The Interpublic Group of Companies, Inc. (NYSE:IPG) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Philippe Krakowsky: And 1 just quick add there, David, is just that across the senior teams, whether it’s corporate or any of the units, our incentives are fully aligned to that objective, right? So the plan is modestly more heavily weighted to margin than revenue. And so to our mind, that ensures that where there’s growth, there’s profitable growth, and that when we’re in a circumstance that’s got more uncertainty, we’re still able to, as Ellen said, make good on that consistent record of where there’s growth, we’ve demonstrated that we can convert it to incremental profit.

David Karnovsky: Thank you.

Operator: Thank you. The next question is from Lina Ghayor with BNP Paribas. You may go ahead.

Lina Ghayor: Good morning. Philippe and Jerry. Thank you for taking my questions. I have three, please. The first one is on the guidance. Could you elaborate a tiny bit more the guidance regarding the impact of inflation on the revenue? And marginally, what shape do you expect the growth to be, for example, H1 versus H2? The second one, perhaps for Ellen on wage inflation. How much was wage inflation in ’22? And what have you taken for 2023 in your assumptions? And lastly, Philippe, just to come back on your point at the beginning of your remarks, could you comment on the performance by sector? I think you mentioned telecom. Could you elaborate? And more what is the attitude of your claims by sector ahead of ’23? Thank you.

Philippe Krakowsky: Sure. That’s a lot. So I guess there are 2 inflation questions. I will take the — so in terms of inflation, vis-a-vis our growth, yes, the majority of our contracts have written into them the ability to — as the world changes, sort of go back to clients and talk about the cost of the services that we provide to them. That’s not something that triggers automatically, it requires that you enter into a conversation or ultimately kind of a negotiation with clients. So if I were to talk about what’s gone into our thinking and how we build the forecast that leads to the guidance, revenue growth is primarily from growing scope with our existing clients. And we definitely believe that there is that the primary avenue for growth, the most — the 1 that we are most keen on is growth with existing clients.

So deepen the relationship, bring additional services. Then secondarily, clearly, you have the opportunity to add when there are new business opportunities and pitches. So I think that, that’s really what is baked into it. And then as we’ve discussed, we are beginning to, in some instances, be able to go to clients with some of these services that are — new services based on the data and the technology part of what we’ve been building. So I think that’s 1 part of the question. And then Ellen, I’ll let Ellen take the cost as it bakes into our business and then the second part and then I’ll come back for your third piece on sectors.

Ellen Johnson: So as far as inflation on our cost base, we’ve been very transparent that there’s been modest inflation in the salary line, but ones that we feel are very manageable and that will not take us off the growth trajectory on our margins nor deter us from expanding them accordingly. So that was factored into our guidance for ’23 and going forward.