Tension between ad agencies and media specialists

While addressing delegates at AdAsia 2001, Proctor said that the tension was just a phase that they were going through, similar to what has been experienced by other service industries that have undergone restructuring, such as banking and management consultancy.

He maintains that the biggest reason for the tension is due to the question of which company (ad agency or media specialist) should take the lead, starting and dominating the more sophisticated communications planning. In Proctor's opinion, though, ideas could come from anywhere, meaning that the most successful media agencies and ad agencies would be those which did not get hung up about structures, which clients did not care about, anyway. "In their attitude and behaviour, they will be flexible and happy to work with anybody," he said.

He also doesn't expect the media function to reintegrate into the ad agencies, saying, "the economies and benefits of scale (of media specialists) will outweigh the perceived economies of integration, and integration will now have to become a real working habit rather than a domestic or real estate arrangement. We really have gone past the nirvana where the ‘ideal’ agency is divided into multi-disciplined brand teams offering a holistic view of every problem. But we can and should re-create these teams from the different addresses we now inhabit."