The Imposterous

Sir John Hegarty, awarded a Knighthood by Queen Elizabeth II for his services to advertising and Creative industries, Founder, Creative Bartle Bogle Hegarty (BBH) and The Garage Soho, now adds to his title, ‘The Imposterous First Birthday Edition Season Two Finale and Episode 50 Guest’. It’s a lot. Welcome to the big time  SJH.John Hegarty has been central to the global advertising scene over six decades working with brands such as Levi's, Audi, Boddingtons, Lynx, British Airways and Johnnie Walker. He was a founding partner of Saatchi and Saatchi in 1970.  He founded Bartle Bogle Hegarty in 1982 with John Bartle and Nigel Bogle. The Agency now has offices in London, New York, Singapore, Stockholm, Shanghai, Mumbai and Los Angeles. John’s creative awards are numerous. He has been given the D&AD President's Award for outstanding achievement and in 2014 was admitted to the US AAF Hall of Fame. John was knighted in 2007 and was the recipient of the first Lion of St Mark award at the Cannes Festival of Creativity in 2011. John wrote his first book ‘Hegarty on Advertising – Turning Intelligence into Magic’ in 2011 and his book "Hegarty on Creativity - there are no rules" was published in 2014. In 2014 John Co-founded The Garage Soho, an early stage investor company that believes in building brands, not just businesses. John has just launched a new online 8-week course, entitled The Business of Creativity, aimed to equip people with tangible tools to help win through the application of creativity.

Dan Nelken is a Creative’s Creative. Saying this exposes the fact we haven’t read Dan’s book, ‘A Self-Help Guide for Copywriters’. If we had we would have written something far more original and spent a lot less time sweating the unavoidable mediocrity of it. Anyway, Dan Nelken is an active advertising creative who works on the world's biggest brands and up-and-coming start-ups. His work has appeared in award shows nationally, internationally, and on his mother's fridge. He's spent many years winging the creative process and is now dedicating his life to understanding it, so he can help creative companies and creative people think faster and healthier (and that includes himself). His weekly newsletter hits 6000 Creatives’ inboxes and is saving a bunch of us from feeling totally lost for words and confidence. His online learning course, ‘Writing Under Pressure’ is proving the difference between - ‘the client wants more options and the client can’t pick a favourite’ - Matt Cascarino CCO, FARM.Early in this episode we meet Alan - a 6 year old pant’s wetter and the ding-dong voice in Dan Nelken’s head. According to Imposterous illustrator Camilo Suarez (@brostalobo) this is what Alan looks like.theimposterous.com/dan_nelken

Here we are, back with the second installment of SAW IT. AM IT. A series of conversations hosted by Shannon Crowe featuring some of the brilliant creative leaders Shannon met at Cannes Lions SEE IT BE IT program in 2017. Today’s guest is Lizi Hamer.The Drum named Lizi as one of the world's most creative women, Cannes Lions selected her in the top 15 female creative directors globally, she co-Authored Creative Super Powers, Co-founded SisuGirls, and continues to build the SheSays Community. Lizi earns attention through her StoryHunting techniques, a powerful network of collaborators, novel thinking and a belief that creativity can change the world.From carting half a tonne of prawns into the desert to re-launch a beer and designing the first Lego character with ears to challenging masculinity in Australia and getting 500,000 people in Asia to touch music, Lizi’s creativity is as contagious as it is impactful.Her campaigns have brought a blind man’s world to life, changed law, and won awards for impact, storytelling, and craft, leading Lizi to be labeled as one of the most creative Women in the World. 

Welcome to the first episode of SAW IT. AM IT. A series of conversations hosted by Shannon Crowe featuring some of the wonderful creative leaders Shannon met at Cannes Lions SEE IT BE IT program in 2017. Today’s guest is Maria Milusheva.Maria is Creative Director & Partner at Noble Graphics. Working in advertising since 2005 (17 years and counting!) Maria joins us on The Imposterous as she prepares to head off on maternity leave. We’re so thankful to be talking to Maria today. For the past 12 years Maria has been developing ideas for some of the biggest beer brands. Her favorite business idea is turning a small local brand into No1 beer in Bulgaria, all without a single shot of male friendship or anyone saying ‘cheers’. Quite a feat huh!Zooming in from Bulgaria, one of the oldest countries in Europe and the only European country that hasn't changed its name since the year it was established, Maria reminds us Bulgaria ranks first in the world in terms of women's participation in the communication and information technology sector. BUT when it comes to personal life, no official statistics are being gathered and released in Bulgaria about violence against women. One of the many contradictions and challenges that keeps Maria fighting the good fight for women in advertising and all the women of Bulgaria.

In his uniquely brilliant laconic style, a way of speaking and thinking that we’ve quickly come to love here at The Imposterous Alvin says, “It feels like forever, but I am still new at this job. I've been ECD for some years now and I feel I need another 200 more to fully understand what the heck I am doing. I like the work, can't say I love the job. Been working on an array of Brands from Telco to Paint, from Insurance to Cable TV. I’ve had experience doing work for Banks, Tourism, Milk, Herbal Medicine, Automobile, and must I list it all here? Also started a social collective called Kita Kawan Mah to play a role in addressing the rise of racism in this country by promoting inter-racial friendship and dialogue. Apart from that, there is also a Project I See, an annual event where we harness the power of the arts community to help the public understand obscure, misunderstood or abused communities like the migrant, refugee and indigenous peoples. We started this in 2013. In all the work that I try to do, stripping away all the rocket science, I try to speak to the heart. I've never really believed in Brands speaking to Target Market. It's always heart to heart. Or person to person. Communication is personal. And while I believe in all that, I have to admit it's hardly ever easy to get to that level. We've had our hits and misses. More misses than hits to be honest. But still, it's a good place to start. And if we're consistent in this pursuit, we'll get there one day. While I am alive, hopefully.”

Anouk Jans creates creative concepts, brand identities, campaigns, social media strategies and digital content to help define, establish and build international love brands that shape culture. Driven by a pioneering spirit, Anouk gives brands an opportunity to rethink marketing by creating dynamic campaigns for today’s audience, with stories about purpose, values and human nature. At The Imposterous Head Office Anouk Jans’ name has featured at pretty much every all-staff meeting and we’ve been in a particular hurry to talk to her since the launch of Kill Your Darlings - A documentary about the world of modern advertising and the talent defining it. A story seen through the wide-open eyes of Anouk, a young Creative Director looking for answers, positive change and a brighter future for herself and everyone that loves the business of creativity. The documentary  stars and follows the youngest Creative Director in Germany as she ponders her future in the industry and travels the world interviewing industry legends such as Scott Galloway, Cindy Gallop, Fernando Machado, Rob Reilly, and many more. As Anouk puts it, “When I first started in this industry, I didn’t question anything – not the structures, not the hierarchies, or the working hours. However, as the years passed, I saw the creatives around me suffer and become cynical about the industry, including myself.” It was incredible to talk to Anouk and to produce this episode, it’s a conversation we’re sure will stay with us for a long time to come.  

David Smith is a creative thinker of international standing. Founded Blood UTD in 2016 - an agency that began life with a focus on doing the best work in the space of sport and fitness. But has since evolved to focus on good companies - by good, we mean companies that are focused on generating profit in a manner that is fair and sustainable. This is not about strident wokeness or ardent moralising, but rather the belief that profit and decency don't need to be divergent forces, that there is a path forward where you can make money without messing things up. Joining David on this episode of The Imposterous is Regina Stoombergin and Julia Spencer aka M.I.A aka Mums in Ads. MIA who is still the most exclusive club in advertising! But the good news is they want you! All you need to do is1. Be a mum2. Be in the industry and3. Find the bloody time to squeeze one more thing in.Mums In Ads will be on the rooftop at the Corner Hotel in Richmond on Thursday 29 September from 6pm. So if you’re in Melbourne, an Adland mum of whatever sort (hey, we don’t discriminate), join them for a drink. 

You know it’s a good day when Natalie Lam joins us on The Imposterous. Natalie is Chief Creative Officer, Publicis Groupe Asia Pacific, Middle East and Africa. She’s responsible for overseeing the creative output of more than 60 agency brands including Leo Burnett, Saatchi & Saatchi, Publicis, Razorfish, Sapient, Digitas with integrated creative, data, media and tech offerings in some of the world’s most dynamic markets. With her roots in design, a strong digital background and being a hopeless romantic for big ideas, Natalie advocates for strategic creative work that brings optimism, joy and beauty to the world, in truly media-agnostic ways to help build the world’s biggest brands. Her 20+ year career included senior creative leadership positions in Google’s Art, Copy and Code, R/GA, Ogilvy and McCann World Group in NYC, with a break from advertising to start an electronic music and DJ school, The Foxgrove, that was featured in Rolling Stone. Natalie was selected for AdWeek’s Creative 100 ranking in 2022, as an “agency leader defining a new era.” Her work for global innovative brands such as Nike+, Spotify and Mercedes-Benz won top global awards including a Cannes Grand Prix, D&AD Black Pencil, and ADC Black Cube.  She is a frequent jury president and judge at global and regional awards shows such as Cannes Lions, D&AD, The One Show, ADC, LIA, and Spikes. How we managed to convince Natalie to join us on The Imposterous remains a mystery. We’re very glad she did though!

Much loved Australian television and radio host, and passionate mental fitness advocate Gus Worland founded Gotcha4Life in 2017, following the success of the ABC series Man Up and losing a very close friend and life mentor to suicide, as he realised he had the ability and networks to make a real difference. Gus simply does not accept the alarming statistics surrounding suicide in Australia and that eight people take their life every day. Gotcha4Life believes in the power of prevention through connection and champions the idea of proactively building mental fitness and the resilience required to deal better with the challenges that life throws at us. Gus is a big believer in starting meaningful conversations by developing better social and emotional connections with mates, families, colleagues and community.To drive real change, Gotcha4Life funds educational workshops and innovative training programs throughout Australia that build mental fitness in individuals, organisations and communities to activate strong, open and binding relationships.

Veronica Beach is the original founder and now partner of the poolhouse (www.the-poolhouse.com), a social network for Producers in TV, Film & Advertising. Previously Veronica  was the Director of Production at Pereira O'Dell from 2020 - July 2022 overseeing the San Francisco & New York offices from the Agency side and their In-House production department, Barrelhouse. Prior to that, Head of Global Production at DAVID and was a founding member of DAVID and even moved to Brazil to open the São Paulo and Buenos Aires production departments. While living in Brazil, Veronica  served a dual role leading Global Production for Ogilvy Brazil. In Veronica’s  first year at Ogilvy Brazil they won Agency of the Year in Cannes through the projects she produced, Dove, Real Beauty Sketches and Coca Cola’s, Crazy for Good. That year winning 29 Lions, including the Titanium Grand Prix as well as previously mentioned, Agency of the Year. To date, Veronica has won over 100 Lions, and multiple other prestigious awards. Veronica was recognized by Business Insider as one of the top Creative Influencers in Advertising while being part of the team to globally launch the Miami office as one of the top 5 agencies in the world at Cannes. 

Paul Middleditch has directed four feature films and is regarded as one of the top performance/action TV Commercial Directors in the world. He is Australasia's most awarded commercials Director, having over 300, with 8 Cannes Lions, 4 of which are gold, and numerous International and National awards to his credit. He was recently ranked 8th Best Commercial Director of all time, based on Lüzer's Archive. He has continually upheld a Number One Director World Ranking on Best Ads on TV, with Carlton Draught's 'Big Ad' being awarded the Best Beer Ad of All Time. His work has featured at the Super Bowl for 6 consecutive years and he is one of the few Australian creatives to have appeared on the cover of Shots Magazine. At the age of 19, Middleditch's first short film 'Light of the Blade' won Best Direction at the Clermont-Ferrand International Film Festival. His first feature film, Terra Nova, won the first film prize in Montreal in 1999, won Best of Festival at the Edinburgh Film Festival and went on to screen at over thirty festivals worldwide. His second feature, A Cold Summer, premiered in competition at the Rotterdam Film Festival, and earned him an Australian Film Institute nomination for Best Director. In 2009, Middleditch completed his third feature, Separation City, a dramatic comedy starring Joel Edgerton, Rhona Mitra and Thomas Kretschmann, which was nominated for 4 QANTAS Awards. His first American feature film for Lionsgate titled Rapture Palooza was released in 2013, starring Anna Kendrick and Craig Robinson. Paul is the first guest on The Imposterous whose bio has been directly lifted from IMDb. This is something we’re sure he’ll never mention but we will be a #humblebrag in social posts of ours to come.

Pum Lefebure is a co-founder and chief creative officer of Design Army in Washington, DC, where she oversees all creative coming through the agency's doors. The Thailand native brings a global sensibility to American design - a creative point of view that draws from different cultures and resonates with diverse audiences. In this episode of The Imposterous Pum brings savvy street smarts, an undeniable entrepreneurial edge and a caliber of confidence born from years of incredible world leading creative work.Guided by an international eye, Pum has helped expand the agency's client base and elevate its reputation as a trend-setter. Pum's hallmark is a distinctive union of the artistic and the commercial. With a rare balance of creativity, strategic thinking and industry know-how, she has proven that good design is the cornerstone of good business. Another good imposter indeed.

The Imposterous, Peter Nankervis is Founder and CEO of Lighthouse Group and a passionate corporate coach working with CEO’s and guiding leadership teams to identify the right people and performance solutions to accelerate business transformation and growth. He brings to this episode a history of partnering with companies that have successfully accelerated their enterprise value, in many cases leading to acquisition.He’s all about providing a clear roadmap for leaders and developed the leadership technology platform 6Ceed, for which Lighthouse was awarded the Westpac top 200 Business of Tomorrow. Priding himself on a very down to earth approach, being an active listener, and having the ability to develop practical and simple solutions to complex problems. Pete’s passionate about helping clients navigate tricky spots and accelerate when the winds blow fair.Prior to founding Lighthouse, this episode’s imposter had a corporate background with state, national and regional leadership roles in management consulting with a global multinational company. In his younger years, he was a champion Whac-A-Mole player, but he’s not in that game anymore.

Two great guests, two episodes in one. Where to start?Let’s begin with Steve Sammartino. Wikipedia tells us Steve is an Australian futurist, author and entrepreneur and according to Forbes, he launched Rentoid in 2007, one of the early sharing-economy, peer-to-peer online hire and rental marketplaces. Rentoid was featured in Rachel Botsman and Roo Rogers’s book, What’s Mine is Yours: How Collaborative Consumption is Changing the Way We Live. Rentoid was later sold to an ASX listed company in 2014. According to the World Records Academy, Steve collaborated with Raul Oiada in 2011 to launch the world’s first Lego Space Shuttle into space. Propelled by a helium-filled weather balloon, the Lego Space Shuttle model 3367 was launched from German airspace into the stratosphere to an altitude of about 35,000m (114,800 feet). According to Wired in 2013 Steve and Oaida developed the world's first life-sized, drive-able Lego car with a compressed air-powered Lego engine. According to TV Week however, Steve is the co-Host of Rebound TV with Tommy McCubbin, who co-creates and hosts the show that is  helping Australian businesses bounce back after the pandemic. Screening on Channel 9 on Saturdays at 12:30. Before being wooed to the screen Future Sandwich podcast host Tommy McCubbin co-founded WellAware with the mission to accelerate the world's transition into personalised, proactive and preventative health management where he works with some of Australia's top companies to help them manage and minimise the risk of Cancer, Heart Disease and Mental Illness striking down their workforce unnecessarily. Tommy’s podcast Future Sandwich is Winner of Australia's Best Tech Science and Gaming Podcast, and has expanded into multiple live events and content series. We have no idea how we convinced Tommy and Steve to join us for this chat, but they’re here now so let’s go for it. Ding, ding.

Meet the imposterous Elaine Li, creative director and photographer. Elaine was born and raised in Hong Kong, spent time in Melbourne, Chicago, San Francisco, and is now based in Sydney. So far in her advertising career, Elaine has planted a beer ad in people’s dreams; raised money for bushfire victims with a burnt Christmas tree; and made edible finger lickin’ good nail polish. Elaine competed in Cannes Young Lions in 2017, representing Hong Kong. Shortly after moving to Sydney, she tutored AWARD School, and won Young Lions Australia with her partner Jared. They competed in Cannes and came top 5 worldwide. Most recently Elaine judged AWARD Award. Elaine’s obsession with photography and social media has garnered over 260k+ followers on Instagram, work with various brands, and do public speaking engagements as a social influencer. Elaine’s work is killer! When Elaine’s not making ads or taking photos, she enjoys travelling and diving into the world of NFTs and metaverse. But somehow she found time to talk to us about the imposterous things that have happened along the way. Lucky you!

Brent Smart is a rare breed of marketer - equal parts creative and commercial. A brand builder who has taken NRMA to third strongest brand in Australia (it was 36th when he started) and is the strongest insurance brand in the world. With a track record of changing the fortunes of brands, leading NRMA to 3 years of customer growth after 7 years of decline, delivering Cheerios first quarter of sales growth after 13 quarters of decline and even helping Yellow Pages steal share of search from Google. Brent spent 20 years in the ad business, rising to CEO of Saatchi & Saatchi New York, having run New Zealand's Agency of the Decade Colenso BBDO. Without doubt this Imposterous guest knows how to build a creative culture on the inside that delivers more effective creative output on the outside. Brent has the honour of being the first CMO to join us for a chat on The Imposterous and we’re all the better for it. 

Mietta started her career in Sydney at Ogilvy and Droga5 working across brands KFC, QANTAS, Coca Cola and Sunbeam Appliances. Seven years ago Mietta made the move to New York where she’s since created influential campaigns for The New York Times, The Jed Foundation for Teen Suicide and Kraft. Her work has been featured on CNN, Buzzfeed, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Mashable and Creativity. Now a Creative Director at Squarespace, Mietta has been named One Show’s Next Creative Leader, top 3 global finalist for Ad Age’s Creative of the Year and most recently earned a place on Adweek’s Creative 100. In 2017, Mietta helped induct her dad Tom McFarlane into AWARD’s Hall of Fame. Tom was always Hall of Fame material. His career began in Melbourne as a despatch boy. Four years of part-time study at RMIT, and four agencies later he headed to London to hone his writing skills. At 34, he was appointed ECD at J Walter Thompson Melbourne, followed by several years in the same role at DDB Melbourne. A major turning point came in May 1996 when he received an offer from friend Tom Dery, his former MD at DDB, just a year after Dery had opened M&C Saatchi's first international office. Within a year of McFarlane taking the creative tiller, ‘the Toms’ had 14 clients, 39 staff and an Agency of the Year title. Crucial to McFarlane's copywriting gifts is an ability to cut right to the heart of any brief and a pitch perfect ear for the Australian vernacular. McFarlane has also been a prodigious identifier and nurturer of talent. Many young creatives blessed with his generous tutelage over the years have gone on to become huge players, both in Australia and overseas and guests on The Imposterous, such as Matt Eastwood and Ben Welsh. At the end of 2021, Tom announced his retirement and is widely regarded as one of Australia’s most influential and effective Creative leaders

Damon is Chief Creative Officer and one of the founders of The Monkeys Aotearoa. Before that he was Regional Chief Creative Officer of DDB (New Zealand and Australia). He was formerly Chief Creative Officer of DDB New Zealand where he won over 20 Agency of the Year titles, including DDB New Zealand being named agency of the year in Australia. Before that he was Executive Creative Director of Saatchi & Saatchi Australia and TBWA Hunt Lascaris, which was voted South African agency of the decade in 2010.Damon has collected awards at some of the most prestigious international advertising festival shows, receiving over 50 D&AD Pencils – including 6 yellow and the first and only Black D&AD Pencil ever won in Africa. He has also judged D&AD three times. He’s won 67 Cannes Lions, including the Grand Prix, 10 Gold, a Titanium and Innovation Lion, two Grand Clio, 11 One Show Gold Pencils, and the first ever ADC Black Cube ever awarded.He has been recognised as one of the top 10 Executive Creative Directors in the world by both Creativity Magazine and the Big Won Report on multiple occasions. In 2011, Finance Week awarded him Achiever of Year in South Africa. He’s had a variety of short stories published as well as articles for various magazines and writes a blog called damonsbrain.com. It is stuff he thinks about instead of world domination.OK, we’re stopping there. The ambition of The Imposterous is to make us all feel a little less insecurity and Damon’s bio just isn’t helping. We had a great chat with Damon and felt all the better for it. Please enjoy the episode.

The term “thought leader” is vastly overused. But when it comes to Valerie Young, she’s that — and more. Widely considered the world’s foremost expert on impostor syndrome, Valerie is uniquely qualified to help organisations, workshop facilitators, coaches, and individuals to stamp out impostor syndrome. Valerie earned her doctoral degree in education from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst in 1982. Her research sought to understand why so many bright, capable women (including herself) felt like frauds. Then (as now), most impostor phenomenon research is done with university students. Instead, Valerie chose as her subjects professional women — a majority women of colour. And unlike psychologists and academics who offer largely therapeutic solutions to impostor feelings, Valerie used her training as well as her findings to create educational solutions to impostor syndrome. Taking impostor feelings out of the realm of therapy and creating educational solutions has proved tremendously effective. (source The Imposter Syndrome Institute and if they don’t know what they’re talking about then who does?)Rachel Lounds returns for her second episode on The Imposterous and we welcome her back with all the self doubt and insecurity of Season One and then some. Prior to becoming a regular on The Imposterous, Rachel enjoyed a long and rich career in production and creative services in such esteemed agencies as Droga 5, McCann and LeoBurnett, and after enough time in those agencies Rachel took a pause and quit. Since 2020 she has been a Certified Life & Mindset Coach, Imposter Syndrome Specialist. Rachel is on a quest to help people in media and advertising who want to overcome negative thinking, lack of self-confidence, and imposter syndrome so that they can become the confident, courageous, phenomenal leaders they know in their heart they can be. In other words, she actually knows what she’s talking about.

How we got Jeff Goodby on The Imposterous still baffles us. But then we remember Laura Petrucelli talked him into it so yeah, it had nothing to do with us. Back to feeling like imposters.Jeff, along with his friend Rich, started this whole Goodby Silverstein and Partner thing.Jeff grew up in Rhode Island and graduated from Harvard, where he wrote for the Harvard Lampoon. He worked as a newspaper reporter in Boston, and his illustrations have been published in TIME, Mother Jones and Harvard Magazine.He began his advertising career at J. Walter Thompson and was lucky enough to meet the legendary Hal Riney, whom he still thinks of as his mentor. It was with Riney at Ogilvy & Mather that Goodby learned his reverence for surprise, humour, craft and restraint.He also met Rich Silverstein there. They founded GS&P in 1983 with a founding client they renamed Electronic Arts. Since then, the two have won just about every advertising award imaginable. And yes, Jeff was the guy who originally wrote “got milk?”He is also a director and has delivered the director’s address at the Association of Independent Commercial Producers. His work has been memorialised in the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. In 2006 he was inducted into the Advertising Hall of Fame, and in 2019 he and Rich received the Cannes Lion of St. Mark Award for lifetime achievement. In 2020 the two starred in an 18-part MasterClass online learning series.Jeff has always held that the best advertising is like vandalism—loud, funny and still there the next day. It’s a topic that has earned international attention, in a talk first given at Cannes and then at comparable creative events in London, Sydney, New York City and Boston. He continues to believe that his success is a happy confluence of his mother (a painter), his father (a Wharton graduate) and the rest of his family, who have always been a constant reminder of irony and humility. He lives in Oakland, California, with a dog, a cat, three horses and said it was OK for us to lift this bio for GSP’s website.