 Hello everyone, welcome to another 42 Courses podcast, today I'm over the moon ridiculously excited to chat to Amani Duncan. We had a conversation a few weeks ago and I think it was supposed to be a 10 minute chat and we ended up talking for about an hour. So really looking forward to this chat and thank you so much for joining us. For those who don't know who you are. I mean obviously if you're watching on a video you can see that you're a multiple award winner because there's literally about a thousand awards and brilliant photos behind you. But for those of you who don't but just because you'll probably do a better job than me what in a few lines like what is it that you do? And then what is it that I do? Gosh, well first of all thank you Chris for your generosity and spirit. I could talk to you for like days on end and our spouses would be like what is wrong with them? Like I just stimulate my mind and I love your genuine curiosity it's just so wonderful. But hi everyone, my name is Amani Duncan and I am formerly the CEO of BBH USA, a little creative strategic shop here in the US. I'm sure many of you guys know of the BBH legacy and I'm currently advising and on the board of several blue chip companies and really enjoying that. I'm a marketer at heart and so I've spent the majority of my career in marketing functions but in various industries I now call my stuff of foreigner and foreign land. Advertising has marked the fit industry that I've successfully gone into. It's just I think it's part of my entrepreneurial spirit and I gravitate towards legacy, beautiful legacy brands. So I've been in recorded music. You could probably see the Beastie Boys behind me but you know I was in the recording music industry when I first left university and decided to not go into law and my parents have just now forgiven me for that decision but it was the right decision I think and so I blindly went into music not even really knowing if you can make a legal you know honest living but I did and I spent about just under a decade at at some of the most iconic record labels in the world. Def Jam, yeah. You're a fine lad. I brought those. That was that was another phase yeah so I stayed in inter I stayed in music for about 10 years and then I went into a brand with Sean Pomp which is Jeep Marketing and I oversaw all yeah all six of his brands which was like a dream job especially for someone who has like an entrepreneurial spirit about them so that was fragrances and spirits and his TV film career and the fashion line and fragrance and they just every day was a new opportunity to do something it was it was so exhilarating and then from there I did another big side and went into manufacturing I people still scratch their head about it like never what were you doing in manufacturing but when the oldest American guitar manufacturer called which is Martin Bitar you kind of pick up the phone and you you have that you know curious conversation with them which led to six glorious years of me running marketing they didn't have a marketing department before I started and so that gave me the white space to create what marketing looked like and felt like at a brand that at the time it was 178 years old when I joined it was amazing and so the the proposition and how do you take a brand that's seat in history and tradition and legacy that's 178 years old and remix it so that it appeals to a younger consumer without losing any of the bread equity so we can talk about that forever it was six amazing years for you know the interest how I mean you do hear about these companies every now and then that don't have marketing departments and that join all months and I don't think that's necessarily a a bad or a good thing it's just a thing but I heard actually a friend of mine was saying I think Haribo the the German a sweet manufacturer they didn't have a M. Rothfinger and so it's the years until maybe five six years ago but when you did that for Martin how how big was the company at that stage was it like hundreds thousands of people yes so there is very much so so there was two factories they had a factory in Nazareth Pennsylvania which I didn't know where that was it's it's about 60 miles from where I live in in South Orange New Jersey so it's not that far away but it's a small town and it's quite lovely and then they had a sister factory in Navajo a Mexico and so you know there was yeah it was over gosh in the Nazareth in the Nazareth facility there was probably 5000 people it was quite large and then roughly around that number give or take in in Mexico and they were just they were trying to reach a hundred million dollar revenue bar and I've joined that year that they were trying to reach that mark and I want to say through the enhanced marketing and you're able to achieve that goal you know it's interesting when you have companies that don't have that market they sometimes they tend to mesh it with sales which was the paradigm at Martin guitar but it's funny whenever I'd usually go into a company mainly because the company needs a little help like they maybe they've lost their way maybe they need a brush and that was the case with this beautiful heritage manufacturing company they were losing market share to be quite on it to a very young upstart guitar manufacturer called Taylor guitar line in it yeah and so they were losing market share and it was it's so interesting when you are in the eye of the storm it's really hard to to see things clearly and so that's what when I come into company especially being a foreigner and foreign land I come in very fresh I don't have any baggage I don't have any you know I'm not tethered to anything so I'm seeing things very clearly and so for me the reason why they were losing market share was very apparent and it wasn't so much that they didn't have marketing it was just that the other company was talking to a demographic that they said that Martin simply wasn't talking to that's all Martin had a very core consumer and they were kind of playing in the pocket and so my job was to remix that without losing any brand equity because that would be like cutting your nose off in spite of your faith but remixing it a little bit so that it did appeal to a very young consumer base so it was quite the pendulum swing um yeah but it worked well for me bravo um thank you I'd run it all right so I don't even know where to start because there's so many different places we go in this conversation but like what are you like after that I went into from Martin I went into media so I went to Viacom maybe ads and then after that I ended up in advertising but I thought maybe a good place to start is like right at the beginning you said that you you were supposed to go to um go into law was it um so how did you how did you get into your first role like what was the what how did it all start because I mean it seems like throughout there's always been a thread if I look at your sort of digital cv and from from what you've been been telling me in our chats there is a thread of kind of music and entertainment like it is did this start from a young age like when you were growing up we like oh like I want to work in that industry one day or like how yeah how did it come about yeah so um going all the way back to my I grew up in a very musical household I was told that at a very young age around four or five I walked to my family walked up to my family's piano and I started plucking out melody by my dad god rest his soul um he was a musician by by love he was an electrical engineer by Trey a musician dad's musician by by love and so he played every instrument our house was constantly filled with music um my dad played the piano he his true love was the fluke so he really dedicated his life to being a flautist my mom played guitar a martin guitar my sister played violin and I played piano and so we we always grew up in a very musical household might we listened to them you know we did we weren't allowed to listen to the radio growing up but we listened to records um and so our house was constantly filled with some form of music whether it was on the record player or whether it was us kind of all playing together and so that was always core to who I was who my family is but I never thought about a career in in music um you know early on they thought I was going to be a classical pianist I went to a conservatory the whole nine but it wasn't my love love I just enjoyed playing the piano I was a political science major so I I was in the debate in very different so I was an academic I was you know I excelled in school I was on the speech debate team winning tons of awards um really just loving it and I went to university and I was a political science major with a minor in international relations I thought I would go on get a law degree and then work abroad you know perhaps for the UN or be an ambassador or something so I really was on a very different track but what happened is once I graduated from university I I had a upon I had a moment it was quite scary and upsetting to everyone in my family basically but for me it was scary in the sense that I for the first time in my in my very young life I was questioning was this the path I wanted to take or was this a path that was simply told to me over and over again throughout my life and uh I asked my parents for a reprieve I just said I I need a moment I need a moment to just think and pause and you know it was tumultuous it was all this drama but they allowed me to defer and my mom was very adamant that if I deferred I would never go back I would never even go and she was right but then here's young Amani sitting on her parents couch miserable stressed out because I didn't know what to do I never I literally was a one-track mind person I didn't even know what I what I liked and so one day I woke up and I said I'm gonna work in the music industry what was it my mom's like what was that you want to take was there something that made you you said that you you paused like was it was it was the pause just because you you you suddenly realized you didn't want to go down the path that you sort of had kind of been predetermined for you and like yes was was it just as simple as that um it was you know if I think back I mean it's been many years but if I think back on it it was the when I was going through the process of applying to law school and like it became very real right and I just I just remember just asking myself is this really something I want to do it was just that simple and yeah when the answer back wasn't an immediate yes of course that's when all hell broke yeah it was just like madness so then then you decided right I'm gonna go down the music path yeah I just woke up one day for no random reason and I said I'm going to work in the music industry my mother was like calling the therapist like she's completely locked and I and I remember getting the yellow pages like you know kids the directory that's not online and I lift to record literally record company I flipped to that page and the first the first one I saw with Def Jam they had a tiny little west coast office and I called the number and this woman picked up the phone I went into my speech you know I'm a recent callist grad I'm looking for a hintership as she said show up tomorrow and hung up unbeknownst to me the woman who answered the phone was the SBP of A&R for the west coast office Tina David she's gone on to manage you know she had an illustrious career she went on to manage Chris Brown and other artists and she's currently at Empire Records right now she's amazing and I showed up and the rest is history I I entered for her I learned I was a student I was just voracious I I was like this is awesome and I you know I was dealing with the contract that I was dealing with transcribing lyrics by tip-off purchase that I was like and uh but I learned everything and they always told me I couldn't they weren't going to hire me and I was like okay and after three months I was like I need a job so I had all these interviews lined up at record companies because I was like I like this I think I'm gonna stay with it and they were like wait no you can't leave we you're amazing and so they found me a job and not a job I wanted but it was office manager of five people I was like okay I'll take it proceeded to create my own job and I was opposed to me it was what promotions manager did and I was like what is a promotion manager I don't even know what that is and I got on the radar of some really important people like Kevin Lyles and Julie Greenwald who's the chairwoman of Atlantic Records and Lear Cohen who's now head of YouTube music and I just did good work for them and then I would say shortly thereafter they offered me a job in New York and moved me over a weekend so it's I mean I never thought about that is you yeah I think it and it's so key for so many people starting is is often the biggest the biggest obstacle to doing great things is normally yourself it's not other people and I love the way that you just opened up a book and you're like here's Jeff Jam Rapids I'd imagine that Jeff Jam even back then was still huge right it's like you in like massive massive it's so you're just like well screw it let me just give them a call and then and then I mean with life there's always a little bit of lucky timing it sounds like you got him really lovely lady who helped mental you and then and then you worked hard and made yourself irreplaceable which then meant they had to hire you of course they're gonna hire you when you say it like that it sounds so easy I think most people tend to over complicate it and I think they maybe then go and try go down the path that they think they should take rather than than the one that one so I'm imagining if you had gone down the traditional route perhaps you wouldn't have had the same energy putting into that job it it it's uh yeah it's incredible so you very sorry so I'm going off yeah thank you no thank you yeah it's so inspirational the story and then from from there did it it was it just a kind of natural progression into other music companies or yes so I I um they called me on a Friday and Kevin Lyles did and said I'd have a job for you in New York but you need to be here Monday as I went home and packed up my little belongings and you'll never get a ride mind you no but I you know honestly Chris I felt like I had nothing to lose and everything to gain like I was like I'm young I can always come back home if it doesn't work and you know I feel very left because I had parents who instilled in my sister and I this sense of fear fairness fearlessness that we could be anything anything that we wanted to be and go for it and so I did it was scary attack because I didn't know anyone in New York and except for Kevin and he wasn't much help and I lived in a hotel for three months and it was horrible I know it sounds glamorous you know three weeks it becomes the walls start closing in on but I loved what I was doing and it was at the you know early 90s and it was at the height of the hip hop and we had Jay Z and Deon Vax and oh my gosh we had LL Cool Jay and the most amazing artist ever and so it was just an exhilarating time to be in New York City at the like just when hip hop was just cranking on all cylinders and so then you know like it is today the merging of the label started and so we merged with island records became island deck jam and then I eventually left to go once again to a legacy command that needed a little help so virgin records called and they were going through a huge transition huge transition and they had let go of pretty much everyone and they were bringing in what they called a turnaround team and so I had built quite a nice reputation for myself so I was tapped to come over to lead video production and promotion at this new you know under this new regime at virgin records and so I stayed there for quite some time eventually we merged with capital record becoming capital music group and I ended my tenure there was eight years and oh well around wait what's eight years and we think it was 2000 it was yeah eight years I left in 2008 and I ended my career there at the senior vice president of marketing for the pop rock side so I had transitioned from hip hop to eventually doing the entire roster all genres at major record company and I'm very proud of that staff because when that had happened back at depth jam I was one of the three black people that did the entire roster at a larger record company so I was very proud of like being part of that that that that changed and so I ended at I ended at capital music group we launched Katy Perry we had 30 seconds to Mars with Jared leto we launched Coldplay's Vida La Viva or Viva La Vida I get that mixed up Viva La Vida it's just Rowan Stone and like it you but it was just on Lenny Kravitz who's a dear friend lodged his gosh was a 12th studio album I mean it was just wow in gorillas which was the joy of my life working with Damon Alvarn it with Danger Mouth and so I left there and when I did it was on a high but I went over to Sean I became his chief marketing officer so again another but still with an entertainment underlay but went over it's a straight brand how did you I mean well the one that a very quick question um you saying that you sort of worked in in the hip hop world and then there was the kind of rock music world from those two genres who were the hitherto like who are your two favorites I think the bit that you had to work with you know it's so funny um artists are artists um it doesn't matter the job you know I the fun thing is I when I decided to move into more of the of the rock and the pop side it was it was mainly because I grew up listening to all types of music so I was like right I love all types of music I love country music like you know my household we listen to everything and um kind of bored because I was doing visual I was doing video production and remember this so I got a little bored with what the hip hop artists were doing you know it was all formulaic it was it was a bit misogynistic and you know to say the least and I was just like I don't want to be a part of that I need I need I need us to do some real creativity you know I remember trying to push J&Z and trying to push artists into like doing something different with their visuals um Jay who I'm so proud of I mean he definitely spread his wings over the years I mean 99 I would have loved to have produced that work you know that that visual um because that's the kind of like being changing rock, pop, hip hop you know with black and white and it's just like ah it was so it was so disruptive and amazing um so you know I I did love working with the rock artists you know I I getting to meet you know Bon Jovi getting to meet Melissa Etheridge you know hanging out with Iggy Pop you know and and meeting the Stones I mean that I was like what like so this was amazing you know and Lenny and like becoming really good friends with them you know but I have to say regardless of the genre they're all the same we have they make you know they're difficult they're challenging but they're no they're no more difficult than working with a client working with a creative director because I always say kind of directors are rock stars you know so it's all the same people are people kind of learned the formula and you know but I think highly highly creative people are not always university but they do tend to be a bit quirky a bit a bit and not necessarily difficult to work with there's definitely you've got to you've got to know how to work with them to get the best out of them that's a powerful way of saying that yes how did you go thanks how did you go from you know sort of how did you get into the branding and marketing side of things so again because I mean that you you were saying at university there was a lot of stuff around communications you thought that you might be an ambassador or something for the UN that I mean there is there's a lot of intersection I guess with branding and marketing with that is I mean it's all ultimately communications so how did you get into that side of the business was it kind of oh by the way can you go and do this for this and then you're like uh yeah why not like what happened you know a lot of any listen there was no rule book when for what we're doing in the music industry it became more more corporate it became more and more business and so I always kind of lean more on the business side and understanding that especially because when we when we were doing music videos at the height of music videos I mean pledges were five six seven ten million dollars and I'm managing that you know so like it it was an obscene amount of money we were doing many films we were doing short films because music videos became longer and longer and longer and then we started doing breadth because we needed when when things started to go on the downside we needed to subsidize these big budgets whether they were specifically for video and that's why you started seeing more product integration or whether it was subsidize your marketing budget so as this senior vice president of marketing for capital music group we were it was at a time this was um early 2000 and it was at a time where things are a little stagnant for us and we just didn't have the big marketing budget than a lot of our heritage to having so we had to get more scrappy we had to get way more creative and so I put a mandate and I said to my marketing team and really to the organization at large I said artist or brand with we have to shift how we think about this talent they are really grand like Linny Kravitz has curated his brand for years for a decade so we have to shift the way we think of them and so I I also said financially we need to start doing some more strategic partnerships but they need to be rooted in authenticity they can't feel like where did that just come from um so I challenged the team by saying every new artist for their album release project we need to have at least one at least one brand associated with this with this project for heritage artists we need at least three or more so that really started our reshaping which is now I mean there's departments at record companies that do that there's they're called strategic partnership uh departments and so I said we really need to reshape how we think about AR talent talent is now a brand and then we need to bring in smart partners to help offset marketing spent so for example with Linny Kravitz I had his um I think it was his 10th studio album if I'm correct it's time for a love revolution and you know Linny's I was a heritage artist for so he was used to big budget and so I had a conversation with him and I said listen I need you to trust me I we're going we're going to need to bring in some really smart partners I promise you that they will be like tick to your brain but this has to happen and he was like no no no and eventually I got him to agree and so I did purchase with Levi's we did a custom line of uh Linny Kravitz designed Levi's because Linny's always Levi's that we sold through coals we brought in my space believe it or not at the time wow we brought in the west airline yeah yeah so that's really when I when I got the bug for the brand side of things um so going from you know the record company side to overseeing all six of his brand uh Sean's brand and his partnerships it was kind of a natural uh transition I had to pause and just say for two seconds when people look at my CV which I now call a career portfolio it's too live it's too dynamic to be a just a CV uh then so when I was making these moves people were scratching their head they were like right what is she doing this literally does not make sense but in perfect sense to me because I don't because I I never I realized early in my career the record business how people want to brand you how people want to put you in a pocket like oh you're this that percent I didn't want to be known as the music the record label not like there's anything wrong with that I still have a ton of friends uh in abundance in the record business but I I didn't want that for myself I wanted to be known as a very smart business woman and so curiosity being curious just like young the money who looked in the yellow page it and found record company that spirit has followed me throughout my entire career and if I wasn't curious um I wouldn't have gone into the industries that I've gone into um and learned how to be a successful foreigner in foreign land so I just I just felt like I needed to underscore that for everyone that's listening because someone might be having the same you know questions or challenges I think I think it's so there was a bit that you said earlier about about the the sort of fearlessness that would have been installed in you by your parents and I thought the you know I probably there was some similar when we were last chatting I was explaining of also had a weird very weird non-standard career uh life and and and something you said resonated with me was that um you know the in what you were saying that you thought well what was the worst that can happen is I I end up at my parents and you know I quite like them so not it's not a terrible thing and I think it's reframing some of these things when you are taking a step um and just going what's the worst can happen you know I end up at my parents and I have to kind of go back into something else I mean that's not a terrible thing and then the potential upside of the other thing does work which you know normally if you put effort into it as showing you did normally amazing things can happen um that's fantastic and can so incredible that you got to meet with so many people and also I love the way that you you said that you framed it quite simply if you're a new artist they need to have at least one brand working them with them if they're a legacy artist they need at least three let's say um and and that it needed to be done with you know a genuine fit so that it really works I I think that's that's kind of key isn't it if you if as long as you as long as you get the the fit right then then everything's fine but otherwise then it otherwise it turns into a nightmare but uh so was was it after this did you did you go did you stay in music some more um or how like because eventually at some stage you get into appetizing into an actual advertising agency which is very different it's remarkable I mean luck luck has served me very well um and and I feel very blessed to even say that you know when I went to I've always loved creativity and I've always stayed very close to the maker um right you know I consider myself a creative I mean there's times I'm sitting there reviewing you know storyboards and scripts and I feel very blessed to have had um you know a foundation in the visual arts you know by making the music videos and the short films and you know even at martin guitar I went on to produce executive produce a documentary that went on and won countless film uh field festival awards but I I rooted myself in both sides so I can use the left side of my brain and the right side of my brain and so I always wanted to stay close to the makers when I went over to Sean um one of the one of the brands I oversaw was his record uh uh label uh business and or his record recorded music career um it started out this is my friend that it's his children puff puff daddy yes pd plus daddy yes all of the money can't disname job sure next yeah I I was one of the few people that just called them Sean I was like I have my god giving me um love him and so you know he was with Atlantic and then he went over to Interscope and that was one of the things that I would oversee as well but there was a full team full team so I was just kind of on the top of it kind of looking down making sure uh everything stayed on track but he had a in-house agency called blue flame and they were they were really just an agency that worked on one of the projects he was working on whether it was for I am king fragrant love launch or with the Diageo or you know the launch of a new flavor I mean that's kind of what they did but I wanted the agency to grow and so I said well we need to become a pitching agency like we actually need to pitch for new business and uh created that and brought in some really smart thinkers some really smart creative um one of them was Shannon Washington who's now the uh chief creative officer over at RGA here in the States um and she does have a global remit as well and so we started pitching um and then from that I joined the ADC global board um and I you know agency life was always kind of circling me when I was always the client I was forever the client um and uh I think that you know just the jump to advertising quickly I think that was one of my I know being I should speak in more affirmative I know that's one of my superpowers because I'm a client was right the clients that we all the new business that we were able to garner at BBH USA I had a hand in bringing them in and I think it was for the first time they had someone that truly understood the the pain point you know I can't tell you how many times I laid in bed wide awake staring at the ceiling with the chess board on the ceiling trying to figure it out um figure out the next move you know and so when I would say to my my client who became friends keeps you up at night talk to me and they felt like they were talking with an ally it wasn't just one who was trying to get a piece of business because I less than two years ago I I was in your seat I was right there with you so there was a heightened sense of empathy um and just just understanding you know I mean my clients would call me in the middle of the night and we would problem solve we would we would work it out and they knew that if I if I said I was going to do something I would do it and if I said I couldn't do something I just you know I just I just believed in living you know leading with a heightened level of transparency and honesty so going back to Sean it was it feels like kind of a head scratch but I think a lot of people didn't know that there was blue flame there wasn't in-house agency that I was overseas so I still had one foot in the brand side and then one foot in the agency side so it wasn't that much of a leap of faith yeah it sounds like you love uh you love being close to where the stuff's been made which I guess then helps explain why you you sort of then dove into the the sort of the agency world I mean it's it's it's uh it's perhaps not as um profitable I don't know what the right words to say but it's it's only more exciting um it it's uh yeah I mean it's just generally in life they've been you know the closer you are to the money the the more your margins generally speaking um so I think when when you go when you do go to the agency side I mean I'm not saying that they're necessarily struggling with money but it is you normally have to think a bit bit smarter so you don't have quite so much wiggle room as when you are the brand yourself generally speaking um well here you're right on what when when you yeah when you joined bbh um was that after after shorn then um yeah I know there's a few more in between there believe it or not I know I know I wasn't done yet I wasn't done so when I left hold on um because curiosity just got me once again it's my life my life I I'll never forget Chris I was sitting in the big corner office you know right at Times Square and the phone rang and I picked up and it was a recruiter and I'm you know I'm always surprised when recruiters get my number like is it listed somewhere like oh my god I need to take it down um it was this amazing recruiter who's become such a good friend and he said I found your information and I'm like how but okay and he said I have an opportunity I would love to talk to you about but don't hang up the phone oh god he goes it's for it's with Martin guitar and of course I mean my mom please every every artist their chaps plays a martin like come on you know and I was like keep talking like I'm very I'm shocked at this point like they're looking to start a marketing department they're looking for a head of marketing I'm like okay he's like but don't hang out I'm like okay he's like it's in Nazareth Pennsylvania I'm like birthplace of Christ like what are you talking about like where's on the next Pennsylvania I'm like what are you talking about and curiosity got me and I went and visited the factory I mean I think people don't realize like I didn't work in an office I work in a working factory with blue yeah so just another another tool to add to the toolbox it's rusty there's another but it's another way that you got placed into the creators again um as well the medicus the maker I like first year and martin people would say they they were looking for me they were like oh she's on the factory floor I mean I said every I mean I was just I was an on a luthier's I mean martin still does so much by hand in the construction of it of a guitar and you know there's only a few things that are automated and these instruments are world-renowned and it was I'm just I'm so curious about the process but also the people you know because you have multi-generational workers you know you would see the son and then his mom and then his dad and then his grandmother and his uncle and his aunt like it was unbelievable and you know you walk into the factory and oh I will never get over that smell of mahogany and wood oh it's it was just intoxicating I mean I stayed there for six years I loved it more than I even could imagine and it still reads benefits I sit on the board of bender guitars because I firmly believe because of um the fact that I you know not only did I tick the boxes of the remit for the board seat I mean how many times are you going to find a black woman CEO who worked at the feeding guitar manufacturer of acoustic guitars I mean like I'm a unicorn so you know it was yeah I would hand those all but and those all the musicians and all the musicians but this time I got like work with some of the most amazing people like you know Crosby stills and mash oh god rest his soul over Crosby um you know Roseanne Cash um Jason infowals Virgil Simpson the avid brothers like I mean it was just mind boggling the artists that I got to work with and bring them on as Martin Ambassador and Sharon like sweetheart you know brought him on board and it was great we need to know your Spotify username uh so we can we can follow I mean I'd imagine it's massively eclectic I want it I want all your playlists um I honestly like miles me this delight yeah I don't know to I'm so keen that's my the high weekend sorted I just need to buy the Marnie's playlist on Spotify and then I'm done I don't think we're jodra you know and it's great I'd wait to you know media and the fourth right I had this with Viacom yes I did Viacom Viacom um and then became Viacom CVS obviously and with the merger and I oversaw you know music for MTV and VH1 and in all the channels I mean it was incredible um and then and then this had an MTV award behind yeah yeah but I have a few I have a few moon person's we call them moon person and I have a few because I one of the things with my executive produced um several VMA which is lovely um so I'd have a few of these um so you know the good thing is that again staying close to the makers you know was able to put on my EP hat again and really transform what the VMA is a video music awards and that in the European music awards to transform what it meant for not only the viewers was we did some really full partnerships digital partnerships um but it also you know changed what it meant to be artists and to the record labels and to the managers um people started uh you know tying their album releases once again to the VMAs um you know we had for the first time a Spanish language performer which was Maluma for the first time it was just crazy um had JLo as the video vanguard had Missy Elliott at the video vanguard one year just really really had some fun but again all these days close to the work I need to stay close to the creator the maker that brings me joy and then COVID has this crazy and then and then you when you joined BBH if I remember rightly it was um it was not in a good space uh so it sounds like again you you know there's a similar similarity in that often you're brought into you know problem solver a sort of a maybe a very famous brand but one that's that's in trouble um and and and I can see you know even just on this call hopefully anyone is listening you can kind of get a sense that you your energy levels are sort of you know at least 20 000 out of 10 um so it's you do I can get a sense that take it to a million or dial it up to 11 um it it's amazing remu and and that I mean that that's sort of I guess how you got into the into the can lion side of things I mean when I um when I when I first sort of met you or I don't even know whether we got to chat but when I first saw you it was because you know jury president um of of entertainment and music at lions um yeah last year in 2022 that's right I've got my years right um and you picked some amazing stuff there I mean I I'm probably gonna flirt through very quickly BBH roles because what I one the other reasons why I really thought it'd be lovely to chat is there are so many people who listen to this podcast who who enter awards who would love to enter awards but maybe haven't found success yet can you you've been a jury member at lions and a bunch of other award shows um you're currently just found out a double president of Dubai links just like the the the the the local it's kind of almost like a sub sub brands of can lions but for uh for the Middle East um and and so you you've got to judge work in in lots of different ways and how you know what are some of the are there some general things that that people should do or not do or um is sort of some general advice well first of all thank you so much um for this I'm having the best time um and uh be honest mine I do like judging um I do I I um I have the pleasure and I have one little one of my can lions behind me but I had the pleasure of judging oh it's just a I mean can is just such a game changer um it was a game changer for us at bbh as well I had the pleasure and the privilege of judging the 2020 and 2021 hand lions for uh entertainment for music with ycliffe john who was the jury president um and that was that was a very healthy time because we're judging two years worth of work it was um it's very very intense in very intense um and then again then they asked me to come back as jury president for the same award category uh entertainment for music for 2022 and then this year I'm heading to Dubai I'm very excited um one thing that I always tell the juries at the beginning of the process is there's not there's no better indicator than your gut it's right it's work that you see that you're like oh come on why didn't we do this or work it to show us um you know that's that's work that you should probably put over in this like good you know like oh right because that will there's nothing better than your gut I mean the grand prix that we awarded last year for entertainment for music was it it was literally the upset of the of the of the awards because no one saw it coming it was just a piece of work that emotionally like we were just so tendered to it it beat out all the usual suspects the little knobs x and the beyond stage and and this was this like not low budget but compared to all the big budgets you know uh projects that we were looking at this wasn't even close you know but it was impactful and it was urgent and it was timely and it needed to be highlighted so I say that to kind of give everyone a piece of advice which is two things b we see a lot of work that is just in every category and it doesn't make sense so it's just quickly dismissed we're just like they don't even meet the criteria like right my my first recommendation is be very thoughtful and intentional around your submission a it will save you money and b it will increase your chances of actually possibly making the coveted shortlist and then maybe even a medal um to be just don't randomly enter it doesn't serve you quantity is not quality um so that's my first piece of advice and the second piece of advice is you know make the work appealing to my point the grand prix which was this is not america for entertainment for music last year it was not anything that we saw coming it was it stunned us we spent hours debating this one piece of work and that is the beauty of an lion that is what we hope to get that is like to have those robust and provocative and exciting conversations around a piece of work that just stopped you weren't just like like oh my god like i'm literally left one day of judging where we locked in the short left thinking that this piece of work even though we talked about it i was convinced we were going in a different direction and so i even started like kind of writing out my notes and my well i was so convinced we were going in a different direction and then the next morning i show up into in the jury room where we're this was the day we're awarding medals so it's a very intense it's all business all jokes aside i'm running it tight i'm like this is we can't make mistakes because this is a can lion you know and they were gonna do the grand prix like this is the Oscars so you know we got to be serious and when that piece of work rose i i had to stop i said i can't i said first of all i can't believe we're gonna be this bold i can't believe we're actually going there and i was i at that moment i could not have been more proud of my jury i had a killer jury i was just like a proud mama so my second piece of key advice is make the work give us pomo make us jealous that we didn't make this piece of work ourselves you know because these award shows the world is watching cmo is the industry the work that is on the shortlist and actually is awarded a medal we are setting the tone and tenor for the subsequent we are literally putting our stamp of approval on this body of work say this is what this is excellent and this is what we expect to see and then some in subsequent years so the bar is set let's see next year who's gonna top who's gonna top it and so that's the that's why i love judy i think there are two interesting things that the tip that one was um one was that i guess it's worth everyone knowing that when you're a jury president you actually don't have a vote unless there's a high i think so that's probably why you're saying it's a surprise because you you're actually not allowed to to the point yourself and the second thing was and i thought that was interesting it's something we were actually talking about before we started the recording was how awards actually can be a great motivator for teams and and just to help point your agency or your company in a in a certain direction because i think you were telling me a story about um i think it was actually entering the webbies uh um for to bbh but um is it possible to just talk quickly about that um absolutely i mean we you know it listen you make you you try every project you try to make the best work possible you know we love right we at bbh we didn't go into projects saying this was gonna win an award or that was gonna win yeah we just we just really wanted to make like the best work possible but for any agency big or small to win any award especially a canline can be a such a defining moment for the trajectory of an agency it can either you know it's a small startup it can like set you on the winning track for new business and new work if you're an established agency it could still show that you're fresh and that you're urgent and that you're delivering awards winning work for your clients so regardless of where you are and stage of your experience at an agency it can just reap such great benefits it definitely did bro we were rebuilding who bbh was in the us of a and the amount of awards that we won over the over the two years that i was ceo was staggering it was staggering and it really kind of it was the amount of positive noise and momentum that we needed to really continue to ride that way and you know the conversation we had earlier about the web if you bbh as an example was here in the states we were really known for a film work for doing bright big amazing film work i mean heck bbh new york launched dear sophie for google chrome i mean that body of work still resonates today so when i became ceo we really wanted to diversify our offering and we didn't want to be just put in a box because that is limiting and we all know from a creative standpoint but also from a business and so right we wanted to take on projects that got us into digital and social and experiential and so we really took our clients into that area broadening our reach and we won you know several webbies around that work which really kind of set that tone and tenor for us and broke us out of that box that we had found ourselves in so it really cannot it really can add to your bottom line but also to your creativity yes it i remember i was lucky enough to work um at ogle bearded period when we were winning tons of awards and it it galvanizes all the people in the company as well so much uh like the the energy you get from it and and the it's yeah i mean if it's it's it's yeah it's such a lovely thing if you can do it um and and i agree i think it's sort of nice to to sort of visit as another sort of way to target and it's also helps individuals within the agency and they're in grief so much yeah absolutely so yeah i remember it so i enter lots of can lines this this message is sponsored by can lines um but just to um to sort of try and try and round it out i mean what what are your what what are you up to next if you have any clue about what the next i mean you know this is uh this is a big question maybe we need to just come and revisit this in a few months time but uh so you're about to head off to Dubai you're about to judge yeah uh grand prix for goods entertainment uh for music uh no just interesting i'm cool i hope you have the most marvelous time in Dubai um oh thank you i mean we could talk forever this was such a great like conversation um as far as what i'm doing next it will be revealed very soon um so i'd love to come back and talk about that but in the meantime i am off to Dubai and gosh a week or so and i'm just so excited it's my first time in the region and i'm so excited to like meet everyone and meet the jury and so there's nothing better than judging in person it really yeah as a matter but also i'm intrigued to know what you find about some of the cultural nuances you know the work from a particular region um i'm sure that's going to be a fascinating time but uh look thank you so much i i think i get so much from from your uh from your chats and i think that i love the message of fearlessness um i love the tenacity and the hard work that you put into everything and just your general good natured spirit and i wonder you've got so many musicians who are now your your best friends too and i'm sure that your dad must be looking down and being incredibly proud of you uh to be such a fantastic human and done so much and good in the music industry as well um so bravo on on being you and and huge love i'd love for chatting again soon enough way thank you for your generosity of spirit thank you for having me on the show we will touch it