Northwestern University Alumni

Renetta McCann has been recognized as a leading innovator and influential executive in the advertising, marketing, and media industries. She has a global reputation for building brands, and developing the organizations and leadership to sustain them.

McCann is chief inclusion experience officer for Publicis Groupe, one of the world’s largest communications groups. In this role, she works to drive inclusion at all levels to ensure the company’s clients and their businesses are benefiting from the many strategic advantages that diverse teams deliver. Previously, she served as chief talent officer for Leo Burnett USA as well as Publicis Communications North America. Prior to that, she was CEO of Starcom MediaVest Group Worldwide; under her leadership, client billings exceeded $26 billion and the global workforce rose to over 6,000 people.

Since 2016, McCann has served as an adjunct lecturer in Northwestern’s Master of Science in Learning and Organizational Change program, co-teaching courses on organizational design as well as diversity, equity, inclusion, and justice.

McCann served on the Northwestern Alumni Association Board of Directors from 2018 to 2020. She is currently a member of the board of directors for the American Advertising Foundation, 4A’s Foundation, She Runs It Foundation, and Chicago Shakespeare Theater, and she serves as vice-chair for the executive committee of the Chicago Community Trust.

In 2023, McCann was inducted into the American Advertising Federation’s Advertising Hall of Fame, the industry’s highest recognition, and received the David A. Bell Award for Industry Service. In 2020, she was honored with the ADCOLOR Lifetime Achievement Award, Sheldon J. Levy Leadership Award, and Chicago Advertising Federation’s Silver Medal Award.

McCann graduated from Northwestern with a BS in communication studies from the School of Communication and an MS in learning and organizational change from the School of Education and Social Policy.