Cannes Lions: Plus ça change?

“Why are you here?" 

It was a simple question from Oprah to a packed theatre at Cannes Lions, but it lingered long after the session ended. Her point was about intentionality: taking a moment to reflect on why we do what we do. 

It made me wonder who was asking themselves that same question throughout the week. 

Was it the creators racing across the Croisette before flooding LinkedIn with hot takes? The AI sales teams filling every diary slot in pursuit of the next marketing budget? Or the marketers escaping the Riviera heat into dark auditoriums to debate, judge and celebrate the industry's best work? 

Like marketing itself, Cannes has always been a blend of logic and emotion. The logic is straightforward: build relationships, spot emerging trends and experience the world's best creativity. The emotion is harder to describe. The intensity of the heat, the spectacle, the ambition and the excess that makes Cannes unlike any other industry gathering. 

This year, one thing felt noticeably different. The AI hype cycle seems to be settling into something more realistic. The conversation is becoming less about replacing people and more about amplifying what people can do. 

Agents may well be doing our grocery shopping in years to come, but it's still human relationships that close partnerships between technology companies and brands. It's still human imagination that defines what's possible with AI in the first place. 

That was the argument I made at WFA Global Marketer Week in the Better Marketing debate. Walking onto the stage, I knew the odds weren't exactly in my favour. I was making the case for inclusive marketing as the smartest investment for brand growth, up against Katrina Dodd from Contagious arguing for creative excellence and Angela Tangas from BrandTech making the case for artificial intelligence. 

On the surface, inclusion has slipped down both business priorities and conference agendas. After the momentum of 2020–2023, economic pressure and political headwinds have pushed it into the background. In many organisations, it's become an afterthought rather than a starting point. 

But perhaps that's because we've become distracted by the language. 

What we're really talking about isn't inclusion as a programme or a label. We're talking about understanding more people. Creating cultures where different perspectives can thrive, so brands can better understand the increasingly diverse societies they serve. 

Dr Marcus Collins describes this as the relationship between the front stage and the backstage. The culture inside an organisation shapes the work that eventually reaches the outside world. The two are inseparable. 

Interestingly, this year's Film Grand Prix went to Mother for its work with Anthropic. We've had the privilege of working alongside Mother on strengthening its culture over several years. I wouldn't suggest any direct line between that work and award-winning creativity, but it is a useful reminder that exceptional creative work rarely happens in isolation. The backstage matters. 

For too long, marketing has been shaped by a relatively narrow group of decision-makers. Gatekept creative roles, limited perspectives and concentrated media power determined what was made and what audiences ultimately saw. 

Today, the picture is very different. Creators have democratised influence. Workforces are becoming more diverse. Audiences are more complex and more vocal. In that world, creative excellence is strengthened – not compromised – by a wider range of perspectives around the table. And AI only becomes more useful when it's informed by richer, more representative human inputs. 

As I left Cannes, I realised I was leaving with the same conviction I had when I started my career 16 years ago. 

Marketing is, and always will be, about humans understanding other humans well enough to create relevance, connection and growth. 

Plus ça change.