2022 Creative LIAisons Coaches

Alfred Wee

Group Creative Director
McCann Worldgroup
Singapore

Alfred has been honing his craft over the years as a multi-disciplinary creative. His work is recognized for its creative excellence and effectiveness in major international and local award shows, including One Show, D&AD, Cannes, Clios, New York Festivals, APAC EFFIES, and EFFIES Singapore for clients under his belt. Campaign Brief Asia ranked him as one of Singapore’s top 10 creatives.

He has spent over 20 years in the industry and has been nominated as an international juror (New York Festival, ADFEST, MIDAS & AD STARS Mentor and Juror). He has been highly involved in grooming the next generation of creative changemakers and nurturing creative courage beyond the classroom for the past nine years as an industry practitioner.

As a board member of the advisory council with IHL (NTU WKWSCI ENGAGE, Advisory Council member) and a global mentor (NUS Global Mentorship Programme), Alfred looks to bridge the gap between the industry and institutions.

Having served as Crowbar Award president - leading the most coveted student award show in Singapore and several training-related initiatives for emerging creative talent, with Accredited Advertising & Marketing Singapore, AAMS (Co-chaired and Chaired from 2017 - 2021), he has expanded his interest in preparing young student talents for the global stage serving as an industry expert for WorldSkills Singapore (Chief Experts and Expert - Visual Communications, Worldskills Singapore 2018-2021).

As the Group Creative Director of McCann Worldgroup Singapore, he leads the integrated creative team as the change agents - contributing to many of the Agency of the Year accolades for McCann (2015 - 2020).

With a MA in Digital Media Management from Hyper Island, Alfred believes we will always be students and learners despite being veterans in the industry, because life itself is a lesson.

Comments

Jing Shan
Tian Yu Kong, Guangzhou

Planning copywriter

Our story begins with a zoom call, Meeting ID 745 4664 4414, at 11 am SG and GZ time on a Friday afternoon. I had the opportunity to speak to Jing Shan from ???, an integrated digital agency in Guangzhou. Jing Shan, a planning copywriter in her day job, is a deep-thinking creative who had already shared a series of questions to which she needed answers. However, having prepared all the answers beforehand, I felt I may have left more questions than answers for her.

“Wouldn’t quicker media lengths mean more clutter?”
“What happened to brand sustainability?”
“Is this the rise of the digital shop window for brands?”

Due to the changing trends in the digital landscape, China has always been more exciting and innovative in that trajectory. However, there are no correct answers to why media lengths are getting shorter. With fewer opportunities to build values and even lesser opportunities to build brand equity this had me do some searching myself.

When we spoke about the future of advertising, there was also a rather gloomy picture from her, with more companies riding on the bandwagon of short-lived marketing and turning to live stream E-commerce platforms for survival in China.

I enjoyed speaking to Jing Shan and found that her furrowed brows only showed her wisdom for a young person navigating her career in the industry. I sensed she was having a case of “self-contemplation” and needed recognition and acknowledgement. It’s not uncommon to have outgrown your job to start seeking inspiration; this is, without a doubt, just the beginning of an exchange we’re continuing.

Pedro Fonseca Almeida
Lisbon

Art Director

This next story started as a conversation with Pedro Fonseca Almeida, an Art Director from Lisbon.

Having built up quite a bit of industry experience, Pedro is considered to have more experience than other mentees, as he started working at 18. However, armed with design skills and tenacity, he wants to keep learning and staying curious.

With Pedro, we spoke a lot about his passion and his dreams. And why he went into advertising; having truly enjoyed doing brand identity. I started loving his mantra, "you never know if you don't do it", as he nearly finished every sentence with that line.

Pedro Fonseca Almeida is a curious individual who feels the need to fill his dreams and seize every opportunity to live life fully. I'm just as curious to stay in touch with Pedro and follow his journey, because you'll never know.

Jessie Staszkiewicz
Apparent, Australia

Copywriter

Our last story starts with our call with Australia at teatime. A feat given our multiple attempts to schedule it between our business.

Meet Jessie, who just joined an independent agency. Our first exchange revealed a very positive and confident person who knows why she was in the industry in the first place. She seems excited to be leaving the holding company behind and going independent, a trend I spotted through my other conversations with Pedro and Jing Shan for this new generation of creatives. Perhaps with a driven purpose, they get to decide between the work they want to do versus a cool agency badge.

A report from Forrester answered why a holding company matters more than an independent agency. And it is demonstrated through structuring and augmenting the multiple capabilities that allow the converging of marketing services for global client needs. However, independent agencies and their capabilities are also debatable against this ongoing topic of where clients are moving to.

Without the need for guessing, this new generation seeks different cultures and opportunities that will motivate them and fullfill their needs. But we did discuss in-depth corporate survival skills, which makes me believe the need to succeed in their career choice is the real motivator.