My Brilliant Career

What do you do at work each day?

My role as CEO is varied. I lead teams of people across the agency’s disciplines and guide them in terms of the operational decisions they make. To this end, my style is leader-ascoach, so I’m always asking questions to enable them to find the solutions themselves, which forms part of our desire to be a “learning organisation”.

I attend client meetings specifically when it comes to the strategy of their business or product. I deal with our international partners in terms of reporting on our service levels, creative delivery and our financial performance. And I handle the external communication — press and publicity — of the agency. My days are part planning and part action, which is dynamic and interesting. The advertising industry has a reputation for working and playing hard — is this the case?

I think this reputation arises out of bygone years, the 1980s, when the industry was flourishing and playing hard was probably a bigger focus than working hard. Having said that, we are an industry that enjoys a good party and celebrating our wins. But life and the world being what they are, the pendulum has swung and I would dare to say that working hard has taken precedence over playing hard. What drew you to pursue this particular career?

As a student, I would visit my elder sister at the agency where she worked and I loved the energy in the office. It felt alive and powerful, very dynamic. I also loved the creative product — something arising from nothing, a blank page filled. I