Katie Rigg-Smith, WPP ANZ chief strategy officer, will depart WPP after 26 years with the global media company.
In an internal staff email seen by Mediaweek, Rose Herceg, WPP country president of Australia and New Zealand, commended the now outgoing WPP ANZ chief strategy officer for her contributions to the company and its brands over the decades.
Herceg said: “Katie is strategically brilliant, razor-focused in her thinking, considered and quite simply one of the most thoroughly decent people I have ever met.
“I am very sad to announce that Katie will be leaving WPP. I will miss Katie enormously; I know that all of us will.
“I know she will continue to be a force. The value she provides is immediate and substantive. At a strategist with gravitas and a futurist who reads quantitative data far better than most, I know Katie will thrive.”
Rigg-Smith recalled her career journey with the Group: “I was straight out of university when I started and never in my wildest dreams did I imagine the adventures that would await me for the next 26 years. It has been an absolute blast and I have loved every minute of it.
“I can’t possibly thank every single person who has impacted my career, so I won’t try, but I would like to say a massive thank you to the CEOs (Aimee, PV, Maria, Pippa, Sally, Tom T, BV, Steve, Trisha, Dan, Justin) and the fabulous WPP team (Morag, Tim, Phil, Paul, Brett, Hilary, Lucy, Eva) for all the love, laughs and support in the role over the last 3 years.
“And then there is the force of nature that is Rose Herceg, who has fundamentally changed the course of my career in the best possible way! I am indebted to her for her mentoring, teaching and being the one to challenge me to step into the space of a futurist, with the strategic foresight to pursue this passion going forward. Thank you doesn’t quite sum it up.
“As Rose says I am still here until the end of May, so I hope to say farewell to as many of you as possible before then.”
Katie Rigg-Smith on leadership and career journey
Rigg-Smith’s career began as a media buyer with Mindshare in 1999. She rose through the ranks as National Chief Strategy Officer in 2010 and then CEO in 2013.
She stepped down from the CEO role at Mindshare to the reins as Chief Strategy Officer, Australia and New Zealand at the GroupM parent company working closely alongside Herceg, WPP country president of Australia and New Zealand.
Rigg-Smith will officially wrap up her duties on Friday, 30 May.
Rigg-Smith is known across the industry for her work with clients and pitches, as well as trends presentations, on strategic briefs, on workshops, on keynotes – and on mentoring.
In 2023, she featured on the Mediaweek Academy panel where she discussed having a Leadership/Management mindset. Rigg-Smith hoped that attendees took away from the discussion that leadership is a journey. “It’s the best way to learn about yourself and how you are when you’re leading others. But it’s also genuinely about bringing out the best in other people,” she said at the time.
Top image: Katie Rigg-Smith