In this exclusive interview, we sat down with Bill Wise, CEO of Mediaocean, who was recently named 2024 CEO of the Year by The Tech Ascension Awards. With a career spanning pioneering work in online and programmatic advertising, Wise shares insights on his journey through tech leadership, Mediaocean’s mission, and his approach to fostering innovation and agility within an ever-evolving industry.
What inspired you to pursue leadership in the tech industry, and how has that journey evolved over time?
I always say that people are a company’s most important asset. And I’ve always been inspired by the people around me. When I worked at DoubleClick we were truly inventing online advertising and I was privileged to work with some of the brightest minds in the space trying to decode the format and future out what would get consumers to double-click on an ad. When I was at Right Media we were inventing programmatic advertising exchanges and again I worked with some of the smartest folks tackling some of the thorniest challenges with how ad campaigns are bought, sold, and delivering on the web. Today at Mediaocean, we’re redefining what independent ad tech can do for the world’s largest brands and their agencies across all channels from TV to TikTok. It’s incredibly exciting to put together all the pieces and create advertising infrastructure that’s become the industry’s mission-critical system of record.
What is Mediaocean's mission? How do you help drive that mission in your role?
Our mission is to power the future of the advertising ecosystem through technology solutions that empower brands and agencies to deliver impactful omnichannel marketing experiences. Parsing out some key words from that, I try to keep us focused on future-proofing our company and our customers by anticipating market trends. And I’m super passionate about delivering impact, however that’s defined in a micro or macro context. Omnichannel is a crusade I’ve been on since I first got into the ad tech space, always looking for ways to bring people, processes, and platforms together for marketers to meet consumers in the moment whatever screen or device they’re on.
How do you foster innovation within your teams while maintaining a balance between creativity and operational efficiency?
Innovation is codified into our core values at Mediaocean. We’re relentless in deploying technology to solve customer and market challenges. And we empower our teams to operate as leaders at every level to run the business so there is accountability and trust. As a hybrid workforce, we have teams in person and virtually collaborating across the globe with an emphasis on frequency and transparency. We use workflow tools like Jira and Asana to keep us centralized in our project management and communication tools like Zoom and Slack to stay connected on a human level. More and more, we’re leveraging generative AI to be even more productive and free up our people to bring their best brainpower and creativity to driving innovation.
In a fast-paced industry like tech, how do you ensure your organization remains agile and adaptable to change?
Another attribute that’s baked into our organization through one of our core values is fostering a learning culture. We’re intellectually curious and embrace a growth mindset. When I co-founded Mediaocean in 2011, we brought together teams (and customers) from MediaBank and Donovan Data Systems that had been working on different systems to solve similar customer needs. We asked everyone to get comfortable being uncomfortable as we transformed ourselves and the industry and we’ve never looked back. Since then we’ve done more than 10 more acquisitions to add capabilities and build our geographic footprint and, with each new injection of talent and customer commitments, we count on our team’s ability to be agile and catalysts for change.
What advice would you give to aspiring tech leaders looking to make a significant impact in their fields?
Surround yourself with A-players at each position. At Mediaocean, I could not do any of the jobs that my executive team does. The only one I’m qualified for is CEO. It’s about setting the North Star and clearing hurdles so people can do their best work. And trying to have a little fun along the way!
