Successive swings between in-housing and outsourcing had left a global bank with rising cost, eroded internal capability and an in-house/agency boundary no one could define across 40+ markets. Each correction fixed a symptom and created the next.
VA drew the explicit in-house-versus-agency line, realigned remuneration to it and designed a governed hybrid measured as one system — so the model holds through leadership cycles instead of swinging back.
Chief Marketing & Digital Officer, Head of Marketing Operations, CFO
The strategic problem
Successive swings between insourcing and outsourcing had left the bank with rising cost, eroded internal capability and an in-house/agency boundary no one could define across over 40 markets and several business units. Each correction had solved a symptom and created the next one. Leadership needed a model that would hold through cycles, not another pendulum swing.
Diagnose & Design
VA conducted a marketing & production ecosystem audit across every business unit and spend mapping & cost baseline analysis across 40+ markets, with a gap & maturity assessment that tested what the in-house team was genuinely for – exposing how much of its output served non-marketing demand – and at what true cost against external benchmarks. AURA/FRC (Fulltime Ratecard Calculator) reverse-engineered agency ratecards and validated SOW value; market benchmarking, scenario modelling & forecast simulation costed each build-vs-buy call; and a governance design (RACI, KPI framework) reset the accountability the pendulum had erased.
Ecosystem & Remuneration
Partner ecosystem design drew an explicit in-house versus agency boundary: a defined in-house core for always-on and data-led work, an external roster rationalised for scale and craft, a remuneration model design realigned to that boundary (harmonised fixed and performance-linked), fee benchmarking & validation, and a scoping & SOW design that ended duplication inside and outside; a three-year transformation roadmap sequenced across people, partners, process and platform – with GenAI capability integrated into the workflow – was priced and committed via AURA/Scoping Tool and AURA/Strategic Mapping Expectation.
Rollout & relationship management
Contracting & onboarding secured the new model in binding terms, and handover, rollout & commitment tracking – with AURA/Planner back-planning each wave of the three-year roadmap – ensured that what was promised in design translated into delivery; VA’s relationship management ran through the full transition, feeding continuous improvement rather than stepping away after go-live.
Execution Oversight
Briefing & estimate review and production cost validation enforced commercial discipline on both sides of the in-house/agency boundary; bid governance (triple/double/direct award) replaced market-by-market discretion; AURA/BMT (Budget Management Template) tracked production bids end to end; and wrap & final reconciliation confirmed realised savings against the baseline, giving Marketing, Procurement and Finance one shared view rather than an annual renegotiation.
Performance Measurement
KPIs defined in governance design are tracked via partner performance evaluation on a 90/180/360 appraisal cadence on both sides of the boundary; cost saving and cost avoidance are reported separately with ROI & efficiency analysis (today AURA delivers closure reports; full performance measurement is on the roadmap). Illustrative: 19% lower cost-to-serve, 13% cost avoidance from work no longer duplicated inside and outside, 28% less duplication.
Why VA
The pendulum is the problem, not the direction. VA fixes the in-house-versus-agency boundary, then designs the remuneration and the measurement around it as one system, so the answer the CFO needs survives the next leadership change without another reset.
Common questions
What is an in-house-versus-agency operating model?
It is an explicit boundary that fixes which marketing work a company runs internally — typically always-on, data-led activity — and which it buys from a rationalised external roster, with remuneration and governance aligned to that line so the split holds instead of drifting.
Why do in-housing decisions so often reverse?
Because each swing is treated as a sourcing correction rather than an operating-model design: without a defined boundary, aligned remuneration and shared measurement, cost or capability problems resurface and trigger the opposite move a cycle later.
How does VA stop the pendulum?
By fixing the boundary, then designing remuneration and measurement around it as one system with a three-year roadmap and a 90/180/360 performance cadence — so the answer survives the next leadership change without another reset.