Today we've talked to Paul Gillam, Creative Director to find out more about what he gets up to at N2O.
What does your department do?
Strategy, Creative, Concept, Design, 3D, Animation, Content, Artwork…
How does it do it?
It's almost the middle process of any agency. To listen to both clients and audience, to help figure out what makes sense for all of them, then get thinking! And that's the fun bit. Finding inspiration, bouncing ideas off each other, all to tell a creative story in all sorts of different ways.
And so often it's our excitement about what we've come up with that gets our clients excited, about what we can do together, and about how the audiences out there might just love our work...
What does your role involve?
A healthy mix of strategy and creative, clients and colleagues, ideation and production.
I also get to be part of leading a brilliant team, who often lead me too, and we get to find the fun and the good stuff.
How long have you been at N2O?
Just shy of a year.
What was your route to it?
My career has been evolving and as mixed as many of us. Experiential wasn't really a thing when I was figuring out what I wanted to do in life as a much younger man, but I love it, the way it's more than the old broadcast approaches, it encompasses every technology you want, but ultimately brings it back to human connections, giving brands a chance to be more than a label.
What piece of advice would you give somebody who’s just joined the business?
Get stuck in. There are a lot of good people among us, and with the right collaboration we can do things that stand out.
Your most satisfying project so far and why?
It would be easy to say Coke Zero's big festival stuff. We've created an experience, music, a game, a bundle of great design, and a bloody impressive looking stand. A proper team effort.
But I'd also say the Garden Gourmet AR project, which took a simple brief to a very new place, and allowed us to learn something we can build on.
Can you give us an example of a difficult project you’ve had to wrestle with?
'Wrestled' means many things. For example, projects that are hard to land, or those that flip and change. My view is to stay on the journey, and don't be afraid to ask other team members to get involved if you find yourself stalling. What we do has better answers than others, but there is rarely a single right answer. It's not maths!
What do you like most about your job?
The variety, and the fact that the majority of what we scribble on a piece of paper somewhere becomes a real thing for people to experience.
And, finally, your interests outside work?
As I've got older, my interests often relate to my wife and kids, so karate, footy, basketball. But I'll never give up on being a snowboarder, and golf has remained a constant way to ruin a nice walk.
I love a bit of DIY - so much satisfying when you've done a decent job yourself, saving those valuable pennies for another passion - I'm an evergreen fan of the wine world...
