Omnicom Oceania has struck a multi-year partnership with the MiniMBA in Marketing, committing to rolling out the program across its client-facing leadership teams at scale in what it describes as an industry-first move.
The initiative will see more than 1,000 employees complete the MiniMBA over the coming years, marking one of the largest coordinated investments in marketing capability across Australia and New Zealand.
The partnership forms part of Omnicom Oceania’s broader evolution beyond a traditional media and creative model, positioning it as a marketing and customer transformation business.
The move comes as marketers face growing pressure to deliver growth across increasingly fragmented channels and audiences, with a sharper focus on effectiveness and measurable outcomes.
Nick Garrett, CEO of Omnicom Oceania, said the initiative is designed to embed a consistent approach to marketing effectiveness across the organisation.
“Marketing has become more complex, and the expectations on CMOs have expanded significantly,” said Garrett.
“For a long time, the industry has focused on extracting value from customers. The real opportunity now is creating more value for them, and that requires a different level of thinking.
What sets the partnership apart, Garrett said, is its scale – moving beyond selective training to a network-wide capability build.
Rather than investing in small pockets of talent, Omnicom Oceania is embedding the program across its entire client-facing leadership cohort to create a consistent approach to marketing effectiveness across disciplines.
Nick Garrett
“We’re not investing in capability for a few; we’re embedding it across our entire client-facing leadership,” Garrett said.
He said the move is designed to underpin the group’s broader ambition to build a culture centred on effectiveness, supported by tangible investment rather than intent alone.
“We talk a lot about building a culture obsessed with effectiveness, but you can’t do that without backing it with real investment.”
The outcome, he added, is a more aligned organisation – one where teams operate from a shared set of principles, definitions and benchmarks when measuring success for clients.
“This means all our leaders, no matter what discipline, not only have far deeper knowledge, but are singing from the same hymn sheet, using the same definitions and benchmarks of success for our clients”.
Investment targets consistency and growth outcomes
For employees, the program is positioned as a long-term investment in capability, while for clients it is expected to translate into more consistent, evidence-based decision-making and improved marketing performance.
Mark Ritson said the scale of the rollout is unusual within a single organisation.
“You don’t often see this level of commitment to marketing effectiveness within a single organisation,” said Ritson.
Ritson framed the partnership as less about training and more about standardisation – embedding a consistent way of thinking across markets, clients and teams at scale.
“This is about embedding a consistent way of thinking at scale across markets, clients and teams, and that has the potential to materially lift the standard of marketing in the region,” he said.
He added that the impact of the program lies in its ability to improve decision-making across the organisation, rather than in isolated gains in capability.
“This isn’t training for training’s sake. When you put more than a thousand people through a rigorous, evidence-based program like the MiniMBA, you’re improving decision-making at scale.”
That, in turn, is expected to flow through to a stronger strategy, more disciplined budget allocation and clearer commercial outcomes for clients.
“That leads to better strategy, better allocation of budget, and ultimately, better commercial outcomes.”
Ritson said the program’s track record suggests immediate impact, with the majority of participants seeing tangible improvements in their marketing capability.
“We know that around 95% of participants don’t just enjoy the program; it makes them a better marketer almost immediately.”
With that level of capability embedded across teams, he said the opportunity for Omnicom Oceania to lift client outcomes is significant.
“It’s exciting to think about what Omnicom Oceania will be able to deliver for clients with this level of capability embedded across its teams.”
Focus on effectiveness and ROI
The MiniMBA, developed and taught by Ritson, focuses on brand strategy, commercial marketing fundamentals, effectiveness and return on investment, with an emphasis on evidence-based decision-making.
Omnicom Oceania said the investment is designed to strengthen its ability to deliver measurable client growth, while supporting its own long-term expansion across the region.
Main image: L-R: Mark Ritson, Nick Garrett, and Kim Hamilton