The advertising industry has spent the last few years telling the world that AI will change how agencies work. The pitch has centred itself on speed, efficiency and new capabilities, driving networks to invest in technology and bring new kinds of talent into their businesses.
Engineers, product managers, data scientists and other specialists became part of that push as agencies built AI platforms and capabilities. Now, as networks restructure and look for greater efficiencies, some of that talent is finding itself on the wrong side of the transformation.
Omnicom’s handling of its Omni AI platform offers a glimpse of that shift. In August, Adweek reported that at least 468 employees working on Omni were transferred to technology services company Endava, while around 50 US employees from its Product & Engineering division were laid off in June. The move is notable because Omni has been positioned as a key part of Omnicom’s AI offering to clients.
WPP is reportedly planning to cut up to 1,000 additional jobs by the end of 2026 as CEO Cindy Rose pushes ahead with a restructuring focused on simplifying the organisation and accelerating its AI strategy, according to the Financial Times. WPP has already reduced its workforce by around 11,000 since early 2025.
Taken together, the moves at Omnicom and WPP point to a larger tension: the networks are investing in AI to reshape their businesses, even as some of the people and functions built around that transformation are being reduced, transferred or restructured.
That creates an uncomfortable contradiction for an industry racing to become more technology-led. If AI is the future of agencies, what happens to the talent hired to build that future?
From hiring talent to restructuring it
Nisha Sampath, Brand Consultant, sees this as a fundamental shift in the agency proposition. “For all these years, scale has been the pitch. We have more people, more offices, we can be more cost-effective. But AI has just reduced that entire logic,” she notes.
That does not necessarily mean AI is directly replacing every role being cut. Restructuring also reflects consolidation, duplication and pressure on agency margins. But AI gives networks a new reason to rethink how many people are required to deliver the same work.
Ashok Lalla, Independent Brand and Digital Advisor, sees it as a combination of both forces. “The broken agency model and a lack of clarity about how to really fix it are leading to such measures,” he says. With clients demanding greater accountability for outcomes and lower fixed retainers, letting people go becomes the quickest way for holding companies to protect margins.
At the same time, he says, “The promise of AI as a cost-efficiency driver is giving agencies the confidence to deliver the same work with fewer people and so go ahead with reducing headcount.”
The talent paradox
That creates a strange proposition for people entering advertising’s technology side.
Agencies spent years attracting tech talent and building AI platforms, data capabilities and proprietary tools as part of their vision for the agency of the future. But as those capabilities become more automated or outsourced, the people who built them may not have the same place within that future.
Kshitij A. Kulkarni, Revenue Marketing Strategist, sees the disruption less in what AI can do and more in how few people it now takes to do it. “AI collapsed on the floor. Capability that needed a room of people and a network retainer now sits with two people and a stack. Owning the tools is worth nothing. Everyone has the same tools. The only question left is who gets more out of them,” he shares.
For talent, he argues, simply knowing how to build or operate AI systems may not be enough. “The premium could increasingly go to people who can connect those systems to business outcomes, rather than those whose value is tied to maintaining a large technology operation.”
What happens to the people who built the future?
There is another complication. Agencies are not simply adopting off-the-shelf AI. They have spent heavily on proprietary platforms and internal capabilities precisely to differentiate themselves.
Omnicom’s move to Endava therefore raises a question beyond the immediate layoffs. If agencies increasingly rely on external technology partners to build and operate the systems they sell as part of their proposition, where does the agency’s technology capability actually reside?
For Sampath, that also becomes a question of positioning. “The fact that you are getting the engineers out after using their talent to build their AI, that is a credibility and positioning problem,” she says of Omnicom’s move. The issue is not simply cost saving, she argues, but how the network positions itself after such a shift.
Technology companies themselves outsource, partner and reorganise constantly. But advertising networks have spent years selling clients on the idea that their advantage lies in bringing capabilities together under one roof. As that roof becomes more porous, the definition of an agency employee is changing too.
The changing agency workforce
Sanjay Trehan, Digital Strategy Advisor, believes the industry risks losing sight of the human relationships that still underpin its business.
“The facelessness of a network, lack of a personal touch, and a multi-layered structure that impedes speed and agility are proving to be counterproductive. As automation and generative AI democratise capabilities that once gave large networks an advantage, agencies need to now focus on continuous value creation and stronger client engagement,” he adds.
That concern extends to the teams themselves. Toru Jhaveri, Founder & Strategy Lead, The Stuff of Life, points to the uncertainty restructuring can create for clients as well as employees. “There’s a lot of uncertainty on both sides. Clients are probably wondering whether the teams that actually understand and build their brands every day will stay,” he says.
That applies internally too. If the people building the technology behind an agency’s AI proposition can be moved out of the organisation or made redundant once the technology matures, the industry will have to rethink what it means to build a sustainable technology talent base.
The irony is that the technology agencies built to make themselves faster and more efficient are now changing the shape of the businesses that built it. The question is no longer whether agencies will become more AI-led. It is what happens to the talent that helped get them there.
