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Contents
2 Acknowledgement
3 Abstract
3 Chapter 1: Introduction
6 Chapter 2: Literature review
2.1 Define advertising agencies
2.2 The influence of advertising agencies
2.3 Sustainable development in advertising agencies
2.4 Define the advertising agencies’ performance of sustainability in context
2.5 The existing framework
2.6 Literature review conclusion
13 Chapter 3: Research methodology and process
3.1 Research methodology
3.2 Research process
18 Chapter 4: Findings
4.1 Current situation
4.2 Influential factors towards creation
4.3 Personal experience and perception
4.4 Talent nurturing
4.5 Client industry and attitude
4.6 Future vision and recommendation
4.7 Conclusions from findings
25 Chapter 5: Discussion – Recommendations
5.1 Workflows
5.2 Creations and productions
5.3 Relationship with clients
30 Chapter 6: Conclusions
6.1 Conclusions
6.2 Limitations and future research
6.3 Reflection
33 References
37 Appendix - Research interview questions

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Acknowledgement
Firstly, I would like to express my special thanks to Dr. Ricardo J Hernandez, who gave me great
encouragement, as well as supervision, to help me complete this dissertation project on the topic of
sustainability. I appreciate his expertise and patience that guided me to learn in-depth knowledge of
this topic and showed me a clear path to consummate this research.
Secondly, I am grateful for gaining much support from participants, who joined in my research
activities, providing not only cherished time but also useful insights and opinions. Additionally, it
would not have been possible to carry out all the activities in such a short time without their help
and referral. I express my sincere thanks for their kindness and friendly assistance.
Lastly, I pay my deep sense of gratitude to my parents and friends who helped me a lot in finalizing
this project. Their support and encouragement gave me the bravery to overcome all the difficulties.
Especially thanks to Nicholas Roden, who with great tolerance and kind consideration, accompanied
me all the way through the entire project, as well as helping with my English language skills.

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Abstract
Advertising agencies play an important role in bringing a social and economic impact to influence
their audience and the whole of society. However, their capability and performance of implementing
and communicating sustainability seems not to be fully expressed and exhibited. This research
investigates the industrial situation from the D&AD association and ten agencies’ perspectives, by
exploring their perceptions, internal attitudes and working environment toward sustainability;
process of ideation and clients’ requirements; existing guidelines in establishing sustainable
development; and the reasons and challenges for limited performance of sustainability. The
recommendations are made based on the extensive literature review and findings from research
activities. Therefore, advertising agencies’ mindset and practices on sustainability in terms of
workflows, creations and productions and the relationship with clients can be advanced and
cultivated by following the given comprehensive recommendations.
Chapter 1: Introduction
In the report of the World Commission on Environment and Development: Our Common Future,
released by the United Nations in 1987, sustainable development has been defined as:
"development meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future
generations to meet their own needs." Following this concept, discussion has grown, along with the
increasing awareness and urgent reaction to improve economic and social performance and reduce
the environmental impact (Leonidou, 2011; Roy, 2000) and it has been considered that it matters
across all industries and in all businesses (McKay, 2013). However, the advertising industry seems
not to be involved in the sustainable development and there seems a lack of significantly intensive
or creative marketing of sustainability to the audience. This research chooses to focus on exploring
the role the adverting industry should play and investigate what the challenges and limitations they
face, to see if there is any opportunity to improve their performance of sustainability.
The definition of advertising agencies – encompassing their functions, tasks and services – is
presented to gain an understanding of the whole picture of this industry and explain how they use a
wide range of media platforms to create exposures of advertisements surrounding us in our daily life.
Then, in the literature on the influence of the advertising industry, the relative importance of the
role they have been playing has been subject to considerable discussion. Much research identifies
that the impact created by advertising agencies toward audience and society is undeniable and
significant (IBIS, 2016; Credo, 2011). A number of researchers also have reported that advertising
agencies should play an important role in providing the message of sustainability, and contribute
their creative strengths to improving quality of life (ABAP, 2011; UNEP, 2002; Lindsay, 2014b).
However, Lindsay (2013a) refers to the TGI report in his review, which shows that the audience
started to have negative impressions towards advertisements and their enjoyment dropped.
While looking closely at agencies, regarding sustainability, the self-regulation seems to be unclear
and passive (Miracle and Nevett, 1987) and employees’ personal perspectives of sustainability

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cannot be articulated clearly by themselves (Swarm, 2014). Even though many prizes have been
awarded for encouraging agencies to express creativities devoted to sustainable communication,
one existing research indicates that some advertisements appear to pay attention to sustainable
issues, but actually have no real meaning of sustainability (UNEP, 2006).
Another interesting point is that there are increasing numbers of companies (agencies’ clients)
eagerly showing their social responsibility and trumpeting their commitment towards the
environment (Lindsay, 2014b; White, 2016). They utilise different media to express their mission
statements and how they achieve their commitment. It is acknowledged that, increasingly,
companies have been considering that their partners should be able to provide consultancy and
visionary marketing plans with the mindset of sustainability. However, from the initial research,
looking at advertising agencies’ websites indicates that agencies are keen to show their creativity
and the capability of marketing integration through their websites. The creations from these
agencies posted on their websites as achievements look appealing and astonishing. Only few of
them provide the meaningful messages in a sustainable manner and there is little about their
commitment towards sustainability. It is worth investigating the reasons behind this and to see how
to improve the communication of sustainability, by facilitating agencies’ creative strengths.
Lindsay (2014a, 2013b) advocates and suggests that agencies need to accelerate their pace and take
some actions to react to this issue, through starting to establish the language and mindset of
sustainability and then to equip sustainability as a competitive advantage to gain business success in
the long term. Meanwhile, a systematic recommendation of how advertising agencies can improve
their performance of sustainability is still lacking. There is an urgent need to address the current
guidelines created by several institutions, since most of them are not comprehensive and could not
provide a holistic assistance in sustainability establishment. Moreover, there is a lack of incentives to
encourage advertising agencies to have a more aggressive agenda. Therefore, in order to encourage
advertising agencies to expand their performance of sustainability practice, it is necessary to show
firm evidence that adopting the practice can be a competitive advantage to stand out from the
crowd.
Despite the importance of advertising agencies, there remains a paucity of evidence on whether
they have implemented any sustainable guideline or mission statement. Little is known about
whether agencies can have aggressive proposals toward sustainability while against their clients’
brief and it is not clear what factors are considered when creative people generate ideas. The
evidence that recruiting new talent and marketing themselves are associated with sustainability is
weak and inconclusive. This indicates a need to understand the various perceptions of sustainability
that exist among agencies’ employees.
Therefore, four main research questions are listed below.
 What sustainable guidelines or plans have advertising agencies been following on a regular
basis?
 Do agencies have the power or opportunities to communicate sustainability in the creation,
while against the clients’ brief?
 What kind of limitations or challenges do agencies face when communicating sustainable
issues?

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 How can advertising agencies benefit from the implementation of sustainability practices?
The aim of this research is to improve the performance of implementation and communication of
sustainability, by providing recommendations for the advertising industry in the UK, further helping
sustainability to become widespread. In order to make a clear scope of work, this research focuses
on discussing sustainability in the following contexts in the agencies: the internal workflows, the
output of message communication (creations and productions), and the relationship with clients, as
well as marketing themselves to be recognized as being equipped with the knowledge and skill of
sustainability. Through making good use of the advertising industry’s creativity, the sustainable
practices might be able to deliver in their creations or on their agenda. Using the creative talent and
media power of the advertising industry can speed up the spread of the communication of
sustainability and benefit the whole of society to become more ‘socially’ conscious. In addition, this
research is anticipated to benefit agencies to become more competitive, since finding a reliable
partner equipped with the sustainable mindset for a long-term relationship becomes essential in
business.
This research uses a qualitative case study approach to investigate the present circumstance of the
advertising industry with in-depth analysis of their working process, attitudes, perspectives and
challenges they encounter toward adopting sustainability. The research data was drawn from two
main sources: one officer of the D&AD association and ten managers in charge of management,
client service and creative generation in advertising agencies. Questioning different departments’
managers aims to acquire rich dimensions of sustainable performance. The interview activities were
recorded, documented and stored with secure confidentiality. Further, in order to help to analyze
data, the coding and clustering method was used and assisted to make cross-references and cross-
comparisons among informative data and ensure they can be clearly organized.
This research provides useful insights and clear suggested directions in helping advertising agencies
to adopt or improve their sustainable performance. Other industrial associations and advertising
agencies can acquire examples and experience from this research for reflection and future
development. The overall structure of the research takes the form of six chapters. In chapter two, it
is necessary to define the following terms through an extensive review of literature: the context of
advertising agencies and their sustainable performance, and the existing guidelines on sustainable
development. The third chapter is concerned with the methodology and methods used for this
research. In addition, this chapter will briefly define who the interviewees are and how to conduct
the activities. The fourth chapter presents the findings of the exploration from association and
agencies’ perspectives. Following this, a discussion of recommendations will be proposed to help
advertising agencies to incorporate the concept as a matter of performance, while drawing around
the benefits of applying those recommendations. Finally, conclusions, limitations and
recommendations for future research will be presented.

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Chapter 2: Literature review
2.1 Define advertising agencies
It is necessary here to clarify exactly what is meant by the advertising industry. The definition of
Department for Culture, Media & Sport (GOV, 1996) states that these sectors – “Advertising,
Architecture, Art and antiques, Computer games, Crafts, Design, Designer fashion, Film and video,
Music, Performing arts, Publishing, Software, TV and radio” – have some of the following activities in
common: “the management of creativity and innovation in complex knowledge flows, a cycle from
the generation of original ideas to their realization and consumption, whether as performance,
products or service.” In their report, Albert and Reid (2011) also refer to “The work foundation’s
2007 report Staying Ahead” which makes the connection and interrelationship between all these
sectors, which aim to generate “expressive output”. Those outputs, especially from the advertising
industry, create significant impact on the economy value chain.
Albert and Reid (2011) define that the advertising industry performs the key role of creative industry,
since it uniquely produce works that:
 “Act as a catalyst for the distribution and consumption of creative outputs developed by
others;
 Commissions the production of expressive value works for campaigns including in art, design,
sound, music and media production;
 Provides content for a range of creative industries business models reliant on advertising,
such as free-to-air TV, newspaper, and many internet service”
In his report, Advertising Agencies Industry Overview, Hoovers (2016) identifies that “companies in
this industry create advertising material and place it across media such as television, the Internet
(mobile and desktop), newspapers, magazines, radio, and outdoor displays.” And he also mentions
that different scales of agencies use different approaches to win business and acquire profitability.
The main differences are small agencies focus on their creativity, flexibility and competitive fees,
whereas, on the other side, big companies emphasize their capability of marketing integration,
working closely with media buying power.
2.2 The influence of advertising agencies
The impact that agencies have is not just on individual consumption matters, but on the national
economy. In 1996, GOV concluded that: “The performance of the advertising industry has a strong
relationship to economic prosperity”. Credo (2011) claims it boosts the whole of society to become
more creative and innovative and brings a great amount of job opportunities, which further
stimulate economic growth. According to the features show on the Statista (2015), in the third
quarter of 2015, there were 151,000 employees in this industry in the United Kingdom. Another
similar report (Albert and Reid, 2011), but with more specific emphasis on ”the contribution of the
advertising industry to the UK economy”, mainly explores the importance of advertising as the
central actor of the creative industry, one that creates a significant contribution to the UK economy
and innovation development in multiple dimensions.

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Advertising plays a key role in changing audience’s opinions and behaviours (Credo, 2011; UNEP,
2002). The advertising industry has been bringing a comprehensive positive outcome to their clients,
customers, and the economy and society as whole (Credo, 2011; UNEP, 2002). They devote time and
attention to satisfy their clients’ needs and help to sell their products, so as to pursue sales and
revenue increase (Credo, 2011). In addition, the messages they create and deliver to their
consumers show a varied knowledge of products. However, Lindsay (2013a) references the Target
Group Index report, which undertook varied surveys in Britain to get the understanding from
consumers’ perspectives, and found that consumers’ enjoyment of advertisements has dramatically
dropped from 56% in 1981 to 18% in 2013.
2.3 Sustainable development in advertising agencies
Much research defines corporate sustainability as the long-term objective and pays attention to the
environmental, economic, and social impacts (White, 2016). With the effort of practitioners and
academic researchers, the topic of sustainable development and consumption has been widely
recognized and explored (Chekima et al, 2015; Roy, 2000). However, Walker (2012) points out that,
as the context of sustainability is complex and massive, most companies are unenthusiastic and
unwilling to deal with it; therefore they lack the provision of advice. As stated above, the main task
of advertising agencies is to create huge messages, which significantly influence a country in terms
of its economy and culture. Consequently, the position of this research is that, as advertising
agencies are essential to the entire society, they should play a leading role in sustainable
development. Therefore, in order to make a clear scope of work, this research focuses on discussing
sustainability in the following contexts: the internal workflows, the output of message creations and
productions, and the need to improve the sustainable business relationship, as well as marketing
themselves to be recognized as being equipped with the knowledge and skill of sustainability.
2.4 Define the advertising agencies’ performance of sustainability in context
2.4.1 Workflows
White (2016) points out that incorporating sustainability into practice is not an easy and quickly
reachable goal. The internal communication system should be established thoroughly from the top
management to every employee, so as to ensure the effectiveness of sustainable development.
While looking at the self-regulation in advertising agencies, Miracle and Nevett (1987) observe that
the typical culture and characteristics of the British is spontaneous and willing to follow regulations,
therefore, no compulsory force is needed. Conversely, Boddewyn (1989) identifies that self-
regulation has a close link with the internal employee morality and codes of conduct; however, he
mentions most self-regulations were established, either by government authority or industry
association, as a result of reflection and corrections for past market failures. Hence, this kind of
passive reaction to regulation is common in agencies, rather than a culture of aggressive
improvement (Boddewyn, 1989). It can be inferred that this disinterested behaviour and attitude
towards self-regulation might burden the motivation of improving the communication of
sustainability.
In the research of “break the silence”, conducted by Swarm (2014) in the UK, they investigate how
agencies perceive the environmental issue – climate change – and how to engage them in the

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communication of sustainability. They asked their participants who worked in the advertising
agencies: “what does the climate changes mean to you?”, “do you ever think about the role the
creative industries could play in the climate change story?”, ”is it something you’re talking about at
work?” and “are you concerned by the lack of action?” Swarm finds that those people could not
articulate the answers, even though they knew this is a serious issue that needs to be addressed.
Most participants had self-consciousness and awareness regarding the responsibility for delivering
messages to make a contribution to society; however, they mentioned that the limitation is how to
persuade their clients to buy into their ideas of communicating sustainability, which needs more
effort in establishing well-planned strategies and tools.
A broader perspective has been adopted by Lindsay (2013b) who suggests that advertising agencies
should develop the sustainable thinking, language and vocabulary, while he also recommends
creating new measurements, payments and incentive systems to reward and encourage agencies.
However, he does not fully explain or provide guidelines to help agencies to adopt the sustainable
practices.
2.4.2 Creations and Productions
Increasingly, it is prevailing that campaigns contain environmental and social issues to encourage the
audience to become more “socially conscious” about consumption (OECD, 2008). The Institute for
Sustainable Communication (ISC, 2014a) aims to promote sustainability to be widely adopted in
communication. It points out that the way the advertising industry acts will determine the results
that affect the population now, as well as future generations. Therefore, it is necessary and urgent
to take the following aspects into consideration while creating the message: environmentally
friendly material usage, economic and social issues such as equity, ethics and safety. Similarly, the
“Sustainability indicators for the communication industry” (ABAP, 2011) also identifies that
advertising agencies should have an imperative to deliver and promote the concept of sustainability.
Recently, there are increasing numbers of awards that aim to enhance the performance of
sustainable communication. On the list of “Advertising awards & festivals” (Adforum, 2011), in the
United Kingdom, “Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, D&AD Awards, International Food
and Beverage Creative Excellence Awards, IPA Effectiveness Awards, LEAF Lisbon Erotic Advertising
Festival and The Advertising Festival Ad Awards Tenerife” are listed as offering high recognition for
impressive and compelling campaigns. In his review of “The Advertising Awards That Matter”,
Suggett (2016b) points out that the British D&AD awards set the extremely highest standard for
choosing the winners from all over the world. The D&AD awards continuously advocate that the
concepts of “do good by doing well” and “purpose beyond profit” be applied in the creations, so as
to motivate agencies to play a key role in making a positive impact and contribution to better the
lives of human beings ( Shayon, 2014; Leonidou, 2011). Similarly, the Cannes Lions (2016) also
promotes that “creativity matters for business, for change, for good”. Therefore, it can be believed
that utilizing the strengths of creativity will make changes for the communication of sustainability
and generate profound meaning to society as a whole (Lindsey, 2014b).
On the other side, UNEP (2006), in the publication of toolkit for sustainability communication,
critically points out that some campaigns seem to mention environmental and social issues, yet have
no direct or real meaning of sustainability. For attracting the audience’s attention, some marketers

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and advertisers created campaigns covered with seem–to-be-good messages, trying to mislead
audiences and build publicly positive images (UNEP, 2006). Additionally, Nieto (2008) criticizes that
advertising agencies create a significant amount of waste of marketing tools in terms of paper,
billboards and PVC banners. Those materials cause pollution to the environment. In her review, she
suggests that advertising agencies should seek greater performance of materials. Agencies can
benefit from saving costs through reducing waste, as well as improving competitiveness (Nieto,
2008).
2.4.3 The relationship with clients
An increasing number of companies (agencies’ clients) show their social responsibility and trumpet
their commitment towards the environment (White, 2016; Lindsay, 2014b) either on their company
websites or using mass media. In his review, White (2016) refers to some international leading
companies, such as BMW, Coca-Cola and Unilever, who were on the league table of the top 100 of
the world’s most sustainable companies, ranked by Forbes (2016). Broad indicators of examination
were used to investigate these companies, from their environmental, social and economic aspects.
Moreover, their mission statements towards sustainability and achievements they fulfilled were
taken into consideration during assessment. Therefore, it can be believed that it is becoming
essential that agencies should equip with sustainable thinking, as their clients have been considering
that as part of their expression of corporate responsibility (Lindsay, 2014b; IPA, 2009). In other
words, that is a must-have manner for becoming one of the suppliers of companies.
However, Lindsay (2013b) says: “the client community is ahead of its agency partners” and he
suggests that agencies should, as soon as possible, make a start to catch up with this trend of
sustainable practices so they are not overtaken by their clients’ momentum, and he suggests that
agencies should aggressively and spontaneously “lead a charge for the sustainability.” If agencies do
not have this capability, how can they provide good consultancy and visionary marketing plans to
their clients and keep their business in a long-term relationship? As a result, agencies might lose
their business, as clients will look for other better partners to consult and to receive a more
sustainable solution (Lindsay, 2014a). The increasing number of agencies that are small scale but
sustainable-driven, appear to offer professional consultancy which leading but conventional
advertising agencies lack (Lindsay, 2014a). A small agency such as Futerra (2016) specifically focuses
on dealing with sustainable marketing. They are teamed up with creative experts, as well as
sustainable practitioners. As Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) (2014) mentions,
embarking on sustainability practices helps agencies to add value and create differentiation from
other competitors. Moreover, if the agencies set their missions beyond the profit, not only can they
earn more money, but they can also make themselves become more competitive (Harvard Business
Review, 2015).
2.5 The existing framework
There is various guidance towards adopting sustainable development, with different names and
given by different institutional players in a worldwide context. Walker (2012) suggests that since the
context of sustainability is complicated and manifold, the start point of the design process is to gain
an understanding of the current circumstance by exploring its historical development. The aim of

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this research is to make recommendations; therefore, the broad views of different existing
guidelines, from a business perspective to specifically tailor-made for advertising, are included to
make a reflection and comparison. The details of five existing directive frameworks will be explored:
 A checklist – International Institute for Sustainable Development
 Strategic guidelines for sustainability communication – United Nations Environment
Programme
 A framework – Sustainable advertising partnership of Institute for Sustainable
Communication
 The green office guide for agencies – The European Association of Communications
Agencies
 The sustainability policy of Institute of Practitioners in Advertising
The first two guidelines chosen focus on helping ordinary business and the last three are specifically
designed for the advertising industry, including the viewpoints from global associations across the
world. These instructions provide divergent views of plans for businesses to follow and are given
with different missions and emphasis.
2.5.1 A checklist – International Institute for Sustainable Development
Though stakeholders’ decisions make adopting sustainable development possible, the performance
of penetration everywhere in the company relies on everyone’s contribution and devotion (White,
2016; IISD, 2013). In the checklist that IISD (2013) provides for businesses to embark on sustainable
development, it suggests head executives should announce a clear mission statement to all
employees. Besides, the mission statement should include the goal setting, guidance and running
procedures of a company. The assessed measures and publicity report are needed to examine the
performance, which also helps commitments and objectives to be reviewed and advanced (IISD,
2013). In the checklist, the initial goal for sustainable development should be easy to reach and
feasible. Once the goal is accomplished, then move to the next challenging stage, while in the
process ensuring the guidance to the employee is workable and achievable and sometimes giving
incentives to encourage the employee to carry out what is needed.
2.5.2 Strategic guidelines for sustainability communication – United Nations Environment
Programme
In the toolkit of sustainability communication of UNEP (2006), it lists key points of how to deliver
messages that synchronize sustainability in a harmonic way, by summarizing tools provided by
international governments, authorities and some private consultancies and groups. Firstly, it gives a
clear path for message communication. The realistically feasible goal is the top priority, based on the
understanding of the market’s environmental, social and economic situation. Then it promotes
green marketing, suggesting the communicative messages should consider characteristics such as:
clearly simple and realistic, beneficial to all the audience, and partnership with other sustainable
experts and so on. Through following the instructions, the credibility and trustworthiness of
messages can be delivered and the sustainable value can be acquired.

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2.5.3 A framework – Sustainable advertising partnership of Institute for Sustainable
Communication
The sustainable advertising partnership was set up as one of the programmes under the Institute for
Sustainable Communication (ISC) scrutiny for assisting the advertising industry to transform, by
embarking on sustainability practices and considering the social issue, environment conservation,
and economic prosperity (ISC, 2014b). In order to fulfill their mission, the sustainable advertising
partnership develops a framework for its members. The framework can be summarized into three
aspects:
 elimination of waste and pollution that causes harm to the environment;
 optimization of the resources and material usage;
 comprehensive consideration of ethics, equity, diversity, safety and transparency
2.5.4 The green office guide for agencies – The European Association of Communications Agencies
In the manual of “the green office guide for agencies”, provided by The European Association of
Communications Agencies (EACA, 2014), it maps four perspectives – inputs, services, emissions and
waste – that this manual can help agencies to address in their working environment and during
workflows. This guideline recommends beginning to set up an action plan and to maintain all the
consumable materials in the office in low waste by reusing, recycling and reducing. Additionally, it
suggests that agencies consider using environmentally friendly office facilities and equipment during
procurement, office construction and environment establishment. Moreover, it promotes that
agencies should reduce their carbon emissions while employees commute, by allowing them to work
at home, giving incentives to encourage them to use public transportation and promote car sharing
and so on. In the end of the report, it emphasizes the importance of publicly reporting the
performance of adopting these means, as some indicators measuring the performance can lead to
faster internal momentum towards sustainable development.
2.5.5 The sustainability policy of Institute of Practitioners in Advertising
The policy of the commitment announced by IPA (2016), the UK advertising association, focuses on
the areas of “energy, recycling, supply chain and transport.” In order to ensure that future
generations can have the same opportunities to meet their needs, it simply declares this policy by
attaching with another environmental policy. In these, they aim to reduce the impact that comes
along with workflows in everyday settings. There are a wide range of regulations, such as saving
water and energy, reducing the footprint and resource waste, green procurement of office supplies,
minimising travel and commuting, placing environmental consideration in the work, persuading
clients to buy in and lastly ensuring agencies follow the legal responsibility. However, it not only
expresses these commitments, but also sets the example for all of its members – the UK advertising
agencies – and partially deals with an emphasis on environment issues.
2.6 Literature review conclusion
Overall, agencies are responsible for achieving their clients’ missions by creating and delivering
advertising messages. It is clear to see the influence of advertising agencies, since they significantly

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facilitate a wide range of channels of mass media, which keep delivering messages to the population.
It seems that they are powerful in message communication and impression establishment.
Collectively, the above studies outline a critical role for advertising agencies; that it seems to be an
unavoidable obligation to communicate sustainability through their works, as a way to make a
contribution to society. However, their movement towards sustainability practices is far behind their
clients. There is room for improvement; otherwise they might lose their business competiveness.
The imperative responsibility that agencies should take is to facilitate their creative capability to
become the driving force for delivering sustainable communication to an audience, while at the
same time equipping themselves with the sustainable thinking and attitude. Combined, the review
of the literature gives this research some thoughts and motivations in anticipating an outcome,
which should not only emphasise effort of communication and implementation of sustainable
development to remain the catalyst of economic growth, but also give guidance of how agencies can
‘market’ themselves to resume their positive reputation and maintain effective communication.
However, ironically, in initial research investigating leading UK advertising agencies’ websites, it is
clear to see that those agencies proportionally exhibit their great talent of creation by showing their
past works. Their innovation capability of storytelling and campaign proliferation make their works
sparkling and dazzling. Those works they present on the websites give the meaning that they
successfully fulfilled their client’s missions by effectively grabbing audience attention and enhancing
their clients’ brand awareness. However, few of them mention their commitment or mission of
sustainable development in their company’s introduction page and none of them create a section
such as a work page to show how they are concerned with sustainable issues. Therefore, another
focus of this research shall be to explore how agencies express their attitudes and their commitment
of sustainability.
Lastly, the chosen current guidelines appear either too focused on environmental dimensions or
over-emphasize general goals and communication setting; therefore they suffer from weaknesses
and shortcomings. These guidelines would have been more useful if they had focused on a more
comprehensive perspective of sustainable practices. The discussion of the performance in the three
areas mentioned above – workflows, creation and relationship with clients – will be drawn in the
context of sustainability. Strategically, the establishment and improvement is not on the paperwork
of the internal task statement, but in the ways to have better preparation for maintaining or
ambitiously acquiring more business. Furthermore, the exploration of the limitations and challenges
that advertising agencies face is included as part of the research for considering the
recommendation provision.

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Chapter 3: Research methodology and process
3.1 Research methodology
While talking sustainable development, Servaes et al (2012) suggest it should be discussed at a local
level, rather than global regulation. A participation discussion is needed and using “community
dialogue and collective action” is more helpful for implementation (Servaes et al, 2012). Weinstein
et al (2013) suggest that qualitative research can help to discover and receive a wealth of
“motivation, behaviours, thoughts, and feelings.” Similarly, Wheeldon and Ahlberg (2012) state that
qualitative methods are the techniques that are “associated with the gathering, analysis,
interpretation and presentation of narrative information.” Therefore, this research decided that
qualitative research involving participants’ reactions and opinions is more suitable than quantitative
research for collecting intensive understanding.
The use of qualitative case studies is a well-established approach in many fields, especial in social
science (Yin, 2014; Johansson, 2003). Yin (2014) suggests adopting case studies as methodology
when “(1) the main research questions are “how” and “what” questions; (2) a researcher has little or
no control over behavioral events; (3) the focus of study is contemporary phenomenon.” It is also
recognized as a good methodology when the investigation tries to get a comprehensive range of
perspectives and a detailed understanding of the complexity of the phenomenon (Yin, 2014; Baxter
and Jack, 2008; Tellis, 1997) and “for [getting] more engaged with practice” (Riccaboni and Leone,
2010). Hence, a whole exploration of “decision” making can be acquired by looking at “why they
were taken, how they were implemented, and with what result” in this approach (Yin, 2014).
Consequently, this methodology is particularly useful in studying the topic of sustainability. Since this
research attempts to advise agencies with sensible and feasible recommendations, Riccaboni and
Leone (2010) point out that gaining varied data from many cases can also be firmly supported in
cross-cases analysis and further recommendation establishment. In other words, it means that the
number of cases contributes to the richness of collected data. Therefore, case study methodology
was chosen to use to prompt this exploratory research, constituting several cases. In each case, it
will be designed to question participants’ viewpoints and draw information on their current situation
through research activities. To some extent, the questions are designed with propositions and
rationale supported by the above literatures to make this research an exploratory case study (Yin,
2014).
3.2 Research process
This research is guided by the procedure proposed by Tellis (1997) to apply this methodology and
will expand into the following sections:
 “Design the case study protocol
 Conduct the case study
 Analyze case study evidence
 Develop conclusions, recommendations and implications based on the evidence”

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3.2.1 Design the case study protocol
In the first place, a clear structure of the final case study report is created, along with an overview of
the research project and ethical considerations during rigorous planning. In addition, the
development of the selection criteria of participants and research questions will be undertaken, to
not only ensure the representability of the industry, but also consider the validity and reliability of
outcomes (Tellis, 1997). Therefore, the estimated 10 interviews will be conducted with the industrial
association and random agencies. Acquiring knowledge from both association and agencies ensures
that this research considers a breadth and variety of different perspectives. Moreover, it is helpful to
make a research schedule so as to control the deadline and the scope of work.
As stated above, this research investigates the present situation in advertising agencies. Based on
the discussion of proposition in the literature review, the activities’ questions are developed. It is
necessary to know firstly, whether or not they already have sustainable strategies; secondly, what
stakeholders and staff’s perceptions are; and finally, to see if there are opportunities to improve
their sustainable performance. According to Johansson (2003), the case study methodology contains
the following features: firstly, the validity should be assured by triangulation, for example, many
data collection and data sources are combined to use in the research; secondly, should be able to
explain the reasons of case criteria; and lastly, apply reasoning principles to make generalizations.
The next sections will include the discussion of how to implement these features into research and
the details of criteria and the reasoning behind choosing the participants.
3.2.2 Conduct the case study
In this stage, the research plans to contact participants individually by reaching them through phone
calls, email invitations and social network media, such as Facebook and LinkedIn. A contact list will
be made and then with two-three times a week follow-up during the research period. The intensive
contacts can be trusted to increase the successful possibility of recruitment and “response rate”
(Tellis, 1997). As few internal and official documentation and archival records from advertising
agencies can be reached from online sources and their websites, two types of sources of evidence,
identified by Yin (2014), will be chosen to apply: direct observation and interview, so as to conform
the requirement of case study – to triangulate the data and make sure of validity of outcome.
Yin (2014) states that useful information can be found from direct observation in the participants’
familiar environment, for gaining an understanding of how they interact. This method can be
especially helpful in this research, to explore an agency’s employee’s everyday workflows and how
they perceive sustainability within their company’s environment. Interviews, meanwhile, are
regarded as “one of the most useful sources of case study evidence” (Yin, 2014) and are expected to
enable this study to “reach beyond initial responses and rationales” from participants (QRCA, 2015)
through a series of inquiries. This research uses open-ended questions to gain an in-depth
understanding of the participants’ perceptions, attitudes and experiences and can be expected to
give sound support to this research. Therefore, face-to face interviews will be prioritized where
feasible and phone call interviews will complement this approach, depending on the most
convenient way for the participants. The direct observations will be used at the same time the face-
to-face interviews are arranged. Detailed plans for interview activities with the reasoning and
objectives are below, and the question sheets for different participants can be found in Appendix 1.

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• Interview with an officer from the British Design & Art Direction (D&AD) office
From the D&AD website (2016), since 1962, it is clear to see this non-profit organization’s mission
and vision: devote themselves to promoting sustainable communication, by rewarding excellence
and offering training to nurture new talent for a better future. Every year, they select the most
superb creations, which innovatively deliver the messages that bring a positive impact to society,
and then grant the UK’s most prestigious prizes. The D&AD award is recognized as the most
impactful award in the industry. Therefore, this research chose to consult with D&AD and anticipates
taking advantage of its understanding of this industry to explore the current situation.
The objective of this interview is to understand the overview of the attitude or vision of
sustainability in the industry from the association’s panorama. The research focuses on three
questions. Firstly, what sustainable development guidance D&AD provides, how it has been
implemented so far and how existing principles can be improved in an ambitious manner. In addition,
their perception of existing guidelines will be explored. Secondly, as D&AD plays an important role in
communicating sustainable issues, the investigation about what challenges might hinder the
sustainability adaptation will be explored. Lastly, in order to ensure that the implementation and
communication of sustainability can be viewed as a competitive advantage for agencies, it is
necessary to know whether or not business seeks agencies as partners according to agencies’
capability of sustainability. That will give an insight into the incentives that motivate agencies to
adopt sustainability practices.
• Interview with staff (managerial manager) from different agencies
This research wants to highlight how managerial managers – such as chief executive officer, human
resources and administration employees – undertake an important role of talent recruitment and
the company’s policy establishment and scrutiny. Therefore, inviting internal employees who know
the clear talent recruiting requirement and their company’s mission is essential to this research.
Additionally, as the adoption of the sustainability marketing strategy is easily influenced by
stakeholders (White, 2016; Kumar, 2013), the attitudes and opinions of managerial administration of
agencies needs to be taken into consideration. The managers from human resources and
administration departments are the guard of talent selecting, according to the requirement of skills,
knowledge and personality, as well as helping to ensure the managerial principle is followed and
implemented. As a consequence, they are also key to this research for the exploration of whether
they currently have existing sustainability mission plans or not, and how they embarked on them.
By interviewing them, this research can receive the general overview information of the target
agency. Additionally, whether the agency emphasizes sustainability thinking as a talent recruiting
criteria and provides training programs are also the main focuses. The best result is to gain each
agency’s mission statement, which might be viewed as a business secret for some agencies, but
might be openly shared by others. If their mission statement of sustainable development can be
examined and compared with other agencies, to see the difference of focuses and in which area
more effort is needed, that would give this research an in-depth reference for further
recommendation creation and development.

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• Interview with staff (account manager) from different agencies
Account managers play a core role in coordinating and collaborating with internal departments, such
as creative designers, research and strategy planners, finance accountants and production
colleagues (Suggett, 2016a). While also ensuring work is created on brand, on brief, on budget and
on time, their workflows, experience and interaction between clients and knowledge of
sustainability are crucially important and needs to be investigated. Since they are in the centre of
workflow, they represent their agency to propose their creation. Their mindset and capability of
putting sustainability practice into work is key to the result of the sustainability communication.
From their experience, this research can also gain the knowledge regarding their clients’ attitudes
and marketing plans. Therefore, several client service employees will be invited in the activities.
The interview emphasizes, firstly, whether their clients ask for sustainability and if their needs or
requirements influence them to put sustainability into practice. Secondly, whether they have some
aggressive proposals for encouraging sustainability, which in some situations might be against the
client’s original brief. Last but not least, based on their pitch experience, whether their client is
looking for their capability of creativity as well as sustainability, and if they have benefited or been
motivated by these factors.
• Interview with staff (creative managers/designers) from different agencies
The creative department is a crucial department for agencies, as creativity brings business, profit
and adds to a company’s reputation. Suggett (2016a) says “it is the lifeblood of the business”. This
department comprises of copywriters, art designers, production artists and so on. Their know-how,
creativity and innovation determine how and what they will produce and whether the outcome will
be successful or not. Without the sum of their capabilities, the output will not be able to surprise the
market and audience and might fail to deliver the message they were assigned by their clients. The
advertisements they create significantly influence the whole of society; therefore, in order to take
advantage of their excellent strengths to actively contribute to the marketing of sustainability,
several managers or designers are imperative to this research and will be invited to the interviews.
Overall, the participants involved in this research are critically important to help to define the
common problems and will contribute to the final solution and help to achieve this research’s goal –
improving the performance of sustainability. Moreover, their recommendations of how the
sustainability concept can be implemented into idea creation and production will be sought, to
provide this research some ideas to establish sensible proposals.
Ethically, there are no risks expected during the activities; all the participants will be told about the
project and asked to read the information sheet and sign the consent form before the activities start.
This research promises confidentiality to agencies’ respondents; it will not expose the respondents’
information and any attribution to the respondents or their companies. Additionally, in order to
ensure this is well-documented, voice recordings will be used where feasible, for collecting the
information during the activities. Transcripts of those voice recordings will be made, for further data
mining and analysis.

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3.2.3 Analyze case study evidence
Though the participants sample is small, the accumulated qualitative data is expected to be
significantly rich. This research needs a data mining method to assist, to make cross-references and
cross-comparisons among informative data and ensure it can be clearly organized. Further, the
generalization of findings will be made by applying the inductive principle on facts that are taken
from cases (Johansson, 2003). Rather than the deductive or abductive principle, this research
chooses to reflect and display the collected information and make inductions in a plain but unbiased
way.
The combination of using coding and clustering methods can assist in sorting out the massive and
complex qualitative data gathered, and make the data structured and classified into smaller groups,
whilst keeping their relevance and interrelationship (Weinstein et al, 2013). Hsieh and Shannon
(2005) defines the conventional approach of coding method, seen as an application of the inductive
approach: the collected data is the origin of codes, rather than creating codes or using existing codes
which have been made before exploration, ensuring a wider and deeper understanding of the issue.
In addition, this way of displaying data shall avoid biasing and manipulation. Followed by embarking
on the clustering method, grouping the similarities and differences of narratives, this approach
enables the data to become distinctly categorized into a new subset (Rokach and Maimon, 2005).
Therefore, choosing these two methods can save time in organizing information, as well as helping
to provide the interpretation and clarify findings (Henry et al, 2015).
Conclusions from the above activities shall be made after explicitly drawing all these key players and
their relationships in the concept map. The graphically conceptualized maps will give a better
understanding of the cause and effect, and visualizing data into maps will be helpful for exploring
meaning, recall memories and for generating new ideas (Wheeldon and Ahlberg, 2012).
3.2.4 Develop conclusions, recommendations and implications based on the evidence
Tellis (1997) reminds that in this stage, clear explanation of implications of findings should be given
in the report without “technical jargon”. In addition, the proposition and meaning of
recommendations should be well supported with the evidence derived from the findings of
literature and activities (Yin, 2014). Therefore, this research will provide structured and firm
evidence to underpin the recommendations, to ensure this research can be seen as applicable, as
well as accountable.

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Chapter 4: Findings
Luckily, the D&AD awards ceremony was held during the research period, providing a platform to
approach and recruit the participants and helping the research activities to be conducted efficiently.
In that event, it can be inferred that either the attendants received an award or they had an interest
in learning from each other and wanted to reflect on the topic of sustainability. With the favour of
this specific event, meeting and establishing close contact with agencies enhanced the possibilities
to receive a varied background of participants from a wealth of different scales of companies. Some
of the selected agencies are international and high branded, while some are small-scale studios,
mostly located in London. Because of confidentiality, the research agencies list only reveals those
participants’ title, gender, companies’ scale and location, and can be found in Table 1.
[Table 1 – Research agencies list]
Agency Job title Gender Number of employees Agency’s location
1 Managerial Manager Female 1-10 London
2 Account Manager Female 1-10 London
3 Creative Manager Male 10-20 London
4 Account Manager Male 30-40 London
5 Creative Manager Male 100-150 London
6 Managerial Manager Male 200-250 London
7 Account Manager Female 200-250 London
8 Creative Manager Male 350-400 London
9 Managerial Manager Male 350-400 Manchester
10 Creative Manager Female 400-500 London
Looking at these activities together, in total eleven interviews were held, including one interview
with an association officer and ten interviews with employees from different advertising agencies,
including eight face-to-face interviews (six on-site and two agency visits) and three phone interviews.
Over forty codes were found from the transcripts typed according to the recordings, combining the
perspectives from the association and agencies. Those codes were further grouped into six clusters
according to their similarities and correlations. Codes and clusters are shown in the following Table 2.
[Table 2 – Codes and clusters list]
Clusters Aspect Codes
Current situation Association  Creative strength and capability should be facilitated
 Encourage and stimulate thinking, rather than provide the tools
 Provide inspiration and celebrate excellence to train people
 The client leads the discussion rather than the agency
 Advertising agencies need to get their house in order first
before advising their clients
 Positively recommend and refer other directive guidelines
Agencies  No specific guidelines have been announced or followed
 Companies provide reusable appliance and supplies
 Naturally sustainable and take sustainability for granted
 Employees spontaneously recycle and do not print anything out
 Publish own accreditation – Forest Stewardship Council logo on

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artwork
 No website marketing
 Not easy to achieve as people have to abide by dedicated
process (paper mill, printer, scanning labels, accounting for
waste, demonstrate chain of custody of paper)
Influential factors
towards creation
Association  Agencies do what their clients want them to do; their main
function is to sell the product
 If a client is not sustainable, it is hard to make them so
 Prizes are used as incentives
Agencies  Top priority is clients’ brief
 Strategy focuses on the audience
 Accreditation is recognised by people
 The creative design is irrelevant; what is produced is the key
 If you have a good story, things will work; good ideas work in all
the different platforms
Personal
experience and
perception
(employee-focus)
Agencies  Sustainability is an urgent topic that should be discussed and
dealt with
 Power of advertisements: design one, teach one
 Believe communication can make a difference
 Allow the next generation to live in a better world
 It’s a strategy that’s more than creative
 Start to do smalls things around life and to live sustainably with
a balanced working life
 Sustainability ingrained in Brazilian culture
Talent nurturing Association  Paid internships and awards to nurture new blood
 People want a professional purpose in companies with a moral
compass
 Younger generation looks to reduce consumption and use new
technology
 It is increasingly important that new talent possesses
sustainable thinking
Agencies  No training programmes are provided by companies
 Every leader of each team is responsible for their own training
 Young people are more sustainability conscious
 Look forward to co-operating with new talent as they are
creative and anticipate they can persuade clients to adopt
sustainability
Client industry and
attitude
Association  Some companies make it a central part of their philosophy
and prove that sustainability can be commercially beneficial,
while other companies just pay lip service and use it as a
competitive tool or as a box ticking exercise
 Two main criteria when clients are looking for an agency: is the
agency conducting itself sustainably? And can it provide the
right advice?
Agencies  Clients’ industries: Cosmetics/ Oil/ Tobacco/ Healthcare/
Automobile/ Retail/ Banking
 Few briefs mention sustainability and no client asks to
demonstrate sustainable ability
 Sometimes the client wants you to follow their own process
Future vision and Association  The communication industry has a role to play in accelerating

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recommendation behavior change because that's what they’re good at, by using
the powerful weapons at their disposal
 Agencies are excellent at interrogating products to find out
what makes them different, special and desirable – products
which are increasingly made sustainably
 Align commercial and sustainability agendas
 It is about incorporating that question of sustainability into the
agency briefing process
 A purpose beyond profit – agencies should have a process that
builds this into the strategy
Agencies  Use resources efficiently
 Talent nurturing
 Cooperation with NGO to highlight issues
 Accreditations help to win business and give a competitive
advantage
4.1 Current situation
The association believes that the communication industry has a role to play in accelerating behavior
change by using their creative strengths. Moreover, they think since agencies always need to find
out the unique selling points of products to advertise, agencies can take quality control on board,
ensuring those products are sustainable. The association observes that the development of
sustainability in advertising agencies is slow and wants to help agencies start to take action. They
think the urgency is to establish the language and mindset of sustainability in the agencies. Though
they do not guide their member agencies, they offer training courses and awards to encourage
creative production. In addition, they recommend some sustainable guidance announced by other
international branded companies, as well as positively agree current on-going guidelines.
On the other side, the majority of interviewees who are working in the agencies responded that
there are no specific mission statements or guidelines that have been announced or applied in their
companies. They just naturally reduce printout papers and use the mugs that companies prepare in
the kitchen areas or open spaces in their daily working environment. Almost two-thirds of the
participants said they have already taken sustainability for granted and feel that sustainability is
embedded in their workflows. However, nearly all participants reported that their companies do not
show their mission or attitude of sustainability on their website. One participant said his company
does not think that it is necessary to market their attitude and capability of sustainability. Only one
interviewee reported his agency has its policy of production regulation and his company endeavors
to gain environmentally friendly accreditation. He also mentioned that his company’s website does
not specify their manner; however, his company’s group, which is one of the largest communication
groups in the world, announces that sustainability is the priority in one of the pages on their website.
4.2 Influential factors towards creation
The association acknowledges that without clients’ permission, there is no room for advertisers to
express or incorporate any sustainable related issues into their creations. Nonetheless, the
association believes that, increasingly, through providing awards to motivate creative outputs, the
mindset of the responsibility of sustainability can be established in agencies. What the association

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wants creativities to achieve is to deliver not only the high quality of sustainable communication, but
also bring positive impact to society.
Similarly, the overall response to the question: “do you think you have the powers or opportunities
to communicate sustainable issues in the creation, while against the clients’ brief?” was very
negative. Nearly all of interviewees said they just conform to their clients’ briefs, and if their clients
do not require highlighting sustainable issues, they will not take the risk against the brief, as they
want to maintain the relationship with their clients and do not want to lose business. Only two
interviewees mentioned that they’ve factored in the target audience’s insight during idea generation.
Lastly, one interviewee commented, another important factor for sustainable development is to
control the printing production, since there are many paper-made advertisements in the
marketplace.
4.3 Personal experience and perception
Overall, all the interviewees believe their creations can affect audience behaviours and influence the
world. They are aware of sustainability, and they are willing to contribute to delivering sustainable
related messages if they are allowed to. Furthermore, one interviewee commented that
sustainability for him is not just to protect the environment, but also to achieve a good work/life
balance. In his opinion, doing things in a sustainable manner, even if they are minor during
workflows, still can be seen as a contribution to the environment. Therefore, it might be able to
prevent damage to our planet and might ensure future generations are still able to live on.
One interviewee from Brazil commented that the UK advertising industry gathers the greatest
amount of talents from all over the world and has plenty of resources that could create an impactful
communication of sustainability. In his opinion, the UK is already a mature and well-developed
country and most people are already equipped with sustainable mindsets and have a high awareness.
Additionally, most infrastructure and welfare are established, and there are fewer problems of social
inequity and discrimination; therefore, he further concluded this is why fewer advertisements are
set to cover or discuss the issues. On the other side, he thinks that since the Brazilian market is still
in the growing stage, compared with the UK market, the communication of sustainability is more
obvious in every advertisement. Moreover, in his opinion, sustainability is ingrained among
advertisers in Brazil and in other developing countries.
4.4 Talent nurturing
The association said that they provide opportunities for new blood upbringing, for instance, training
courses, internships and awards. They also concluded that the young generation has social ethical
responsibilities and is keen to work in sustainable agencies, since they have an ambition of doing
positive things for society. Moreover, another informant said as those in their early twenties are
living and immersed in the information and technology-led world, they have a strong moral
conscience and are brave to deal with sustainable issues and fight against inequality. Though the
association noticed that few agencies view the capability of sustainability as one of their key
recruiting requirements, they think it will be increasingly established.

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In reality, when agencies were asked whether their company views sustainable thinking as criteria
when selecting new employees, 90% of the respondents reported that they have never heard about
it. Furthermore, in response to whether their companies provide training programmes related to
sustainability, most of the responses were negative. Among the participants, most interviewees who
are senior employees, some of them said that they look forward to cooperating with the younger
generation and hope that new blood will bring their ambitious and innovative ideas to propose to
their clients. One senior employee even mentioned that it would be better if a sustainable proposal
were made by the younger generation, rather than by those senior employees who have concerns.
4.5 Client industry and attitude
The association reported that the attitude of clients towards sustainability is hard to generalize.
Some businesses view it as a core for long-term survival in the market and prove that sustainability
can be commercially beneficial, whilst others do not pay attention to it and see it as just a "box-
ticking exercise." Additionally, to discover the main criteria that clients look for in an agency as a
partner, they say decisions will be made as to whether the agency can conduct itself sustainably and
whether it can provide the right advice.
According to the examples given and described by interviewees, they have worked with many
campaigns and advertisements for many brands and various products from a varied range of
industries, such as cosmetics, petroleum, tobacco, healthcare, automobile, banking and retail and so
on. They mentioned that, disproportionately, here in the UK, few briefs were aimed to communicate
sustainable issues. One interviewee further said that some clients do not want to be known by the
public, even though they have done many good things for society. Also, while asked about the
previous pitch experience, the majority of respondents’ feedback was that none of the clients have
asked them to show their sustainable capability in their pitches. Only one participant said his
company offers their clients to have a free right to use their accreditation. That helps them gain
more business and becomes one of their competitive advantages. And again, most answers to the
question of whether clients seek an agency as a partner depending upon their sustainable
performance were negative.
4.6 Future vision and recommendation
While talking about future development, the association suggested that meeting the alignment of
commercial and sustainability agendas will be the key to the success of sustainability. But before
advising clients, the most important starting point is to establish the strategy and process in which
sustainability is embedded. Otherwise, advertising agencies’ business will be overtaken by other
agencies that specialize in the expression and communication of sustainability.
From employees, several simple ways they can think of to improve their performance are, for
instance, to use resources more efficiently and to focus on nurturing new talent. Only one
interviewee commented that the green accreditation is the key factor of differentiating themselves
from other competitors and showing the unique capability to beat others in the pitches. Another
remarkable recommendation from two participants was to advise a client to cooperate with non-
profit organizations, not only to highlight the issues better, but also to incorporate sustainability into
their creative productions.

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4.7 Conclusions from findings
Taken together, the above findings of this investigation complement those of the earlier literature
review and further support the assumptions. In addition, the findings from this research activity
draw attention to the understanding of the present circumstances, while noticeably showing the
limitations that burden the advertising industry with expanding communication of sustainability, as
well as offering opportunities to provide feasible recommendations. In summary, possible
implications of this research can be concluded into five key points, which could be used to develop
recommendations.
 Firstly, in most agencies, they do not officially announce policy or mission statements
relating to sustainability. Even though employees partially conduct workflows in a
sustainable and environmentally friendly way, they actually do it without clear and
instructive sustainable guidance.
 Secondly, to maintain the relationship with clients, advertising agencies will not dare to
propose to communicate sustainable issues against the client’s brief. It can be inferred that
fundamentally the best way to increase the communication of sustainability is to align the
sustainable agenda with the commercial agenda.
 Thirdly, all the interviewees expressed that they are ready to communicate their knowledge
of sustainability, as they have been aware of the urge towards sustainability and are willing
to respond as soon as they get the brief required.
 Fourthly, even though manpower in advertising agencies needs to play a vital role in the
communication of sustainability, ironically, possessing the skill or knowledge of sustainability
is not one of the requirements of job recruitment, nor are any training courses provided by
their companies for assisting upgrading knowledge. The lack of emphasis on nurturing
employees can be seen as room for improvement.
 Lastly, cooperation with other organizations to acquire knowledge and gain green
accreditation can become a means to strengthen the power of communication and win
more business.
It is also interesting to note that the D&AD association announced that they have rewarded many
agencies for their excellent works of sustainability communication. However, most interviewees
from agencies mentioned that they received few briefs aiming to raise the discussion of
sustainability. So, the goals for the agencies seem to be to win the prize and win over the judges,
rather than to attract the attention of the public.
One concept map was drawn to summarize the relevant elements that influence the sustainable
performance in advertising agencies and to demonstrate the relationship between the industrial
association and client business through clear propositions (see Diagram 1).

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[Diagram 1 – Concept map]

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Chapter 5: Discussion – Recommendations
According to the feedback gathered from the respondents, they have no choice in deciding the
outcome, but listen to their clients’ requirements. However, this research did not include the point
of view from the clients’ side; it is hard to judge and try to improve the situation from the origin of a
brief. Even though most people feel they do not have the power to change the situation, considering
the same position with the D&AD association, it can be believed that once all the agencies are
equipped with the mindset and language of sustainability, it would be much easier for agencies to
state the argument and express the attitude in front of their clients in a firmer and more solid
manner.
This research aims to provide recommendations to help advertising agencies to improve and support
their performance of sustainability. Meanwhile, referring to some ideas from the existing framework
and guidelines, the recommendations are divided into three sections: workflows, creations and
productions, and relationship with clients. To recap the concepts in the literature review:
 Workflows: focus on internal regulation, sustainable guideline implementation, sustainability
perception and mindset establishment and recruitment
 Creations and productions: underline and incorporate sustainability into creation and idea
generation and align the commercial to sustainable agendas
 The relationship with clients: emphasize on differentiating from competitors
Following each section, there are three stages for helping agencies to conduct these
recommendations, starting from preparation stage, to adoption, and then to communication stage
(see Diagram 2). Agencies shall embark on the recommendations from preparation as the starting
point, to get ready to adopt sustainability; then in the adoption stage, the recommendations
become more focused on ensuring sustainability can be well conformed; finally, the last stage is to
reassure the internal and external communication and have a wide effect on sustainability.
[Diagram 2 – Structure of recommendations]

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5.1 Workflows
5.1.1 Preparation – Start to set up plan for sustainability and then widely announce to all
employees
From the findings from literature, a lot of guidance, in many forms, aims to help agencies to adopt
sustainable development. Meanwhile, from acquired discussion with people in the agencies, it can
be inferred that either the sustainable guidelines seem not to be well noticed by employees, or most
agencies actually do not announce any mission station or operating procedure to adopt
sustainability. Using the reusable mugs and other appliances and reducing paper usage are common
behaviours; however, it would be better in improving the sustainable performance if agencies really
work with any current guidelines or self-develop new attainable procedural guidelines which fit their
condition most. Though so far there has been no comprehensive guideline and, as said before, most
existing guidelines are partially related to environmental protection, they are still useful as a
reference in helping agencies develop their own plans.
5.1.2 Adoption – Start to recruit new employees who are equipped with the mindset of
sustainability
Once the guidelines are established, the next step will be necessary to pick up employees who are
willing to follow the rules. Generally speaking, employees are viewed as the important asset to
agencies. As mentioned in the literature, they will influentially contribute to sustainability, either in
their everyday settings or in the creations they produce. With the help of the industrial association,
more and more new talent are trained and motivated with the knowledge and prizes. Once agencies
start to recruit those employees who are ingrained with the sustainable mindset, those employees’
actions and behaviours might gradually influence other colleagues and their clients. With the
feedback from interviews, it can be believed that most people are naturally being sustainable in the
workplace; therefore, the recommendation here would be a force of abiding by the requirement of
the capability of sustainability as necessary criteria when hunting new talent.
5.1.3 Communication – Provide training, internal campaigns and employees’ goal setting
In order to ensure the mindset can be established and mission guidelines can sustainably last longer,
agencies should continuously provide opportunities to communicate with internal staff. Organized
training programmes to bring in the knowledge of sustainability, covering social, environmental and
economic issues, can be useful in widening the imagination of creativities, as well as upgrading the
international vision. In addition, holding internal campaigns for employees to propose innovative
ideas, to encourage sustainable performance with rewards can also be an effective way to motivate
employees. Lastly, this research proposes an aggressive means, which is to measure and assess
employees’ sustainable performance as a part of annual goal setting, which might affect their
promotion and salary level adjustment. This impulse might lead to more assured and high
achievement toward sustainability. The above approaches are suggested to help nurture and
increase the knowledge and awareness among employees; they are optional depending on the
conditions of each agency.

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5.2 Creations and productions
5.2.1 Preparation – Have plans to work with non-profit organizations
Once the language and mindset of sustainability are set up in agencies, the next stage is to
incorporate the knowledge into creations and productions. However, a cruel truth exists in most
agencies. According to the information collected from interviews, most of their clients do not see it
necessary to mention sustainability, and agencies have no negotiating power to propose ideas to
communicate sustainability while against their clients’ brief. Only a few clients’ industries – such as
cosmetics, petroleum and healthcare products – care to mention sustainability. Therefore, it might
be useful to collect a list of non-profit organizations as preparation and to get in-depth and width
understanding of those organizations’ missions and tasks in the first place. Then, agencies can try to
spend time exploring and figuring out if there are any opportunities to cooperate with non-profit
organizations in the future. It might also be useful in the near future to connect the sustainable
issues with clients’ industries who don’t see the necessity now. The power of alliance might make it
easier to persuade clients to tune the direction or make changes of communication strategy toward
sustainability and further take that into account during creation and production.
5.2.2 Adoption – Set up a professional team to scrutinize and follow the sustainable procedure
In this stage, after following the previous recommendations, assume that agencies might have the
knowledge and partners now to pursue a sustainability agenda. It is important to ensure the process
from idea generation to production can be completed following the sustainable procedure. It might
take time to standardize the procedure, but once everyone naturally reacts sustainably, it would
accelerate the process. Before the procedure becomes widespread among everyone involved, a
professional team for scrutinizing is necessary, either formed from the internal employees in project-
base scale or outsourced to other consultants. Though following the previous recommendation,
most employees might be equipped with some basic knowledge of sustainability, it is still essential
that this team can pay attention to check every detail, examine the process and give immediate
feedback on everything from creations to production. The scale of the team depends on the scope of
projects, while the professionals should have related experience and keep updated with knowledge
of sustainability.
5.2.3 Communication – Align the commercial agenda with the sustainable agenda
The interviews show an interesting phenomenon: it is ironic that few briefs ask to communicate
sustainability; however, a lot of creativities were rewarded by industrial associations as they
revealed superb ideas to convey sustainable matters. It can be inferred that some agencies seem to
only pay attention to win prizes rather than really produce work for clients in commercial usage.
Though winning prizes can be acknowledged as a high level of capability of creativity, it is also
important to elaborate on making publicly commercial communication. Reflectively, like the findings
of the literature review, agencies should be responsible for facilitating their creative talent and
resources to make sustainability communication widespread. Moreover, with the effort of previous
recommendations, trying to get clients’ commercial agenda close to a sustainable agenda, it would
be easier for agencies to complete creation and production and at the same time improve their
sustainable performance. Therefore, the recommendation here will like to encourage creativities to

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win not only the prize, but also the public recognition towards their clients’ products. In this way, it
can both benefit the agency itself and its clients.
5.3 Relationship with clients
5.3.1 Preparation – Gain accreditation to differentiate from competitors and win the business
Some environmental green certifications have been recognized by the public as well as some clients;
however, few agencies notice that this can provide differentiation from competitors as a powerful
weapon to build up positive reputation and to win the business. It is recognized that an agency
which is accredited will not only set up the leading example in the industry, but also make an agency
itself more sustainable to last longer in the competitive marketplace. The ripple effect might be
expectedly strong and significant to influence the entire advertising industry and even more widely
extend to varied clients’ industries. Therefore, it is necessary to encourage agencies to gain
certifications in the first place. Several accreditations are suggested here; more are needed to be
explored in the future:
- For printing production – FSC (Forest Stewardship Council), PEFC (Programme for the
Enforcement of Forest Certification)
- For working building environment – LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental
Design), ISO 14001 Environmental management and so on
- For personal skill development – CPD (Continuous professional development)
5.3.2 Adoption – Financial investment on acquiring and renewing accreditations and certifications
Combined with the findings from the literature review and research activities, in order to compete
with other agencies, which are small-scale but specialized in providing sustainable solutions,
conventional advertising agencies shall speed up adoption of sustainable development. Along with
the above recommendations, renewing accreditations and encouraging employees to acquire
certification will be the best way to maintain the leading status in the marketplace. Additionally, as
literature shows that when agencies aim to fulfill sustainability, which means sometimes looking
beyond the profit, agencies will not only earn more money but also become more competitive.
Therefore, the recommendation is made by looking at long term effect rather than immediate
financial return. It would be worth to invest money in possessing the accreditations and
certifications as a unique advantage to compete with other agencies. Therefore, a portion of budget
for this investment must be allocated and arranged beforehand, to ensure the full support for
sustainability would be long-lasting and secure.
5.3.3. Communication – Display the capability in all the documents and websites
The findings from the literature review show that increasingly companies seek partnerships with
agencies which are equipped with sustainable capability; however, in reality, according to the
responses from the agencies’ perspective, only few clients view it as important. But this research
believes that once the professional and trustworthy image builds up in agencies (if they follow the
above recommendation), it will be easier to attract clients’ attention and then gain the businesses.
Therefore, here, this research suggests the needed to display the capability of sustainability in the
documents of pitches and company’s credentials, as well as on the websites. Again, the results of

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interviews support the assumption that few agencies show their attitude of sustainability on their
websites. It can be inferred that exhibiting and marketing what an agency possesses and what
unique services it can offer will make itself appealing and competitive among other agencies. This
research believes that will bring in more business, as well as creating a positive effect on public
relationship and business reputation.
To conclude, the recommendations are made inseparable and stage-by-stage, and would deliver
better performance of sustainability when all of them can be achieved in a comprehensive way,
covering all the perspectives and processes in adverting agencies. Diagram 3 clearly shows the
summarized points for reference. However, the scale of an agency and its budget is likely to have an
effect on the speed and extent to which these recommendations can be adopted.
[Diagram 3 – Summary of recommendations]

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Chapter 6: Conclusions
6.1 Conclusions
To recap, the purpose of this research is to help agencies to improve their implementation and
communication of sustainability. The research exploration constitutes the literature and activities, to
gain an understanding of the current industry situation and then make feasible recommendations in
the discussion.
Firstly, this research explored considerable literature about the role that advertising agencies play in
the creative industry and their impact on the whole of society. Since they have a vital role in
affecting audience behaviour and opinions and have significant influence on the national economy,
an advertising agency has inarguable responsibility to make good use of its creativity and ability of
integrated marketing to contribute sustainability.
Secondly, by face-to-face and phone call interviews with officers of the D&AD association and
employees in agencies, this research collected extensive information from association and agencies’
perspectives. The association offered this research the opportunity to gain an understanding of the
current industrial situation (the attitudes, position and willingness to devote resources toward
sustainability) and provided this research a clear direction in creating suitable recommendations for
advertising agencies. In addition, this research has raised important questions about the nature of
advertising agencies in terms of companies’ mission statement, working environment, requirement
of recruitment, workflows on a regular basis, the process of creation and production and how they
maintain the relationship with clients. Gathered information from employees reflected their
companies’ policies and attitudes, and explained why they felt they were out of their depth in the
contribution to sustainability, and what they thought would be helpful for incorporating it into
future development.
Returning to the questions posed at the beginning of this research, the answers for the four main
research questions were fully explored:
 What sustainable guidelines or plans have advertising agencies been following on a regular
basis?
 Do agencies have the power or opportunities to communicate sustainability in the creation,
while against their clients’ brief?
 What kind of limitations or challenges do agencies face when communicating sustainable
issues?
 How can advertising agencies benefit from the implementation of sustainability practices?
The investigation has shown that most agencies lack clear special and comprehensive guidelines to
follow and have not created their own sustainable procedure. Moreover, they do not take talent
recruitment and nurturing toward sustainability as serious matters. The main restriction on their
sustainable practice is from their clients. Their perception of sustainability and the willingness to
devote to sustainability are strong, but not enough to beat the pressure that comes from the
clients’ side. Even though they do believe their creation and production can highly influence the
audience toward sustainability, for the sake of maintaining the business, they can do nothing but
follow their clients’ briefs, when most of time they are not consulted to cover sustainable issues into

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creation. However, it is also suggested that implementing the sustainability practice can help
agencies gain more business in the long term, as well as stand out from their competitors.
The above findings strengthen the idea of recommendations made in the last chapter and suggest
several courses of action for improvement and alteration for sustainability. Those recommendations
were made respectively and specifically, pointing at their workflows, creations and productions and
the relationship with clients. To recap from the last chapter, conforming holistic recommendations
can lead to a secure result of improving the performance of sustainability and have offered several
practical applications.
 Firstly, needing to adopt or create sustainable mission statements and guidelines, in a strict
and well-announced way among employees.
 Secondly, ensuring manpower possess the capability of sustainability, by continuously
receiving knowledge from training, or motivation from prizes to stimulate their creative
generation.
 Thirdly, planning to cooperate with existing organizations, like NGOs, can facilitate resources
and further strengthen the ability to affect clients’ decisions.
 Fourthly, arranging specific positions in agencies and investing budgets to acquire
accreditation are another two ways to achieve the sustainable goals effectively.
 Lastly, this research is clear that the only way to motivate agencies to adopt all the measures
of sustainability is ensuring they can maintain their business and can gain more business.
Several recommendations focus on how to equip and exhibit their unique advantages, like
documenting and marketing themselves in different ways; therefore, standing out from
other competitors will become easier when they possess the professional capability to
advise clients and contribute to sustainability.
With the advertising industry’s devotion and commitment, the sustainable practices might be able to
be conveyed in their creations. Furthermore, followed by the effectiveness of media exposure, the
sustainability concept can reach a larger population. Hopefully, by these means, using the creative
talent and media power of the advertising industry, it can speed up the spread of the
communication of sustainability and benefit the whole of society.
6.2 Limitations and future research
Finally, a discussion of the limitation of this research is required. Though it includes holistic
perspectives from an industrial association and several users, the limited time and small scale of
participants cannot fully represent the entire situation in the industry. Therefore, further work is
needed to test these recommendations in practice. There was no attempt to assess whether these
recommendations would lead to better sustainability communication. Further work is needed to
assess their effectiveness. In addition, this research does not consider the financial compensation or
commission system in the relation and cooperation with clients in the advertising industry, which
remains in need of investigation to see whether it affects the adoption of sustainable practice or not.

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Moreover, in order to make these recommendations appealing to those creative people in agencies,
it can be improved in the future by visualizing these recommendations in an attractive and graphical
way. Last but not least, although this research focuses on advertising agencies, the findings may well
have a bearing on consulting agencies, which are relied upon by businesses to give advice on how to
be sustainable in the marketplace in the long term.
6.3 Reflection
The research expedition provided a great opportunity to advance myself in many facets, especially
language ability and academia and industrial knowledge discovery. Combined with my previous
working experience, the capability of project management led me to start the work from planning
the scope of research and approaching interview activities with the associations and agencies. I was
lucky to gain great support from my supervisor and the participants mentioned in the
acknowledgement, to make the process smooth. Most importantly, even though there were many
difficulties and frustrations during the process, it was an amazing feeling to immerse myself in the
literature studies and to try every possible potential opportunity to conduct the interview activities.
In the past four month of dedication, my conversational language confidence was enhanced and my
faithful motto was deepened: “nothing is impossible.” I hope those recommendations are useful and
can be adopted in the advertising industry sooner or later, to ensure the effectiveness of their
contribution towards sustainability.

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