The creative industry is evolving, with mounting evidence highlighting the commercial and cultural importance of inclusive representation.

For nearly 30 years, AKQA has championed the importance of brand experiences for industry giants, including Nike, Porsche, and Richmond Group.

Chris Marsh, Experience Design Director at AKQA Berlin, highlights the impressive impact of unifying teams around a single core thought. A thought that permeates throughout everything a brand should look, say, do, and feel.

How to Fit a Square Peg into a Round Hole

The strategic claim

In today’s fast-paced marketing landscape, in-house agencies are no longer a “nice to have” but a strategic imperative for every business undertaking promotion at scale. 

The resulting challenge

Building one from the ground up within the complex structures of a large organisation is no small feat. 

What we did

In a landscape where AI, automation, and hybrid working is changing how creative teams operate, what does exceptional creative leadership look like? 

This panel discussion will:

• Explore the evolving role of creative leaders
• Discuss how to balance technical innovation with human creativity
• Manage multi-generational teams, and
• How to develop the next wave of creative leaders

Panellists will share practical insights on building and sustaining high-performing creative teams while maintaining operational excellence. 

Every Creative Operations leader faces the same challenge: how to build processes that enable rather than inhibit creativity. 

This panel discussion brings together diverse perspectives from across the creative industry to explore the sweet spot between chaos and control. 

Explore how different organisations have successfully created frameworks that provide structure while preserving creative freedom and discuss practical approaches to building flexible processes that scale. 

In an era where emerging technologies are reshaping the creative landscape, the age-old tension between art and science takes on new urgency. 

This provocative panel discussion explores how leaders are navigating the delicate balance between leveraging technological capabilities and preserving the human essence of creativity. As data-driven decision-making and AI-powered tools become increasingly central to Creative Operations, we'll examine both the transformative opportunities and potential pitfalls that lie ahead.

Sue Mountford speaks to Gemma Mason of Superdrug, examining how brands who empower their people and practice empathetic change management will see the most impactful transformations in their creative operations.

Creative teams are often forced to rely on intuition rather than data insights, resulting in unpredictable ad performance and wasted budgets. In this session, Oliver Stewart from Celtra will explore how integrating actionable performance insights into creative workflows can revolutionise the creative process and drive meaningful impact.

Guido Derkx chats to Dennis Ritter of Dr Oetker about the rise of asset intelligence, and the need to create the perfect story for every interaction in order to cut through a crowded marketplace and boost ROI.

Time to have some lunch and visit the exhibition. See you back at 14:15 for the afternoon sessions!