Investigating whether UK advertising agencies are high-performing organisations (HPOs): a comparative study of the perception of managers and non-managers

The importance of understanding the factors that contribute to high-performing advertising agency has grown substantially. This is partly due to a highly competitive industry and bigger brands which has historically fuelled this industry moving away from the use of agencies. Therefore, to combat this issue, many agencies are turning focus to enhancing productivity within their teams to maintain their market positions. There is currently no universal framework or toolkit for agencies to implement which will ensure success, but rather ‘general’ frameworks and studies, which can be amended and applied. For this research paper, the HPO framework developed by Andreé de Waal has been adapted to fit advertising agencies within the UK and to gain an understanding of where the downfalls potentially are. The study segmented managers and non-managers to establish, if any, difference in responses in regards to the HPO questions between the two groups. The semi-structured interviews were conducted online through email and Google Forms (n = 8) using 25 questions adapted from the original HPO framework. The results were very mixed, but three participants consistently scored highly (two managers and one non-manager). Their average scores were over 8 (out of 10) which can indicate that they are working within HPOs. Otherwise scoring of the other participants were consistently lower and issues came to light about each factor. The findings highlighted a number of areas for agencies to consider when focusing on improving their performance both financially and non-financially. Finally, the study considered implications of these findings, limitations of the research as well as suggestion bs for future research within this field