Earned First

Jean-Leopold Schuybroek, chair of PROI’s International Development Group, joins the Earned First podcast to reflect on four decades in the consultancy business. The Interel founder and former ICCO chair has spent 20 years building PROI into a network of independent firms that now covers most of the world. In conversation with Earned First’s Arun Sudhaman, the episode explores:what he looks for in a firm before it is bigwhy clients now build their own rosters of independentshow public affairs outgrew its cosy lobbying originsthe silos agencies built for themselves.

Earned First's David Blecken and Arun Sudhaman look at the backlash over Singapore Airlines' stake in Air India, Chinese brands going global, and Mastercard's global PR pitch. They also discuss OpenAI's nine-month CCO search, and why only just over half of CCOs report to the CEO, according to Earned First's PR 2030 research.

GlobeScan CEO Chris Coulter joins the Earned First podcast to break down findings from the latest Oxford-GlobeScan Global Corporate Affairs Survey. Now in its seventh edition, the study draws on nearly 300 senior practitioners across 51 countries, and offers a wealth of insight into the opinions, trends, and challenges facing corporate affairs teams worldwide. In conversation with Earned First's Arun Sudhaman, the episode explores why corporate affairs heads want their functions revised — and why that appetite runs highest in Asia-Pacific — how geoeconomics is reshaping their priorities, the woeful state of corporate affairs measurement, and much more, including the latest on the ESG backlash.

Charlotte Mceleny returns to discuss Cannes Lions 2026: the creator economy's growing dominance, the industry's fixation on "culture," and renewed momentum behind CCOs and organisational trust. The conversation turns to GEO and AI search's parallels with early SEO, before closing on the Gen Z-led political movements reshaping communications across Asia.

Earned First's Cannes podcast series concludes with Omnicom PR CEO Chris Foster, who joins Arun Sudhaman for a wide-ranging conversation about creativity, culture, CCOs and consolidation. Foster reflects on what he sees as a shift in creativity toward influence, and what that means for earned media in an AI-driven landscape. He also examines the growing prominence of CCOs at Cannes, the relationship between geopolitics and market access, and what the best creative work of the week tells us. Seven months into the creation of the new Omnicom PR, he also opens up about the lessons of integration, on communication, culture and what it takes to make a network feel like more than the sum of its parts.