Episode
Getting Sh*t Done: Tom Amies-Cull on Fixing Broken Agency Operating Models
- Podcast
- Signal & Noise
- Published
- May 14, 2026
- Duration seconds
- 3531
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Summary
Most companies don’t fail at strategy. They fail at execution =. In this episode of Signal & Noise, Brett House and Rio Longacre sit down with Tom Amies-Cull—a seasoned operator who has spent two decades inside the most complex, high-pressure agency environments, including senior leadership roles across IPG, Dentsu, and Kinesso. This isn’t a conversation about AdTech plumbing. It’s about something far more fundamental—and far more broken: How organizations actually work. Or more accurately… why they often don’t. Drawing from years inside the machine, Tom unpacks the uncomfortable truth behind transformation in large, matrixed organizations: It’s not a strategy problem. It’s a coordination problem. It’s a leadership problem. It’s an operating model problem. As he puts it: “Transformation usually fails not because companies lack strategy, but because they can’t convert intent into coordinated behavior.” This is a candid, sometimes blunt breakdown of what actually gets in the way of change: Why most “transformations” are just reorgs in disguise How internal politics quietly kill execution The real reason employees aren’t change-resistant—they’re resistant to bad change Why strategy decks and org charts are not operating models How unclear decision rights create organizational paralysis The hidden role of middle management as the “connective tissue” of execution Why leadership teams say they want accountability—but often avoid it in practice There’s a lot of industry noise right now about agencies evolving into platforms, operating systems, and AI-powered machines. Tom brings this conversation back to reality: Most organizations are further away than they think. Not because the vision is wrong— but because the underlying systems (people, incentives, culture, decision-m…