment and services.
