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For veteran marketer Jerri DeVard and many of her fellow Black Executive CMO Alliance (BECA) members, the annual pilgrimage to Cannes Lions is one that, in the past, felt like it was missing something.
“Cannes is like our Super Bowl, our Davos, our Allen & Co.,” DeVard said. “Whatever you think about as the ultimate summit, that’s what Cannes is for creatives. And so, when you think about how organizations are changing and examining and interrogating their results around representation, that is showing up in Cannes.”
The annual festival’s historic lack of diversity was just one of many reasons why the former evp and chief customer officer of Office Depot—who previously served as its CMO, and whose 30+ year career also includes leadership roles at ADT, Nokia, Verizon, Citibank and other blue-chip corporations—founded BECA in April 2021.
Another was the tragic murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police in May 2020, a tipping point that began a new era of reckoning for brands and led to a seismic shift in attitudes toward DEI across the globe. It also birthed a movement of Black leaders and creators proactively taking the reins to enact change once the novelty of performative allyship wore off.
“I don’t think the George Floyd family will ever truly understand the depths to which he changed the world,” DeVard told Adweek.
BECA’s first order of business was the launch of The BECA Playbook, a two-year program designed to develop mid-level managers, called Future Leaders, based on the organization’s core pillars: “To share, learn, elevate and pay it forward.”
The Future Leaders of BECA and Cannes
BECA now includes 38 Black C-suite executives from companies including Mars Wrigley, Unilever, Marriott and Progressive. Eighteen members will be in Cannes this year, joined by eight Future Leaders who will present at various venues including the Palais Forum, Cannes Can: Diversity Collective’s Inkwell Beach, Stagwell’s Sport Beach, MediaLink Beach and The Female Quotient Equality Lounge.
It is a proven fact: More diverse organizations lead to better business outcomes.
Kenny Mitchell, CMO, Levi’s
BECA, along with its corporate partners, fully sponsored the trips—including airfare, hotel, registration and meals—for the group, who bested 21 fellow program participants in a competition.
“I just want to take it all in,” said Amanda Mitchell, one of the winning Future Leaders. “You see the pictures. You read about it. It’s hard to understand exactly just what you’re going to experience when you get there,” added Mitchell, who is director of wireless growth at AT&T and was nominated by AT&T CMO Kellyn Smith Kenny.
