I am the Global CCO of 14, otherwise known as Catorce. It´s my first one client agency.
SEAT is one of DDB´s biggest global clients. All consuming.
I am based where the cars are made, in sunny Barcelona.
It´s a challenging role, in truth made much more so since a global pandemic hit the automotive industry hard. Maybe the automotive industry needed to be hit hard. Another conversation for another time.
My team are responsible for conceiving and implementing end to end campaigns that run in as many ninety countries. That´s a lot of Teams meetings. I´ve coming up for my one year anniversary. It´s been quite the experience, which is why I took the job. Boredom kills creativity.
Prior to upending my wife and I to Spain last year, I was CCO of Saatchi & Saatchi New Zealand for three years. Speaking of Aotearoa, although I am British born and bred, I have lived in New Zealand on and off for over twenty-five years. Currently off.
As much as I love New Zealand and its awesome Prime Minister, presently I feel the need to be in Europe. My daughters are in London. I´m close, but thanks to Covid, not close enough.
Aside from my complete inability to ever sound like a Kiwi, New Zealand has been a wild success, both personally and professionally.
I led the transformation of what are now some of the best agencies in the world.
Eight incredible years at Colenso BBDO. Massive turnaround from no-hopers to one of the best agencies on the planet, where they still are.
Five years at DDB Auckland, currently the best agency in New Zealand.
And then another two years at DDB Sydney, dropping the mic after winning the pitch for Australia’s biggest bank and becoming the country’s most awarded agency at Cannes.
I spent a year back in the UK for family reasons in 2012 as ECD of Rainey Kelly Y&R, at the time the third biggest agency in the UK. Mark Roalfe still likes me even though I left him at the altar. Nice man.
As an ECD and then CCO, the last decade for me has been about making good agencies great. Through the work, primarily. But great work only comes when you have the right people and the right culture. I’m passionate about both.
Now I´m in my fifties, I feel I can help in ways that a spectacularly ageist industry is only starting to realise is important. Bit of wisdom and a lot of experience. Grown up conversations with clients. And an ability to step through the bullshit bingo of social media and take a client on a proper journey.
Let´s get the award stuff out of the way. Is it me or has Covid kind of made awards feel a tiny bit irrelevant.
So I have won lots of local and international awards; too numerous to list without your eyes glazing over. In brief, all the big ones like D&AD, One Show, Cannes, Spikes and Clio. In all the shades: Gold, Silver and Bronze. Many times over. A smattering of Grand Prix too.
Things that I’m proud of:
I believe right now I’m more creative than I’ve ever been. No brain atrophy. I’m either a unicorn or a spectacularly late developer. Possibly a bit of both.
I have helped develop the career of as many women as men. Not just rookie female creatives. But promoting women into CD and ECD positions. I might add, I have been doing this long before it became fashionable to do so. As a father of a daughter who is also a copywriter like her dad, it´s personal to me.
I won Campaign Asia Creative of the Year when I was at DDB New Zealand for Australasia.
I also won Campaign Brief Agency of the Year five years in a row at DDB. And Agency of the Year at Spikes, AWARD and Axis.
I am currently ranked number 2 ECD in the world on the bestadsontv rankings over the last ten years. I play the long game well.
I was behind the most awarded mobile campaign in the world at DDB Sydney, #comeonin for Sydney Opera House.
I am happily married with two daughters whom I was daft enough to conceive in my early twenties.
My best work, I think.