Paul: Introduce yourself.

Yousuf: My professional journey has been both fun and rewarding, encompassing diverse roles such as a brand designer at a boutique corporate branding studio, digital producer then account director at a large ad agency, and management consultant at PwC.

You might be wondering, how did this guy start in visual design and end up leading business transformations for major corporations in Canada? Well, curiosity and an entrepreneurial spirit have been my driving forces, complemented by great mentorship along the way. These experiences have equipped me with unique vantage points for problem-solving and a versatile skill set for building solutions with incredible teams.

Today, I have the privilege of serving as the Head of Product Management and Strategic Design at PwC Canada, an iconic global enterprise with an impressive array of clients. My current practice area focuses on reimagining end-to-end customer and employee experiences. We design, build, and launch software to bring those experiences to life and enhance organizational capabilities to enable sustained success.

In my role, I foster an environment that enables pragmatic innovation, resulting in aligning siloed processes, integrating disparate technologies, and realigning incentives to successfully deliver customer/employee experiences that lead to business growth, increased customer satisfaction, and improved operational efficiency. It’s a wonderful blend of business, creativity, and technology.

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SPEAKER LINKS
Host, Paul Syng: ⁠https://linktr.ee/paulsyng⁠
Guest, Yousuf Afridi: ⁠linkedin.com/in/afridi⁠

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EPISODE LINKS
Spotify, Apple, Anchor & more: ⁠https://anchor.fm/PAULSYNG⁠


CHAPTERS
00:00:00 Yousuf on writing his LinkedIn bio
00:02:06 How we met
00:07:01 When a Pakistani studying at British School in Dubai
00:20:40 Immigrating to Canada
00:27:30 Being self-taught
00:30:00 Skateboarding and emulating
00:36:28 Starting a creative business at the age of fifteen
00:44:18 Mentorship and learning the business of design
00:49:41 What Yousuf’s mentor taught him
00:57:36 Asking questions vs having answers
01:03:05 How consulting firms differ from agencies
01:11:00 Coffee and creative career paths
01:19:03 Business case vs creative brief
01:21:50 Can agencies swim upstream?
01:38:36 First year in consulting
01:48:04 What working WITH clients looks like
02:00:32 What consulting and agencies have in common
02:16:23 What creative people do in consulting
02:25:59 Being authentic as your MOAT
02:34:08 Ways of working and how approaches differ
02:53:52 Curious creative consultant over conclusions
02:59:34 What is Yousuf focused on now
03:06:08 3001 Questions and final thoughts
03:09:52 Closing remarks