Fearless Creative Leadership

Edited highlights of our full conversation. What terrifies you? Marcel Marcondes is the Global Chief Marketing Officer for AB InBev. Becoming the successful Global CMO of any major brand is a life’s dream for many people. If you’re one of the few to make it, it’s easy to get caught up in the gestalt of the thing. The public adulation that comes with the buying power and influence that you suddenly wield. But for the very best of them, being a Global CMO brings out the human being in you. I’m not conscious that I’ve ever heard prominent leader publicly use the phrase, ‘sometimes it’s also terrifying’. There are three points to make coming from Marcel’s memorable use of that phrase. One - that business is in great hands because it’s being run by someone who’s conscious of the responsibility and is also conscious that he needs to be courageous to keep it moving forward. The fastest path to letting the status quo win is to believe that what you should be doing next doesn’t require courage. Two - more talented people will want to work for Marcel because he is honest about the size and the consequence of the challenge. And if there is a single truth that I’ve learned, it’s that creative people want to make one thing more than anything else - a difference. And three - leadership is a constant battle between fear and courage. It has to be. If you feel afraid a lot, you’re probably on the right path to making a difference. If you sometimes feel terrified, you definitely are.

Edited highlights of our full conversation. What terrifies you? Marcel Marcondes is the Global Chief Marketing Officer for AB InBev. Becoming the successful Global CMO of any major brand is a life’s dream for many people. If you’re one of the few to make it, it’s easy to get caught up in the gestalt of the thing. The public adulation that comes with the buying power and influence that you suddenly wield. But for the very best of them, being a Global CMO brings out the human being in you. I’m not conscious that I’ve ever heard prominent leader publicly use the phrase, ‘sometimes it’s also terrifying’. There are three points to make coming from Marcel’s memorable use of that phrase. One - that business is in great hands because it’s being run by someone who’s conscious of the responsibility and is also conscious that he needs to be courageous to keep it moving forward. The fastest path to letting the status quo win is to believe that what you should be doing next doesn’t require courage. Two - more talented people will want to work for Marcel because he is honest about the size and the consequence of the challenge. And if there is a single truth that I’ve learned, it’s that creative people want to make one thing more than anything else - a difference. And three - leadership is a constant battle between fear and courage. It has to be. If you feel afraid a lot, you’re probably on the right path to making a difference. If you sometimes feel terrified, you definitely are.

What role does love play in your leadership? Before we start, I want to acknowledge the death of someone who played a big role in helping Chris and I to create the film editing company that we built in the ‘90s and 2000s. Jim Garrett was a brilliant businessman and a gentleman. He was the founder of the award winning and internationally recognized production company, Garrett and Partners, and he worked with directors like John Schlesinger, Nick Roeg, Ken Russell and Richard Loncraine along the way. I’ve posted a link to his obituary in the London Times in this week’s show notes. When we were conceiving our film editing company in 1994, Jim sat down with Chris and I over lunch in London, and gave us advice that formed the foundational DNA of a business which is still thriving almost thirty years later. Many of the principles and practices on which that business operates today came from that lunch. All of us who have spent any part of our careers working at the original Lookinglass or at the Whitehouse film editing companies owe Jim our thanks. His impact was and is enormous. And now, on with the show. Devika Bulchandani is the global CEO of Ogilvy. And her view of leadership includes an impassioned belief that seemed so obvious to me once she said it, but which I have never heard before. The business of running a business does not usually contain much discussion of love. You hear people say occasionally, “I love what I’m doing,” or “I love where I work.” You can see evidence of passion in some people, particularly business founders. But the idea of saying “I love you” to a co-worker will send tremors down the backs of HR and Talent leaders across the entire spectrum of the creative industries. And yet, as Devika asks, wouldn’t the world be better by the way if we all just felt more of it? We live in a time of apparently limitless upheaval. And we will spend roughly a quarter of that time at our jobs. Shouldn’t part of that upheaval be to challenge the norms under which we’re working? Including the possibility that “I love you” might be a leading indicator of what it means to be a more human leader. Where do you draw the line? And why?

Edited highlights of our full conversation. What role does love play in your leadership? Before we start, I want to acknowledge the death of someone who played a big role in helping Chris and I to create the film editing company that we built in the ‘90s and 2000s. Jim Garrett was a brilliant businessman and a gentleman. He was the founder of the award winning and internationally recognized production company, Garrett and Partners, and he worked with directors like John Schlesinger, Nick Roeg, Ken Russell and Richard Loncraine along the way. I’ve posted a link to his obituary in the London Times in this week’s show notes. When we were conceiving our film editing company in 1994, Jim sat down with Chris and I over lunch in London, and gave us advice that formed the foundational DNA of a business which is still thriving almost thirty years later. Many of the principles and practices on which that business operates today came from that lunch. All of us who have spent any part of our careers working at the original Lookinglass or at the Whitehouse film editing companies owe Jim our thanks. His impact was and is enormous. And now, on with the show. Devika Bulchandani is the global CEO of Ogilvy. And her view of leadership includes an impassioned belief that seemed so obvious to me once she said it, but which I have never heard before. The business of running a business does not usually contain much discussion of love. You hear people say occasionally, “I love what I’m doing,” or “I love where I work.” You can see evidence of passion in some people, particularly business founders. But the idea of saying “I love you” to a co-worker will send tremors down the backs of HR and Talent leaders across the entire spectrum of the creative industries. And yet, as Devika asks, wouldn’t the world be better by the way if we all just felt more of it? We live in a time of apparently limitless upheaval. And we will spend roughly a quarter of that time at our jobs. Shouldn’t part of that upheaval be to challenge the norms under which we’re working? Including the possibility that “I love you” might be a leading indicator of what it means to be a more human leader. Where do you draw the line? And why?

Edited highlights of our full conversation. What role does love play in your leadership? Before we start, I want to acknowledge the death of someone who played a big role in helping Chris and I to create the film editing company that we built in the ‘90s and 2000s. Jim Garrett was a brilliant businessman and a gentleman. He was the founder of the award winning and internationally recognized production company, Garrett and Partners, and he worked with directors like John Schlesinger, Nick Roeg, Ken Russell and Richard Loncraine along the way. I’ve posted a link to his obituary in the London Times in this week’s show notes. When we were conceiving our film editing company in 1994, Jim sat down with Chris and I over lunch in London, and gave us advice that formed the foundational DNA of a business which is still thriving almost thirty years later. Many of the principles and practices on which that business operates today came from that lunch. All of us who have spent any part of our careers working at the original Lookinglass or at the Whitehouse film editing companies owe Jim our thanks. His impact was and is enormous. And now, on with the show. Devika Bulchandani is the global CEO of Ogilvy. And her view of leadership includes an impassioned belief that seemed so obvious to me once she said it, but which I have never heard before. The business of running a business does not usually contain much discussion of love. You hear people say occasionally, “I love what I’m doing,” or “I love where I work.” You can see evidence of passion in some people, particularly business founders. But the idea of saying “I love you” to a co-worker will send tremors down the backs of HR and Talent leaders across the entire spectrum of the creative industries. And yet, as Devika asks, wouldn’t the world be better by the way if we all just felt more of it? We live in a time of apparently limitless upheaval. And we will spend roughly a quarter of that time at our jobs. Shouldn’t part of that upheaval be to challenge the norms under which we’re working? Including the possibility that “I love you” might be a leading indicator of what it means to be a more human leader. Where do you draw the line? And why?

Explore improving leadership skills in 2023 with insights from creative leaders. Topics include the impact of recent years, the threat to democracy, fear in the workplace, the power of optimism and art, transforming priorities, unlocking potential, being rooted in reality, and the importance of self-reflection and authenticity in leadership.

What’s your big goal? Carl Johnson is the Executive Chairman and one of the founding partners at Anomaly. If you go to the company’s website, it says, in block capitals, “A DEVIATION OR DEPARTURE FROM THE NORMAL OR COMMON ORDER, FORM OR RULE.” In Anomaly’s case, this is not hyperbole. The company pushes boundaries and defies norms all the time. It’s one of the reasons that yesterday Adweek named Anomaly the US Agency of the Year. Carl Johnson is an iconoclast. Meet him once and you’ll remember him. This is actually the third time he’s been on this podcast. His first appearance was in my second episode and that conversation set the tone for the kinds of insights I wanted listeners to benefit from. He was candid. Honest. And human. This conversation breaks new ground. It’s a case study on building a world-class, creativity driven business. So where does Anomaly go now? There are two parts to the Anomaly leadership story that are worth paying attention to. The obvious one is the boldness of their ambition. They set big goals. And they are unrelenting in pursuing them. But the second and, I think, equally influential component of their story is one that doesn’t get talked about very often - their consistency. If you go back and listen to my previous conversations with Carl - the first of which was almost six years ago - you’ll hear him talking about many of the same things in the same ways. That consistency engenders trust - from employees and clients and from prospective members of both those groups. Trust gets people to invest emotionally and take risks. Trust produces better questions and better answers. Trust builds foundations that give you the confidence to define goals that are so audacious it will make even you gasp. And that attracts world-class talent and makes them want to stick around. So set big goals. But then behave with consistency so that people want to take the risks necessary to achieve them.

Edited highlights of our full conversation. What’s your big goal? Carl Johnson is the Executive Chairman and one of the founding partners at Anomaly. If you go to the company’s website, it says, in block capitals, “A DEVIATION OR DEPARTURE FROM THE NORMAL OR COMMON ORDER, FORM OR RULE.” In Anomaly’s case, this is not hyperbole. The company pushes boundaries and defies norms all the time. It’s one of the reasons that yesterday Adweek named Anomaly the US Agency of the Year. Carl Johnson is an iconoclast. Meet him once and you’ll remember him. This is actually the third time he’s been on this podcast. His first appearance was in my second episode and that conversation set the tone for the kinds of insights I wanted listeners to benefit from. He was candid. Honest. And human. This conversation breaks new ground. It’s a case study on building a world-class, creativity driven business. So where does Anomaly go now? There are two parts to the Anomaly leadership story that are worth paying attention to. The obvious one is the boldness of their ambition. They set big goals. And they are unrelenting in pursuing them. But the second and, I think, equally influential component of their story is one that doesn’t get talked about very often - their consistency. If you go back and listen to my previous conversations with Carl - the first of which was almost six years ago - you’ll hear him talking about many of the same things in the same ways. That consistency engenders trust - from employees and clients and from prospective members of both those groups. Trust gets people to invest emotionally and take risks. Trust produces better questions and better answers. Trust builds foundations that give you the confidence to define goals that are so audacious it will make even you gasp. And that attracts world-class talent and makes them want to stick around. So set big goals. But then behave with consistency so that people want to take the risks necessary to achieve them.

How do you find the right people? Nick Law is the Global Lead for Design and Creative Tech at Accenture Song. Nick has had a storied career. He was Global Chief Creative Officer at R/GA. Chief Creative Officer of Publicis Groupe. And the VP, Marcom Integration at Apple, before joining Accenture Song in early 2022. He has led and unlocked creativity across thousands of people. He’s seen what works. And what doesn’t. In my experience, the very best leaders understand three things. Their business, their people and themselves. But not in that order. Most leaders prioritize their understanding of the business. After all, it's the reference point that most people use when measuring the success or otherwise of an individual leader. So, leaders rightly worry about the vision, the strategy, the execution and the performance of the organization. They pour themselves into KPIs and P&Ls. But getting those numbers to sing, to really sing, is the consequences of two things. How well you understand your people. And how well you understand yourself. The creative thinking and innovation that every modern business depends on is amplified a thousand fold when its people trust and believe in the leaders of that business. Better visions, better strategies, better systems will move the needle a bit by themselves. But only a bit. And nothing like as far as when your people believe in you. And what drives that belief? Your courage, your confidence, your consistency. And your humanity. And all of those depend on how well you understand yourself. So if you’re struggling to find the right people, start by finding yourself and deciding what really matters to you. And then say it out loud so that your people can find you.

Edited highlights of our full conversation. How do you find the right people? Nick Law is the Global Lead for Design and Creative Tech at Accenture Song. Nick has had a storied career. He was Global Chief Creative Officer at R/GA. Chief Creative Officer of Publicis Groupe. And the VP, Marcom Integration at Apple, before joining Accenture Song in early 2022. He has led and unlocked creativity across thousands of people. He’s seen what works. And what doesn’t. In my experience, the very best leaders understand three things. Their business, their people and themselves. But not in that order. Most leaders prioritize their understanding of the business. After all, it's the reference point that most people use when measuring the success or otherwise of an individual leader. So, leaders rightly worry about the vision, the strategy, the execution and the performance of the organization. They pour themselves into KPIs and P&Ls. But getting those numbers to sing, to really sing, is the consequences of two things. How well you understand your people. And how well you understand yourself. The creative thinking and innovation that every modern business depends on is amplified a thousand fold when its people trust and believe in the leaders of that business. Better visions, better strategies, better systems will move the needle a bit by themselves. But only a bit. And nothing like as far as when your people believe in you. And what drives that belief? Your courage, your confidence, your consistency. And your humanity. And all of those depend on how well you understand yourself. So if you’re struggling to find the right people, start by finding yourself and deciding what really matters to you. And then say it out loud so that your people can find you.