Hey there, welcome back to the Creative Room Podcast.I'm your host, Katie Cowan, and today we've got a great episode lined up.I mean, of course we have, we always have.
This week, I'm joined by Lisa Smith, the Global Executive Creative Director at J.K.R.Yes, the person behind some of the most talked about rebrands of the last decade.Burger King, Mozilla, Chobani, you name it, she's shaped it.
In this episode, we get to the heart of what makes J.K.R.'s approach so game changing, and that's putting the brand idea at the centre of everything.
Sounds pretty straightforward, but as Lisa reveals, there's quite a process behind turning a simple concept into a full-blown brand experience.
And trust me, she's got stories, from the pressure of launching iconic rebrands to handling the critics when things don't quite land right. We also get personal.I mean, of course we do.We can't help it.We're human.
As Lisa opens up about the rollercoaster ride of leading at the top, how she stays inspired and what it's really like to juggle those massive projects with a life lived in constant motion.And she sounds full of energy.
Yes, we talk about being women in the creative industry, but not as you'd expect.
I apologize in advance for the swearing, and I want to add a disclaimer that some of the topics we cover are complicated beasts that we're all still trying to figure out ourselves.
So settle in for an inspiring conversation with one of the most influential figures in the design world today. Hi Lisa, it's great to have you on the show today.We've been trying to do this for a while, so it's lovely to see your face.
Yeah, I'm very excited to do it.And we're both in the same country.I'm in London right now.So it's, yeah, we made it work.
We got there in the end.And both of us have rough voices, different reasons. I've got the lurgy.I'm not going to mention what you've been up to.
Well, it was the D&AD President's Dinner.So just let's say I had a few.
You had a fun time.It must have been great.I mean, because like you kind of obviously are based in New York and then coming over to London, it must just be great to catch up with old friends and contacts.
Yeah, you definitely see and D&AD is definitely sort of diversifying, not only their kind of like the trustee board is now very much made up of much more global than it's ever been.
And yeah, so it's really awesome to then see some of the New Yorkers over for this as well and kind of all mixed in with like past, present, future.It's just, yeah, it's really, really fun.And it had, I think they had
eight or nine previous presidents at the dinner last night, like Michael Wolff and just so many different faces.And it was just like, it was actually like the legacy of design and advertising.
It was pretty like the Hall of Fame, I suppose, the living Hall of Fame.
Amazing.Nice to have it all in the same room.And I suppose by the time this episode goes out, the new president of D&AD will have been mentioned, will have been released.So we can talk about Kwame, can't we?
Yes, we can.It was in the press yesterday.So yeah, and Kwame was my sort of partner when we led the sort of reimagination of the Chobani We both worked in-house doing that together.
So it's really, really awesome to be able to work alongside him, being on the trustee board, but actually I'm going to be the vice president next to him.
So I'm really excited to go on a journey with him this year and then hopefully take the mantle or the banner or whatever you want to call it the following year.
It's amazing.I know that in our sort of chat before that we're similar age and you're at the top of your game, JKR.I mean, you must just be, I mean, what's next after this?You've kind of reached the high bar, right?
I don't know if you ever stopped. reaching.I've never stopped learning, so I always love that and I'm pretty ambitious, so there's always something else.
My journey at JKR over the last five years, yeah, has been awesome, but that's because it's a company that's very open to its own transformation.
It was very historically well known for CPG, which Consumer Packaged Goods, for those who don't know that, and it's sort of growing more and more into a sort of fully-fledged branding agency that works across all sorts of categories.
So it's been an amazing journey from Burger King to recently, obviously last week with Mozilla, Uber, Paramount, Impossible.I love the variety.The variety is what keeps me excited.
I love learning about people's businesses and then it's almost like the minute you stop working together, you forget it and then you move on to another category and you learn it all for the next job.So yeah, it's been
it feels like the right place and I love being here, so I'm not really thinking too much about what's next, but you know, you never know.
Yeah, I mean, God, I mean, all those brands you mentioned are absolutely amazing and just always get such great praise.Do you ever still get that kind of panic when you release a project and think, oh gosh, what's the
what's the creative industry going to think?Are you beyond that now?That's beneath me.
When you had one of the worst ones, which was the Metropolitan Museum of Art, you do learn to grow some kind of outer skin or layer that's a little bit more, that one hurt really hard.
I worked on that for nearly two years when I was at War Fallens and we were really proud of the work.
It was much needed in terms of like, if people look at it from a kind of more of a business standpoint, this idea of bringing life to art, art to lives and this sort of
idea that sat at the heart was all about making sure that they were as relevant today as they could be in the future and more and more people, even though it was the number one visitor's attraction, weren't really engaging with the rest of the collections because it's not like fine art and or like sort of like
high art, it's actually art objects over periods of time.
So we had to kind of find a way that when you curate a show that might be something like, I don't know, Alexander McQueen, how could you curate inspiration collections from the rest of the Met all around that show that would then mean you would go off and explore other areas of the museum.
And they've been doing that ever since.They rewrote their labels to make them more understandable.I mean, that was a huge sort of journey with all the curators.
I mean, brand ideas aren't just how it looks and feels, but it's also how you act and behave.And it was a true example of that.And they live and breathe that to this day.
And then the identity, it couldn't be about one moment in history, which was like the sort of Leonardo da Vinci-esque kind of man that was just about one point in time.We had to create something that was much more timeless.
So it was this serif that connected. Oh my God, I worked with Gareth Hague, which is an incredible typographer based here in London, but people annihilated us for that and called it a typographic car crash.
It was meant to be a bit unconventional and weird.It wasn't meant to be perfect. a peer who kind of shouted me, is it left align, right align, centered?I was like, fuck off, are we talking about this at dinner?
Yeah, but it was very, you can imagine, because again, it was, I think it all comes down to actually how you
you do launch, but obviously you don't get to tell every single consumer or person the narrative or the story that's behind it that I can talk about.
But it was sent on the top of like, I think one to the board members, an invite to an event with nothing explained that the brand was going to be going through an identity transformation.
And so of course, one of the board members went to the New York Times, was like livid, then they got all these
so-called experts from like Eric Speakerman to Karim Rashid, which is like more of furniture and industrial delight, all to have an opinion about this, which they hated because they didn't know any of the context or the story or why any of this was happening.
And it was a bit of a nightmare.We were all press embargoed.We handled it very well.It wasn't, What I think is really interesting about it is because it was a very thorough piece of work that went over two years, very strategic.
We'd taken a lot of the museum along the journey and engaged either with the wider museum or a set of curators who were the stakeholders.So everybody
felt like this was the the right thing so they stood by it and then just slowly sort of released what the actual the true narrative behind it and 10 years later it's like one of the most iconic things you see in New York whether it's a hat whether it's on the bags whether it's in
a TV show like Gossip Girls or something, it shows up all the time in culture.
And I always think of this, there's this quote that Paula share, I can't remember where I read it or saw it, but she talks about, it's not all about opening night when these brands launch and everybody has an opinion, which of course we all welcome, freedom of speech and all that good stuff, but it's actually how long it lasts on Broadway.
and it stands the test of time, it does the job and it takes you where you need to go and it's just one of those identities that maybe just needed more time to sort of settle in.People don't like change, let's be honest.Yeah, they don't.
But it's crazy when it's your own industry that can't handle change and rips you apart.And I think that's what was most hurtful, is when it's peers to peers.Where is all this like, let's bring each other up, let's celebrate creative work?
I mean, yes, there's good and bad design, but that is somewhat subjective. And it's just, yeah, you just wish people were a little bit more conscientious of that.
And if they're so good and so knowledgeable, why didn't they get to do it in the first place?
Yeah, exactly.Fuck off.Yeah, there's a snobbiness, isn't there, in your industry?How do you feel about that?
I, it's, you know, again, working a lot with D&AD this last year, you know, two of the judges that were judging the branding category talked about like what a bloodbath it was judging it and how they interrogated and ripped it all apart.
And of course, you're there to judge, I get that, and to rank things and things like that. But just even that language sounds so aggressive.So many people put their hearts and souls into this work.
And just to celebrate the Shira, I mean, 900 pieces of work were entered in a branding category.That's like the largest like D&AD has ever had for that.That's a celebration moment that this work is happening.Creativity is thriving.
It's freaking awesome. do we have to talk about it being a bloodbath?Exactly.I'm like, come on, and it is graphic design.
Perspective, exactly.What's it like compared because you've had your dip in toes of both sides of the pond.What's it like in terms of if you're a successful person in Britain, we know that. We're not very good at shouting our own achievements.
I get the impression in America, it's different.Success is rewarded.If you said, I'm Lisa Smith, I do this.In America, it would be, wow, that's amazing.You go.Whereas in Britain, it's like, you show off.
Yeah, it is interesting.The cultures are different and even with J.K.R.having offices in London and New York, there's different sort of ways everyone approaches work and manages. their profiles or all these different things.
Well, I don't think any of us really manage our profiles or any of that anyway, but regardless, I do, you know, like, I think design fundamentally is loved and appreciated much more in Europe.
It is always been that kind of like, whether it's from the Bauhaus all the way up to all the Swiss design and it's just, I think a lot of the clients have a lot of taste and you've seen
good design in culture for a very long time, no matter what kind of category or industry you're in here, like whether you work in the arts or financial, like, I think there was a level.
What always I loved about New York was, or the US, was like you're fighting for good design.So it's actually, there's a personality trait that fits maybe better in the States in terms of like,
I don't know if I love the word hustle, but there is a big hustle.It's a lot of tenacity is needed there to get things through.And I've always just loved that fight, that for the great thing and the politics and the navigation of all of that.
And in some ways it was almost like too much served on a platter here versus that.But so then that leads you to personality types.People here are a bit more austere, they're a bit more, like, just a bit more sort of, well... composed, I think.
And over there, we're a little bit more erratic, and a little bit more different, and weird, and wonderful, and it's celebrated, and it's heightened, and there's highs and lows, and the roller coaster.
So I think it just generally feels louder in some ways, even though, yes, you can tell I have a lot of energy, and I'm coming off cross pretty loud.Of course, you can be introvert, extrovert.
it all works, like even the more extroverted creatives I know in the US are like amazing speakers on stage, like maybe the best and most engaging, so it just really creates the room for all of those personality types, whereas here there's just a certain decorum, I think, in a way, and hence, yeah, it isn't all, individuals aren't always as celebrated, but the industry here is, and I do feel like
go to things like I did last night with D&AD or I go back, oh my God, 20 something years when I worked at Browns or the V&A.We used to go to the same pubs, all the designers would hang out from all the other agencies, all the competitor agencies.
And it was such a wonderful industry to be part of.I loved our Friday nights, where potentially we also drank too much, so there's probably a theme there, but it was a real sense of creative community.Now in the US, there is not that.
It is very competitive in terms of like, which that frustrates me because I believe there's enough work to go around for pretty much all the agencies.
You know, I know the same ones come up when you pitch and things like that, but it does feel like someone might stab you in the back if you don't do something.It's a little like that.
And they don't drink, do they?They're kind of sensible.
And that's a shame.There's no place where we all hang out.There's no sense of kind of community like that.Yes, we all go to like, there is the equivalence of D&ADs, like the one clubs and art directors.And those moments are very special.
But it's not, these groups are not mixing on like a weekly basis, like historically they have done.
in the UK and I so it's just be and I know it's smaller but it's it's it's still it if you think of even just New York as the island even versus all amazing creative community outside of it across the US but it's just yeah it's really surprising I've always found that I've always felt like my tribe was where I worked and that was it that was
And then you kind of tracked a few people that moved around different agencies, and luckily you might have stayed friends and contacts with them.But it's just not as friendly an industry as you would hope.So that's a little sad.
And I'm always trying to break down those barriers, but it's a tough one.
You should start a little creative get-together, see what happens.Say, come, we'll have free drinks.You'll be the only one who drinks more than two.
Yeah, maybe.And maybe I'm responsible for that.And maybe that's my way of thinking about what the role I could play with D&AD over there in the next couple of years.It's like, how do we build more of a community there?Because it is a bit of a shame.
Yeah, I didn't know that.That's really interesting.So where does this energy come from then?Is this from having lots of brothers growing up?
Yeah, I guess so.I was the oldest of my, uh, sort of, yeah, my, my, I always say my real brothers because they're my, my siblings, but I have a, I had a half-brother and a step-brother as well.So lots of guys in the, in the, in the family.
And yeah, but, but I suppose I was always a bit, yeah, tomboyish.We all did sports.So we all were always mucking around.We lived in the country as well.So it was,
It was, yeah, we were outside a lot and go-karting down the lane and all of those different types of things and probably fighting a little bit.All the stuff that my mom had to handle eventually by herself with just us.But yeah, it was good.
But the energy, I don't know because I don't drink coffee, I don't have any caffeine. And someone asked me, are you a morning person or a night owl?And I'm like, I can kind of do both.Yeah, same.Just the sleep is, and that's, sleep is the hardest.
I just like, I need, I know when I need it, but it's like having time, enough time to sleep.
Does the brain ever switch off?Is the idea is always just running around and you're like having to write post-it notes or put things on your phone?
Yeah, I can definitely, I can definitely cut off or replace it with something else that just consumes me.Obviously, binge-watching Netflix or I go on holiday and my mom's like, you've read nearly four books in two weeks.
It's like you did a job on holiday.This is my moment to read and I need to consume now and I won't get another chance for the rest of the year.But it is hard.I noticed this year for the first time,
It took me a while, like being on vacation, to sort of be able to go to the beach and not look at my phone.My mum was like, God, you just need to put your phone in a safe or like put it away.
Don't even take it with you because otherwise you're just on it all the time.And that starts to really annoy me that I'm on my phone all the time.And there's like things like Instagram of not as many people are using it.
It's become almost like more of an extension of a work tool.So you do see things that are really inspiring on it, but you can lose yourself on all of these things.It's really hard.What have I done?
It's hard when you've got a brain like ours where you're just kind of energized by doing this, doing that.And I get obsessed with one thing and I'll really go full on in.
Like I've got an office and a house full of things that I started once and then abandoned and then tried something else.I just always have to have something.When people say to me retirement, I'm like, what?
I don't know what I feel like that, but then you'll find I have told people before, I'm like, I just want to live by a beach have a little vegetable patch garden and I'm going to be fine.They are like, you are so not going to be able to do that.
I'm like, I so can.I can.I believe I can.
No, you can't.You're like me.You won't be able to.You'll be working until death.We'll see.It'll be fun.But then if you were out by a beach growing vegetables, you become an expert vegetable grower.
Yes, and maybe I will learn to surf or get a very good tan.I don't know.Go on a tan-a-thon.That sounds terrible, I know.But anyway, I love the sun and I love the beach and I love being in warm weather, basically.
Oh God, who doesn't?Can't wait to get away myself, but... We were supposed to talk about how JKR puts the brand idea at the center of everything, but we're getting a really good flavor of where you come from approaching projects.
It is all about the idea, isn't it?I suppose that's the most exciting part of the process.When you embark on a new project, you sit down and say, so what is this?How does it work?I'm putting words into your mouth.
depends obviously what the brief is and the ask and we've been talking a lot about that at JKR we get all different types of briefs whether it is reimagining a product or whether it is a brand that needs a bigger like a design system for but might not need to change all their assets or then sometimes you've got a
brands which are the ones that I suppose I gravitate or got the most excited about that are at a point in time where what they have isn't working for them and where can they go from here and what sort of equities do you keep that they already have because you don't want to throw everything away and obviously a lot of the times they've already got an existing sort of fan or consumer base but they need
their need to signal where they're going and how the business is going to grow.So it's often, it is all actually driven from like where the business is going to grow.It's all for the business.
It's not like it's design or decoration for decoration's sake.So to kind of come up with like a brand idea or brand behavior idea, we call it because it's not only does this idea affect
it should inspire how they look and feel, also how it moves, how the brand talks, but actually also how it acts and behaves in the world, a little bit like what we talked about with The Met, where it actually changed behavior of how you approach writing or curating or things like that, that reflect
and sort of tie in with everything else you're communicating.
So like, again, this was a point in my career where I had worked at some amazing design companies, I was at Browns for five years, I'd been in-house at the V&A, I'd worked at another awesome design company in
New York doing more hospitality work for hotels and restaurants and exhibition designs and things like that, that when I went to work at War Follies it was the first time I'd ever been sort of around brand strategy and they happened to have some amazing ones and they really sort of like
sort of it all suddenly made sense like before I was doing like workshops with clients of like oh if you were a celebrity who would you be like trying to find out who they are what they stand for by using kind of prompts and tools if you're a car if you're a flower if you're you know just trying anything to unearth who they are
and I think basically they had a very simple tool at Wolfollens which is probably common across, I mean again everybody uses some variation of similar tools but in branding agencies but it was like what's special about you and what does the world need and kind of the special about you is looking more internal you know and and then what's what the world needs was more about trends, future, opportunity,
the sort of business planning, what's the growth and things like that.And it was an aha moment.Like when I worked on USA Today, which was my first project, which I remember they'd already pitched that before I got to Wolfollens.
And then Todd Simmons, who's who was the ECD at the time, who's now at IBM.He wrote a company note, Lisa's joined, we'll follow him.We have a new project, we've won USA Today.Lisa, this is your project.Good luck.We would love to see what you can do.
And luckily I did get, like, I worked with him and some other great, amazing people.But it was a project that I did very intensely over a year.And there was also other partners, external agencies, comms agencies.
So we're all circling around trying to get to the core of the essence of what this idea was.And USA Today being a sort of news media company that was very famous for a newspaper that was free in all hotel rooms, that was neither right nor left.
It was meant to be the people's news, so it's written in a more kind of colloquial, it was almost Twitter before Twitter, the way the headlines were. It had color infographics before any newspapers were color, but it looked really dated.
They had not advanced in digital.All the other news media was far outperforming them.So it was a huge opportunity to almost create a digital-first identity whilst they were sort of cataloging and overhauling their website.
And through this process, they did go on to be the number one news app for a long while. Actually, so that was a huge undertaking.But as we were doing it, we were talking about, well, the print newspaper is obviously like the best news of the day.
The actual digital is like, it's obviously here right now. it can update immediately.So how do we capture that in sort of an idea?And we talked about the idea of pulse of the nation.So this idea sat at it.
And then when we started to strip away even like the logo, which had all of the Americas, but they were about all, yeah, all of the Americas, but they were mainly about the United States of the 52 states.And then it had
It was like line work that didn't even reproduce in print very well.So we went and stripped it back and did lots of different directions, playing with line work, playing with Americas, and playing with what ended up being just the circle.
I remember presenting this direction.I think we presented five, but this was like a circle and I just put a TM in the corner.Knowing you couldn't probably trademark a blue dot, But we were like, this is your identity.This is Pulse of the Nation.
And then it can activate, whether it's like a story about Lady Gaga, whether it's something happening in the Middle East, whether it's something happening in financial, whether it's something happening in sports, this could get activated on every single section of the news.
And we would use the color coding system.So it was almost like making the identity an infographic. in itself.
And we just initially presented six colored dots because their news was blue, sports was red, the life section was purple, the tech was like aquamarine, and they were like, It's so reductive.
It was the most reductive thing I think I've ever done and worked on, but it was completely the right answer.And everybody was like, oh, like, oh my goodness, we have to do that.And obviously it's still the same today.
And what they've gone on to do is actually acquire all the other local news.So that's Cincinnati today and other places where it's just like, they've added the word today, but yeah.
this idea of pulse of the nation and then we went on to do design the newspaper because we also realized at the time that the
it was still where they were actually making money from, very little, but they were making money from print advertising still as they were transitioning to this kind of digital model.
And we redesigned the news room floor to do digital news first, and then the print published the best news stories of the day.And in the newspaper, we had in the op-ed section, it was Instagram stories, Pinterest story, like posts that like,
Twitter back then before it was X. So it was all speaking to each other.I'd never designed a newspaper before.I'd come more from annual reports and publishing.So it was the craziest task.
Then we went on to win a lot of the advertising because we'd shown some out of home.So I ended up making TV spots and I had to hire a producer who I'm still great friends with to this day, who basically had to teach me how to make TV spots.
I mean, we brought in writers, but we did giant human graphics, infographics all over LA.Oh, it was just, and more followers are like, what are you doing?We don't make things this far.We do brand identities and deliver guidelines.What are you doing?
You're making newspapers and stuff like that.But it was such a cool project, but that unlocked everything for me because I'd always, I'd been in museums, I'd been, doing publishing, identities.
So it all just started to be like, oh, you could create film and motion and sound and writing and all of these things together all around this core idea.And that carried on, obviously, to the Met.We talked about life to art, art to lives.
But even like once I went to Chobani and went in-house the sort of core kind of idea behind everything we made there was fighting for happily ever after.
And that was, unearthing these ideas is not, can happen quickly, or it's like a total going on like a crazy hunt.And what was incredible about that moment was that there was an article published in Fast Company about the founder, Hamdi,
And he talked about being a shepherd and a warrior.
Chobani means shepherd in Turkish, and it's the idea, and making yogurt is the idea of giving the gift of love and nature and something that's delicious, nutritious, natural, and accessible, which is their sort of DNA.I still remember that, wow.
So like I'm not mine, but it was this Shepparton warrior was like the food was the gift of love and nature and then the warrior was fighting for what was right.It was on behalf of people.It's a very people-centric business.He had employed a lot of,
ex-refugees who worked for the company and who continues sort of that mission and encouraging, he has a non-profit called Tent that he encourages other businesses to have a sort of mixed employee base and it's it was just really powerful.
So we kind of took that and turned it into something much more poetic with this idea of fighting for happily ever after.
And we talked about that we're trying to make this Eden 2.0 where everything like the giving tree where everything's growing on trees and it's like it's the perfect world and we I mean it's fruitful and I
and optimistic and caring and all of this one and that was what he stood for but it had a little bit of like fight in it and and that was just so when we designed typefaces it was the tales of happily ever are like the car the voice the tales of happily ever after the illustration is like the folk art of happily ever after like it's it all
you know, ties together the photography that was like the ectochrome, that looked like magic dust had been sprinkled over the photography, and it was like a peach that you just wanted to tear apart.So we just evoked all of those feelings.
So it was amazing.And then we do, we have our own sort of version of being able to do that at J.K.R.and I've been, yeah, kind of always working on that mission to try and get there.Now, some of it's not perfect.
Sometimes the design sort of evolves as you're doing it and you come back and go, actually, this needs tweaking.
But we use kind of a methodology of where we really unearth anything existing in the company, what it stood for, really trying to get to this be yourself everyone else has taken.We want to get to the essence of who it is.
Chobani always still shocks me that when we created that, it was the most mimicked brand identity.I could find hundreds of things online.It was obviously that happened that so many brands tried to look about it.
Hamdi, we used to get kind of angry like, why is everyone copying us?Why is everyone copying us? And I was like, well, it's flattery, but also it's not their brand.So it's not going to stand the test of time.
And of course, all those brands and mimickers have actually all sort of faded and disappeared away.
But you have to be true to who you are and whether it's learning about the company, understanding the category, getting insights into their existing consumers, but who they want, where, and where is kind of culture going.
And if you can understand all four of those around that brand, you get to that kind of brand idea, which you work with writers and strategists and creators all come together to interrogate that and come up with it.
And then once you have it, you're like, it's amazing.You could work on Burger King.It's as craveable as the food.Magnolia, it's a bite of whimsical delight.Impossible is making the outrageous possible.Mozilla has reclaimed the internet.
Manischewitz is savoring our traditions.They all can only be for that brand. And they're just really inspiring, but it sounds perfect, but it's actually really hard to do.
Yeah, I can imagine.Yeah, and it suits your personality, just diving into all those different things.And you touched on, like, nobody else can mimic
what that brand's, it's the same I guess for a personal brand, I mean are you, you're, you know, you're a similar age to me, do you, have you, have you found yourself yet?Was that, was that long ago or are you still working on it?
It sounds like a ridiculous question but I do find that a lot of my female friends are going through a very similar thing in this mid-40s
Well, when I worked at Browns, and I left because I loved it there, and I'd worked there for five years.And when I left, John, the founder, bought me a gift, which was a Paul Davis illustration.
He's an artist that I'd also designed a book with him when I was at Browns.And it was a picture of a woman, which some people say kind of looks like me, but it isn't me. And it says determinist underneath it.
And I thought that was my word that I'm just like that sort of tenacity and drive and always determined to do the best I can.You do win or lose.Sometimes it is what it is.
You can only I can only help people that want to change and transform and have a vision for where they want to go.Yes, there might be a lot of people in an organization we need to convince to be able to do it. you've got to want something too.
So I always thought it was determinist.And then this past year we were at the Cannes Lion Festival and there was a few of us from JKR there and we were sitting in, which is a global sort of advertising agency, we're talking about
a single word that defines you to your point.I was like, I know mine, it's determinist, it's always been that, it's been that for that.They were like, it's not, yours is contagious.It was really interesting for five people to
tell me what they thought by me.And it's just like, and I guess that energy has been about corralling a lot of people, whether it's inside organizations, whether I'm inside them, whether I'm working at the agency side, I have a lot of empathy
for the politics that happens inside brands, and I think that's the number one mistake agencies make all the time, thinking that they're right, they know the best, they have no idea what these brand managers and CMOs and CEOs are trying to navigate.
and you will get there in the end.It's just, it is a marathon, it's not always a sprint, and you've got to, it will, you'll get there.
I've always, and Tosh has always taught me, you can have a five-year vision for where you want a brand that's like got very low appetite or bravery for change, and then show them what that looks like, scare them, and then go in steps of how you get them there.
You'll probably get them there quicker than you think.But yeah, it's, the contagious thing I think has,
It's helped, obviously, working with all different types of creatives and curating different people and the way I think I lead, as well as when I work with partners.
The best work I've done now, when I look back and I think about any of the brands that I've worked with, I consider some of the clients now, they're my friends. I would invite them to a party if we all lived in there.
We build these relationships that are so honest that I can call them up or WhatsApp them.We can disagree.It's totally okay.I think people have forgotten that it's okay to not agree about things.
Let's not be disrespectful and rude to each other because it's not personal. But it's okay to have difficult conversations and that's where you build that respect and then make it fun.
I go with Amy Bevington who's the Global Head of Brand at Mozilla to Paradigms last week. and launching Mozilla in this conference in Rome, it was just, it's been a huge journey.We've been on this last year, many, many different stakeholders.
It's a very kind of complex sort of company, Mozilla, and a lot of different opinions, and we've done our best to listen to everything and navigate it. And it was also a moment to have fun and celebrate that this is the milestone.It's not done.
We're still on the journey.We've still got to codify it even more and there's things to develop and stuff like that.But it's just, take those wins when you get some different milestones, even if they don't look like what you hoped.
expected they might have.As I said, it's more of a rolling release, this brand.It's not the atypical, like, everything is polished at this moment in time.
And that's been a little bit different for me because I am used to, like, polishing a case study and going, this is the best story I can tell about this brand.And actually, yeah, we're doing it.We're drip feeding it.
And it's kind of refreshing and interesting to kind of go with the flow.And like, it's that sort of mirrors how the brand can roll it out and make it happen.
Is there a danger we can lose ourselves in our work though?
I've definitely had moments where I lost myself.In fact, I can think of
three moments and they all are some of the work that I'm really proud of but it's almost like it's almost been like a recovery period after it where you've forgotten how to act and behave and chill out and have a weekend and who are my friends and what do I do and like
because you've just totally, and USA Today was one of them.I've never worked like that in my life.I think I would work from early hours till the wee hours every day for a year, almost every single day.
And people around me, some people burnt out sooner.And because I have a lot of stamina, I have to keep an eye that my behavior can't reflect everyone's and I have to also respect how much other people can take and that's taken a lot of learning too.
It's like, it's not, I'm not pissed off if someone needs to finish at five and go and pick up their kids and they have responsibilities or, or their work threshold isn't the same as mine.It's just simple as that.
And you have to kind of, that's taken me a long while because I probably pushed people to their limits without meaning to, but, but that's because I was losing myself
Yeah, it's hard.It's hard.I think I lost myself in Chobani.It was very... The first year, it was very... I was trying to connect all the dots.I was the curator of it.
And even Leland, my boss, who I love, he was very, like, just let her... He almost said to people, I actually, I've heard this, like, just leave her alone, let her do her thing, and we'll resume back to normal.
I don't know whether I went a little bit crazy, but I work with so many of those people still today.A lot of them have actually come over now.A few of them have come over to the JKR side.So obviously, it wasn't all bad.
I want to work with you.You are contagious.
It's lovely when you hear it.It's a hard word to use, myself.So I'll keep the terminus myself and other people call me contagious.They're my in and out side.
Yeah, I think there's a thousand versions of us out there, isn't there?Oh, yeah.That's just the way it is.
There's going to be some people out there who've made up their mind about you, who hate you, despise you, and have got a real kind of strong negative opinion of you, which is not right.But then there are others who'll have great opinions of you.
But here's a question for you, Lisa.And it's controversial in some circles, but can you get to the top without hard work and sacrifice?
Yeah, and again, I think it comes back to something you said at the beginning.I mean, what is the top as well?And I think, yeah, I mean, it definitely has been hard work and I have sacrificed a lot.I mean, I'm not going to lie.
I'm sitting here as a single woman.I haven't met a sort of life partner that is teenagers and children we all imagine when we get married and have kids and stuff like that.And has that been because of that?
And people, all my girlfriends always say, it's because you're working too much, you don't have time for that.And I'm always like, I would change if I met that person and all of these things.
But I'm not going to stop doing it whilst I'm on the search.So that's That maybe, I think, you know, having a family, and I have a family in a very different, unconventional way, but I am very comfortable in myself now.
It's taken me till I was 46 to go, this is me. This I'm doing what I love.That's more than many friends I have hate their jobs.
Like I actually was sitting with Michael Wolff last night and Mike Dempsey and he was telling me about Mike Dempsey's in the process of selling his apartment in London. such a famous legacy designer.
And he was just like, he was telling me that there's this financial gentleman who's coming back to view the apartment for the second time.But he was like, he doesn't appreciate my apartment.
He doesn't understand the Vitsi shelving and all of the sort of design details.I want to sell it to a creative
But I feel like I had a bit of a mourning period in the last few years that I wasn't going to have a family the way I originally thought I was going to have a family and wasn't going to use my body the way it was designed to be used.
I was sad, but then I was also like, as I said, I think, oh, yeah, actually the point with the Mike Dempsey story was that this guy hates his job.
And like 99% of people, this financial side, he's like, oh, and Mike said, aren't we so lucky that we love what we do?And I think, yes, I've taken it more. seriously than maybe others do.It's consumed me in a way.
I feel like I was in Rome and Florence last week and just seeing art and frescoes and I just, I literally, I just want to keep soaking it all in.I feel very inspired.It's just, I can't imagine
even if I was the perfect sort of 2.4 married kids, da, da, da, not trying to find a way to have it all.Like, even if I have a family, I don't want to not, I won't stop doing what I do, which is then your retirement problem issue.
But I was like, no, I can stop. You just calibrate differently.You prioritize differently.You compartmentalize differently.And I haven't needed to do that yet, so I've let it.But I do feel much more comfortable that this is the body that I was given.
I wish I didn't have those love handles.It's not going to be one that I can work out and eat.You start to accept who you are in your own skin, what you stand for. what you believe.I've learned to continually work on myself.
I'm not, you know, there's no such thing as perfect.I've been working with coaches the last few years, making sure I can keep my sort of sovereignty, my passion, which can sometimes tip over the edge and be too passionate and push too hard.
How do you get back to your centre?All of these things are just amazing and I can I couldn't really, like, it's all making sense, but there's still always more work to be done.We're never finished. I like that.I don't want to stop learning.
I love all this.I love all the AI.I love all of this stuff.I'm just like, bring it on.
So then my next question, I'm going to ask this question on behalf of an email that I got last month from a man.He said, my god, Katie, there's only a few women at the top in the creative industry, creative directors.
Is it 0.1% or something like that? we've got to do something about it."I was like, okay.All right then, so like I will ask on his behalf, why aren't there more female I mean, it's a huge question.
I mean, there's loads of reasons, but it's, you know, how can you have a family and sacrifice?Men do it, I know, but is it ridiculous that it's controversial to say that actually women are the mothers?And, you know, it's a lot of work.
You can equal parent the shit out of it, but at the end of the day, the woman is the life giver
Yeah, it is.I mean, it's a sort of, it's a very complex.
And what's interesting about it, I think very early on in my career, which is so crazy, it comes back to D&AD, they were doing a workshop in London and they invited lots of different women creatives across all different levels.
And one of the main questions they asked is, who wants to own their own creative company?
company here were advertising, branding, design, whatever and who put up their hands and only like I think two women put up their hands and then similarly they asked who wanted to be like ECDs and creative directors and I think my hand went up very quickly and one of the things that I think was really interesting because actually there was only like maybe
two or three more hands than the two hands that wanted to own their own business.So there's five of us that had some level of senior or ownership ambition.So they didn't really want to talk to us.
They actually wanted to know from all the others, why weren't they putting their hands up?And this was a room of about 50. And a lot of them were like, I'm already working as like a senior designer or something, the most hours I can physically work.
I don't, you know, it feels like if I'm going to go more senior and do more, have more of this ambition, I just can't do that.I want to get married.I want to have a family.You can't have it all.And I do think there is a truth.You can't.
You can't have it exactly all.If I had a family now, I couldn't work them as much as I'm doing now.I would have to prioritize and find a new calibration.I wouldn't have to give either thing up.
I would definitely have to find a new threshold, because it's just, again, you have to.But I was so shocked that it was just like, that was going to be in the way of people being creative directors and being ECDs and being all of that.
And I think that is why you still find such a disparity.But it was also a very historic system of male.So also we had to break through. and the breaking through has been fucking hard and my journey is hard.
It has always been surrounded mainly by male leaders.
Lots of microaggressions and pats on the head.
Yeah and I've definitely had, like I also have a lovely story of like three or four creative leaders who have totally male who've given me the platform, encouraged me, if not even sometimes pushed me to do it my way, which thank God.Not all men.
Yeah, not all men.But I've seen, well, I mean, I've been working since 2000, so I've seen all sorts of... behaviours that are not acceptable now, which thank goodness.
Oh my gosh, yes, I know.Oh God, yeah, we could share some stories I'm sure, because I started my career at the same time as you and the 2000s were something else.Good grief.Yeah.
Yeah, anyway, carry on.But it really, but similarly like, Again, the first company I worked at, I loved.
There was three partners in that company, male partners, and they sort of parted ways over who was bringing in the most work and revenue, and they couldn't see eye to eye, and they couldn't calibrate on that, and the stress of paying people and all of that.
And I ended up staying with the partner that carried on sort of running the business, and we worked together for many years.But I was just like, that that put me off owning my own company.I'm not going to lie.
People always ask, like, Lisa, why aren't you doing your own thing?And I was like, to be honest, I just I don't want to be in Excel.I don't want to pay anyone.I don't want to talk about EBITDA.I just want to do the work.
And I want to work with really cool, interesting, diverse, mix of ages, origins, backgrounds, of creatives, and I want to make weird and wonderful fucking shit.I just don't want to do Iberta and any of the whatever.
And when even a PM brings up an Excel, they're like, we know you don't like looking at the index.Yeah, can you make a beautiful chart and keynote for me? see the timeline in a way that I can digest it.
Bless them, they're like, I'm a pain in the ass for some of them.That's why I've also, I talk very proudly about not being the top person at the agency.I think Tosh, my global CCO here is amazing.Leland, when I was at Chobani, I don't
want their jobs.I like to have a seat at Global and understand how the business is running, but I want to do the work.And when you're doing great work, you'll make money.
So I don't want to run around looking for money because I'd want to run around looking for the work and the projects.I believe that comes from that.
So it's always been good to kind of create that relationship with someone that's got my back, encouraging me, is there when something goes wrong, is there when I want to talk and look at the work.It's an amazing sort of...
a partnership that I have with someone like Tosh, but I just, I don't want the responsibilities of how the business runs.
It's hard, it's really tough.It's all encompassing and consuming.And I realised the irony of this next question saying, isn't it fucking annoying that they always have to point out that we're women?
Yeah, there's been moments in my career where I've really resented that it's like we need to have a woman on a panel or let's talk about being women.And for a long while I was very
sort of, I sort of retracted from those because I just wanted to do the work.
I was about to say I wanted to be known for the work, but there's so many people that work with me on the work, so I just represent many people that have created that project.But there was a moment
in my career when, well, actually it was only a few years ago.When I worked on Burger King, I was being interviewed by a journalist, I think for Fast Company.And she was asking me questions about Burger King and the rebrand and stuff like that.
And then we just happened to like sort of stumble and start to talk a little bit about, oh, Chobani.And then I mentioned the mayor and things.And she's like, you worked on all of these projects? I had no clue.
And it was like, I could see, we were probably on a Zoom like this, I could see her face light up like she had discovered something that no one else had connected the dots on.And then she wrote a very different piece.
She wrote a piece about me and being like, did you know who this person is that was worked on X, Y, and Z?
And whilst loads of people celebrated that, I remember Tosh wrote a really nice piece to JKR, look at the recognition and it's also the recognition for so many people that work with Lisa and we never forget that.
It came with a lot of responsibility that moment because I wasn't a very well-known graphic designer and I was very comfortable with that.People who knew, knew.Like that's how I've managed to get my different jobs or move around.
But I, and I don't, sort of graphic design, advertising, fame stuff.I'm just like,
It's cringy isn't it?Don't give a shit about it.
But it comes with responsibility when that's unearthed and then I suddenly found like oh my god I'm gonna have to own this female conversation, that there still is such a lack of
diversity, equity, and inclusion, whether it's gender, and then so many more, the disparity is even bigger in all the other areas.And I need to use my platform when I can to actually encourage other women to go, to be like,
please see this path as an opportunity.But I have had feedback, which this is very honest, when you do your annual reviews and stuff, that I'm actually a lot harder on women.
And it's often because I love them so much and I want to push them to be the best they can be.So it's all done.But that was actually quite a hard piece of feedback to receive.And so I've thought a lot about that.
And I've been working on obviously more, hopefully more, being more on the encouragement versus hard. pushing angle of it, but it was always done with like, please see this as a path, as an opportunity, have a voice, share the platform.
I'm always trying to like, all the talks now I do when I go on stage, like I did with Amy Bebbington, who was my partner on Mozilla.The last one I did for D&AD was with the head of creative over at Impossible.I love
I want to, especially when they're the strong female leaders in brand side as well, take this platform and do it together.Show more people that women are running and getting this shit done and can do it and stuff like that.But it is, it's...
It is fucking annoying.We still have to talk about it.
I know.It's exhausting.And when people say, how can we solve this?It's so complicated.It's so nuanced.There's a myriad of reasons why there are more female creative directors or entrepreneurs.There's a myriad of reasons.
It's not just about having kids. I think, I'll give you an example.I had an idea the other day, because I love playing around with AI as well.I had an idea the other day.I've been doing Creative Boom for 15 years.
And I was like, I wonder if I started another magazine and just made it about graphic design.And every press release that I got through on Creative Boom, I just put it into AI and got that to write it.I did an AI.
a generative image of a very cool looking male graphic designer with a beard, maybe staring off to the side, looking really kind of intelligent and mysterious.
And then just sort of did that for a year and looked at the traffic and then revealed all at the end.Now, obviously, because I'm telling you this on the podcast, I'm not going to do it, but I'd be so curious to know whether it was
more popular because it was perceived to be written by a male graphic designer than, you know, little old me, cutesy me.
I don't know, it's just, it frustrates me that who I am and my sex has potentially held me back, you know, not to get into Taylor Swift or anything, but I do wonder if I'd have got there faster. I do.I do wonder.
And, like, you know, I have had friends say, no, that's bullshit.It's bullshit.You've worked hard.You've done really well.But, you know, that's got nothing to do with it.But has it, though?Has it?
I hear you, especially the way, like, this sort of the next generation want to sort of almost jump through titles and roles very quickly.How quickly can there be a CD?And it's like,
I find myself telling them stories about, I was a design director for eight years, I was a creative director for 10 years.But it was interesting in hindsight, because everyone else does get those, has jumped through those roles much quicker.
Or was it just the right...
amount each level has always been the right amount of time for me and I loved being a hands-on designer which was really is the design director role is sort of the first point in your career where you're like you're directing a project I don't think about it just directing a team but you're directing the project and you might be you're also probably the
most equipped and most experienced designer on the team, so you can do a direction probably a lot quicker than other people.
And then you are starting to work with more creators, so it's a very complex role, that role, but I loved it and I did it for the longest amount of times.I know it's the role that actually
In our studio, most people, it's the most challenging because you're learning to manage people as well and have a strong point of view and sell in the work.It's sort of the biggest learning role.
But some people just want to do that for a couple of years and jump straight to CD, whereas I was in it for the longest amount of time, but that's because I still wanted to make.And that was when I did USM today.
You didn't want the extra responsibility, you wanted to be right in the work.
When you think about it, it's very multifaceted, so probably trying to overachieve too many things.
Well, it sounds like you've certainly been really kind of, you know, satisfied career wise.There's always been something to, you know, really bite into. Now, we're going to wrap this up because we've been chatting for an hour.
You're an absolutely fascinating person to talk with and hear about your story.But because we're talking about the idea of being at the centre of everything, what's your idea?What's Lisa Smith all about?
Well, I suppose, yeah, the duality of determinist meets contagious.
uh it is well I mean it is being at the center of everything it's also being at the center of the project and curating the right teams and but being at the center of and then I suppose my life where it's like the life with your friends your life with whatever your family is your life of travels I mean I've loved my job has taken me all over the world I'm like
It's hard living out of a suitcase weeks and weeks on end, but God, I've got to see things that I couldn't have imagined or dreamt of seeing as the younger designer myself.So it's the curiosity and the learning.It's just never done.
And I think that's what I circle around, I think.
Reaching for the stars.I love it.Well, thank you so much, Lisa.It's been great chatting with you and I hope you have a great time in London.Let's catch up again soon.
Yeah.Thank you, Katie.I really enjoyed chatting.
What an incredible conversation with Lisa Smith, the Global Executive Creative Director at JKR.
We really found out about how she puts the brand idea at the center of everything from strategy to execution and how she navigates the highs and lows of leading major rebrands for some of the world's biggest companies.
I mean, gosh, I mean, it sounds like a lot of hard work, but completely suits her personality.I do wonder what would happen if we met in the same room and You know, I don't often meet people who match my craziness.She was great.I loved her.
Anyway, before we wrap up, I'd love to hear your thoughts.What did you find most inspiring about today's chat?You know, were there any of those sort of complicated topics that we brought out?Did they spark up anything in you?
Do you want to share them with us?You know, please note, I'm not an expert on any of these topics.I'm just exploring them and curious and trying to figure things out myself, if I'm honest.
Anyway, do you have any of your own stories of how you've approached branding or handled creative challenges in the industry?
Feel free to drop us a line to letters at creativeboom.com and your story might even be featured in our Letters to the Editor segment on The Spark, our weekly Thursday pick-me-up for creatives.
And remember, The Spark is packed with the latest from the creative world, tips to fuel your journey and much more. along with a little bit of my madness.So tune in every Thursday for your dose of inspiration.
And if you enjoyed this episode, I'd really appreciate it if you could take a moment to rate and review the podcast.It really helps Creative Boom reach even more amazing creatives just like you.You'll find the link in the show notes.
Thanks again for listening to the Creative Boom podcast.I'm your host, Katie Cowan, and I'll see you next time.
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