Adrianne C. Smith

SVP and Senior Partner, Chief Diversity and Inclusion Officer, FleishmanHillard
Founder and President, Can: Diversity Collective

Adrianne C. Smith is SVP/Senior Partner and Chief Diversity and Inclusion Officer at FleishmanHillard. Prior to joining FleishmanHillard, Adrianne was named the first Global Director of Inclusion and Diversity at WPP. Adrianne is also the Founder and Visionary of the Can: Diversity Collective, a non-profit organization created to provide access and exposure to young adults of color and under-represented communities to global thought leadership conferences on advertising, marketing, creativity, economics, innovation and technology. In 2018, she launched the first iteration of the Diversity Collective, the Cannes Can: Diversity Collective (CC:DC) which provides rising stars in the advertising and creative industry the opportunity to attend and participate in the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity. In 2019, she made history by creating the first stand-alone Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Beach in the festival’s 66 years of existence and named it Inkwell Beach – Cannes after the historic beach on Martha’s Vineyard.  In January 2024, she launched the Davos Can: Diversity Collective’s – Inkwell Beach – Davos during the World Economic Forum., making history again by building the first activation committed to conversations on the global impact of diversity, equity and inclusion. Adrianne is on the Board of the Harlem Business Alliance and advisory board of the Reykjavik Global Forum. and has been recognized as an Outstanding Mentor by the Diversity Action Alliance, a Game Changer in the Quantum Leap category during the She Runs It Game Changers Awards and the 2023 AdColor DEI Executive of the Year.