Andreas Hugi becomes President of the Leading Swiss Agencies Association

The members of Leading Swiss Agencies (LSA) appointed a new Chairman at their meeting on Thursday afternoon at the Amboss Rampe in Zurich. They elected the previous Vice President Andreas Hugi von Furrerhugi as the new President. He succeeds Beat Krebs from the Omnicom Media Group, who has chaired the association for the last four years and will remain on the Board. Andreas Hugi will be supported by the newly elected Vice President Laura Jenny from Agence Trio, who has been a member of the LSA Board since 2022 and represents the members of French-speaking Switzerland.

As the new president, Andreas Hugi wants to further strengthen the proven LSA strategy and position the association as the leading voice of communications agencies. "The LSA wants to focus even more strongly on establishing industry standards: With our Leading Quality Audit or the CMS certification as well as with further standards on ESG topics, we want to further fill the term 'Leading' in our association name with content," explains Hugi. "Anyone who is in the LSA demonstrates proven leadership quality and operational excellence in their agency as well as added value for their clients. We will also do even more to promote the relevance of the communications industry for the economic success of our clients."

The current board members Petra Dreyfus from Wirz, Mark Burow from Dentsu Creative DACH, Pablo Koerfer from Farner, Beat Krebs and Tobias Zehnder from Webrepublic were also confirmed in office.

Matthias Koller is stepping down from the Board after seven years, as are Pam Hügli and Walter Stulzer, who both served on the Board for four years.

Diverse association activities

With the second season of the LSA branded content format "The Perfect Match" the LSA showed how successful relationships between agencies and clients work. Four agency/client couples who work together as equals revealed what makes their relationship special and how their collaboration began.

At LSA Lunch-Time Podcast The LSA agency provided insights into the day-to-day work of the LSA agency and discussed current topics. In the LSA Live Talk customers spoke with the respective LSA agencies about trends and best cases on digital topics.

The LSA also launched a series of seminars on the topic of "Artificial intelligence and machine learning", which was kicked off with a leaders' discussion. These talks and impulse seminars on a wide range of current topics in German-speaking and French-speaking Switzerland met with great interest among LSA members and were well attended.

The LSA is also involved in various initiatives and projects for young talent. In 2023, for example, the only inter-university competition in Switzerland, the Junior Agency Awardwas held for the third time. In addition, the RealWWZ at the University of Basel invited over 30 Bachelor's and Master's students to find out about work opportunities at communications agencies. This opportunity was also offered to students in Lausanne, who took part in the SAWI forum and visited the LSA presentation. The workshops and events organized by the Young LSA the young and young-at-heart employees of LSA agencies were able to continue their education and network. The boot camp, the one-week intensive basic course for LSA agency newcomers or newcomers, also offered the opportunity to gain an overview of the industry in a short space of time and to acquire the necessary skills to work productively in the agency. Talented creatives or employees in strategic planning and/or consulting have the opportunity to take part in the Ad SchoolThe CAS in Creation and Strategic Planning. This is recognized by the HWZ Hochschule für Wirtschaft Zürich and developed and implemented by the LSA in collaboration with the ADC.

Further information and all the activities of Leading Swiss Agencies can be found in the current annual report 2023 to find.