Hasta La Creative!

Following up on yesterday’s rumors of big staffing changes at Rosetta, we’ve acquired an internal email from Eric Healy, the former SapientNitro executive who joined the agency in February and replaced Tom Adamski (now with Razorfish) as its CEO earlier this month.

In short, a large-scale executive-level shakeup did indeed occur this week, and the agency’s creative lead was not the only party who has, in the memo’s words, “decided to leave.” Departing executives include:

• CCO Lars Bastholm
• Head of consulting Jay Lichtenstein
• Tech lead Grant McDougall
• VP of UX Jason Zimmer
• Managing Partner/PMO Jeff Thaler

The note also includes news of multiple promotions. Most prominently, North American CCO Alex Mahernia will become Rosetta’s new Global CCO.

We’ve included the full email after the jump.

(more…)

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While we’re not sure at this point if this is new Rosetta chief creative officer Lars Bastholm‘s doing, we have received confirmation that the Publicis Groupe-owned agency has parted ways with executive creative director, Dave McClain, who worked out the Los Angeles office. Here’s a brief statement from Rosetta: “Dave McClain and Rosetta have parted ways. We are truly grateful to Dave for the huge impact he had on the agency in the last 3 years and wish him all the best in his future endeavors.”

To address the tips we’ve received this afternoon, from what we’ve been told, there have been no other ECD departures to report as of yet. As for McClain, the creative served as an art director early on in his career at the likes of Saatchi & Saatchi and Deutsch before moving into senior CD roles at Razorfish and Blitz.

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After seemingly staying off ad land’s grid for the past year, Lars Bastholm has returned full-force to the industry as he’s now assuming the first-ever global chief creative officer position at Publicis Groupe-owned agency, Rosetta. Last we heard from Bastholm, well, besides his regular Facebook posts that is, the creative exec left his gig as CCO at Cheil USA a year ago and headed to the West Coast.

Now, as global CCO, Bastholm will indeed remain out west and lead his creative department out of Rosetta’s L.A. office. By now, you’re probably well-acquainted with Bastholm’s resume, but we’ll regale you anyways. Prior to his yearlong stint at Cheil, Bastholm spent two-and-a-half years at Ogilvy, where he last served as CCO (and gave us this memorable moment in the process). During his career, Bastholm of course also spent nearly five years at AKQA, during which time he helped launch the agency’s New York office. In a statement, the new Rosetta global CCO says, “I’m looking forward to joining a group of hungry and passionate colleagues at this very exciting time of growth and expansion for Rosetta. Rosetta has been flying somewhat under the radar in the agency community, but its growing global client roster and outstanding work ensures that it won’t be for long.”

Bastholm will officially assume his global CCO role at Rosetta on 11/11 and will oversee creative for the likes of Marriott, Luxottica, Allergan and some yet-to-be disclosed “major technology clients.”

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