The legitimate expectations of our clients faced with unprecedented challenges, the necessary restructuring, the meticulous management of costs and cash and the questioning of established certainties have placed exceptional demands on the management team and the Supervisory Board which, throughout the year and the eight meetings held, provided steadfast support to the Management Board, successive action plans.
Your Group has shown a resilience that has won the admiration of the Supervisory Board. It is the contribution of each person, the individual and combined strengths of the teams that form the backbone of this resilience. Thanks to our fundamentals, built up over the years, it has been expressed to its fullest; through human values (respect for others and for cultures and origins of all diversity), through its economic and financial fundamentals, and of course, through its constantly renewed creativity.
At the height of the crisis, the Chairman of the Management Board, Arthur Sadoun, maintained a very close relationship with all Groupe employees, through weekly messages and virtual meetings addressing all the issues of this period and ensuring that the most professional and people-focused solutions were applied to each new situation. The accelerated implementation of Marcel, the internal platform, facilitated communication and working together.
This new abnormal has gradually become the norm for daily operations. Empty offices, difficulties in separating work and personal time, and the absence of social or impromptu situations were imposed on our daily lives. The legitimate expectations of our clients faced with unprecedented challenges, the necessary restructuring, the meticulous management of costs and cash and the questioning of established certainties have placed exceptional demands on the management team and the Supervisory Board which, throughout the year and the eight meetings held, provided steadfast support to the Management Board, the management team and the successive action plans.
It is due to the following, and through the continuous efforts of everyone, that satisfactory results have been achieved.
Firstly, through our innovative tools and solutions that integrate technology and data at the heart of creativity and the media, thus offering a rare alchemy between science, technology and the art of emotion. Then, with the performance of campaigns and client results, along with early competitive wins in complicated and remote pitching situations; and finally, in the economic and financial performance of the Groupe, with revenue that has certainly dipped, but much less than the market as a whole, and with a margin that has held up well.
In these circumstances, the Supervisory Board considers that the variable compensation of employees and management was well deserved, and sends its heartfelt thanks.
In these strange times when this new abnormal has become the norm and when global society is faced with huge problems: climate change, DE&I, and the fight against waste and pollution, the Group has chosen to strengthen its unwavering commitment to the consideration of Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) criteria. Significant progress has been made in this area and new objectives have been set so that your company will be an exemplary in this.
2021 is likely to be a continuation of this new abnormal, before old habits gradually return. Consumption will not pick up quickly. Confidence that the health situation is under better control will have to be established before the savings accumulated during this period are spent. Although global growth is expected to return, there is concern that the economy will be impacted in the long term. The most conflicting opinions are expressed on the strength of growth in 2021. It is wise to believe that it will only regain its full force once the health hazard has been removed, and probably not until 2022.
…the Group will mobilize all its strengths, all its talent and all its energy to enable its employees to get through this period in the best possible conditions, to enable its clients to succeed in an increasingly difficult competitive environment and to enable the company to resume its winning ways and post the best possible performance.
In this context, the only thing we can be sure of is the fact that the Group will mobilize all its strengths, all of its talent and all of its energy to enable its employees to get through this period in the best possible conditions, to enable its clients to succeed in an increasingly difficult, competitive environment and to enable the company to resume its winning ways and post the best possible performance.
The Supervisory Board has every confidence in the Group’s ability to face new challenges: an economy that is still recovering, technological developments, such as the abandoning of cookies by major players, or transformative innovations. These are all challenges that drive employees and management to excel. On the strength of all that has happened in this unprecedented and abnormal year, the Board is confident in the future and would like to thank the Group’s clients, all employees, the management team and its Chairman, and welcomes the effective tandem formed between the Supervisory Board and the Group’s Management Board.