Initiative India strengthens senior leadership

R Venkatasubramanian and Vishnu Sharma join the agency as senior vice-presidents.

After the recent change in leadership at Initiative Media when Manas Mishra was roped in as president, the senior management team has been boosted with two new appointments.

R Venkatasubramanian (Venkat) and Vishnu Sharma are slated to join the agency as senior vice-presidents and will be based in New Delhi. While Venkat returns to Initiative for a fresh stint from MPG, Sharma last worked as the national head, sales strategy and business analytics at HT Media. Both are currently serving their notice periods at their respective companies and are expected to join Initiative around August-end.

On the development, Mishra says, "These key appointments will help take Initiative into a superior level of delivering business and media solutions for clients. I look forward to welcoming Venkat and Sharma as part of my leadership team for this agency."

Venkat, in his new role will oversee investments and sports while Sharma will head strategy and insights for all of the agency's clients in Delhi.

"We are looking at pushing sports a lot more. You can expect lot more action in this sphere going forward. Sharma will lead the bigger business with his key skill set – planning. Both Venkat and Sharma are seasoned media professionals. The key thing here is that we are looking at people who can successfully lead our team and clients," Mishra tells afaqs!.

For Venkat, it is homecoming after having already worked in the agency for a decade between 2000 and 2010. With close to a couple of decades' experience, he has worked extensively on the Maruti account at Initiative.

Sharma, armed with about 16 years of experience, has worked with ZenithOptimedia, Madison and GroupM (Maxus and MEC), among other companies. He has worked on major brands such as Airtel, Hero Honda, LG, Dainik Jagran and Videocon, besides others.