Great ideas work on universal insights: Amir Kassaei & Sonal Dabral

Interview with global chief creative officer, DDB & chief creative officer, DDB Mudra

It is not uncommon for a global chief creative officer and his regional counterpart to share the same table when discussing ideas or reviewing work. But how often do the two comment on the same set of questions? In a rare interview, Amir Kassaei, global chief creative officer, DDB, and Sonal Dabral, chairman and chief creative officer, DDB Mudra, answer posers by Viveat Susan Pinto & Masoom Gupte on the agency's creative product, its legacy and their stints so far. Edited excerpts:

It's been two years since you joined DDB and one year since you went to China to set up a creative hub there. Your experience so far at the agency?
Kassaei: We have creative hubs around the world. China was one in that series. Since we have global brands on our roster such as Volkswagen, McDonald's, J&J, Mars and Wrigley's, it becomes important for us to leverage our network in a truly global way since many of these brands want one voice across the world. Great ideas work on universal insights that can come from anywhere. China currently lacks national talent in advertising and marketing. So if you want great work from that country you have to rely on international talent, which means you have to have a creative hub. That's what we did in China last year.

Your journey at DDB? It's been a year for you in office too.

Dabral: The journey so far has been interesting and lots of hardwork involved. It's a big place, lots of young talent and nice, big clients such as Volkswagen, TTK, Nissan and Big Bazaar. With Mudra becoming a part of the DDB Group and with us now interacting on a regular basis with the global team, we are in a sense wired into the network and are able to apply learnings to our day-to-day work. That has been enormously enriching for me at an India level. From a regional point of view, I chair the Asia-Pacific creative council. We meet four times a year. Amir also sits for these meetings at times. Again the opportunity to review work from the region and connect with counterparts from the region is an enriching experience.

Some DDB campaigns that made you feel proud?
Kassaei: If you look at the Volkswagen work that we do in 38 countries, it is simply amazing. Every country has great communication on Volkswagen. It is not only the best in the car category, but is also good when compared with other high-profile brands such as Nike. In terms of other brands on our roster, I liked the work that our Canadian office did for McDonald's last year. This whole digital platform of 'Offer Your Questions', where we encouraged consumers to pose whatever questions they had to McDonald's, which was answered by the latter, was well-received. What we were promoting in a sense was the aspect of transparency, and also motivating people at the same time to look at McDonald's in a different way. At the end of the day what is our job? Our task is to solve a client's marketing problem in an innovative way.

Dabral: At the Asia-Pacific level, there was a lot of good work in the last one year. The McDonald's work that emanated out of New Zealand or the Volkswagen print campaign that came from Australia and many more. Specific to the Indian market, it is still work-in-progress, though there were some good films that came for Volkswagen. On Big Bazaar and TTK Prestige, which is based in Bangalore, there is some good work in the pipeline.

Any areas you need to devote your attention to bolster the agency's creative product?
Kassaei: Certainly the endeavour at the moment is to bolster the agency's digital expertise. DDB was one of the first networks to start a digital agency called Tribal DDB. This was way back in 1995 and since then it has done well for itself. But in the last five years, we have taken Tribal DDB back into DDB to improve our digital expertise in the mainline agency. We still have some offices of Tribal DDB across the world, which produces technologically-driven digital solutions, but that is a niche area.

Dabral: We have Tribal DDB as a separate digital agency here, where the team is being beefed up. In the last few months, the agency has also bagged some new business. Within the mainline ad agency, however, we are improving our core strengths in digital so that people within DDB Mudra can become digitally-savvy and are able to conceive ideas for the digital medium. Training is an important area that I am focusing my attention now that I am part of the agency. Creative people by nature are restless. If I can make the agency a happy place, where they feel they can come back and work, I'd be satisfied. My effort as a creative leader is to foster interactions; help my team members evolve as better advertising people. That is how we are making sure that people don't jump ship.

Your take on scam ads and do creative guys really need it?
Kassaei: Car companies produce prototypes, which you never see on the street. These prototypes are created to give a sense of where the company is headed and what it has in its product pipeline. But if a car company simply produces prototypes to show off at car shows then they have a big problem on hand. The same goes for agencies. We are not here to create prototypes. We are here to solve client's problems.

Dabral: You can't hold a creative mind back, but you have to see what it is translating into. We do have checks and balances in place to prevent scamming. For instance, we periodically review work to check whether creative people are creating ads merely to win awards or genuinely indulging in brand-building activity. These reviews are done every three months. At the regional level, we have something called the Bull's Eye Council. Again the Bull's Eye Council reviews work using set parameters. If there are gaps we look at how we can take corrective action.