She will be an active leader with focus on client counsel as well as developing intellectual property and services for BCW that will strengthen the agency’s offering and bring it to new heights. For North America, Thomas will build, broaden and nurture the client teams and help integrate the practice with other areas of expertise to build new offerings.

“I was searching for someone who has the energy and vision to propel our global strategy forward and lead in this highly competitive practice area,” said Donna Imperato, Global CEO, BCW. “What is so striking about Michael Ann Thomas is that she is not bound by convention. She’s fearless at a time when we need bold ideas, uninhibited creativity and a sophisticated understanding of the evolution of the world of technology. Michael knows what’s driving global businesses.”

Before joining BCW, Thomas was Global Technology Practice Chair for APCO Worldwide and spent years building a health technology offering for Edelman. In both roles, Thomas was responsible for meeting market demand with integrated communications solutions that lived at the intersection of technology and global business disruption. She has specialized in emerging technology, across disciplines and industries, and is a trusted advisor to well-known venture capital firms and start-ups. She has built unique diagnostics and communications tools to help traditional enterprises rebuild their infrastructure, culture, talent pool, products and processes to evolve, thrive and win.

“Michael is an expert at helping organizations define and communicate new measures of value as they navigate digital transformation,” said Chris Foster, President, North America, BCW, to whom Thomas reports. “Michael understands this disruption, the issues facing the technology sector and how to position our clients to win.”

For the last several years, Thomas has researched the global talent war burdening businesses around the world, spearheading strategy to better understand developers and the highly technical workforce. This has helped her technology teams optimize content and channel strategies to attract and retain quality talent, with higher velocity, as their businesses evolve.

“The moment I spoke with the team at BCW I knew instantly that there was a real hunger coming from Donna and Chris to move quickly, and in some cases re-design solutions based on new collective resources,” said Thomas. “Businesses today need integrated campaigns, built on the backbone of sophisticated technologies and subject matter expertise, analogous with their own industries. BCW has incredibly strong leadership that’s already thinking big, is experimenting and merging talent – and is now adding new variables, new people, new creativity and new sophisticated tools to exceed expectations and meet market demand.”

Thomas previously served as a board member for the Hacking Medicine Institute, an organization born out of MIT’s Hacking Medicine Program. She has also supported MIT’s annual GRAND HACK and participates at SXSW and other digital events.

About BCW

BCW is one of the world’s largest full-service global communications agencies. Founded by the merger of Burson-Marsteller and Cohn & Wolfe, BCW delivers digitally and data-driven creative content and integrated communications programs grounded in earned media and scaled across all channels for clients in the B2B, consumer, corporate, crisis management, CSR, healthcare, public affairs and technology sectors. BCW is a part of WPP (NYSE: WPP), the world's leader in communications services. For more information, visit www.bcw-global.com.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180906005806/en/