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1. What is Ogilvy's greatest asset or edge in helping clients?

Our greatest asset is our creativity and the strategic anchor to this creativity. We go beyond crazy ideas and make the wild, unusual and unexpected make sense strategically. The Heart Truth and the Red Dress project is a great example of a partnership-based program that has taken some pretty unorthodox ideas and made them real, and made them have impact for the client. The partnership we forged between the federal government and the fashion industry was groundbreaking and unique, yes, but it was also effective in making women aware of the #1 risk to their health. We know that partnerships, however unexpected, that are rooted in common purpose have the power to transform ideas into movements. We have a history of bringing together very different organizations in order to achieve a common objective. That's what Ogilvy is best at: coming up with unexpected ideas, and unexpected alliances, that have a measurable impact for our clients.

2. What is your process for developing ideas for your clients?

Our methodology is rooted in research and coupled with years of experience across all sectors, with an emphasis on health communications and social marketing. With any partnership, our principles are the foundation for our plan: define objectives, know your audience and keep the lines of communication open. The process varies because we create customized programs for each project, depending on the client's goal.

Personally, I think the most successful processes I've worked in are ones that navigate a balance between order and chaos. We're always driven by the client's end goal, but sometimes when we step out of looking at the goal in discrete and linear terms, we end up thinking in very creative and unusual ways about how we can generate ideas. Much of the partnership work that we've done at Ogilvy demonstrates that ingenuity. We go beyond creation of expected PR tactics to think about unusual and off-the-wall ways to take the client's message to the people who need to, or who the client wants to, have hear it.

3. What is your proudest Ogilvy moment? What makes you proud about saying that you work for Ogilvy?

Specifically, I think the work Ogilvy has done on The Heart Truth and Red Dress project is a career-defining project for those of us who work on the program. It's the quintessential social marketing campaign that is really the perfect storm in PR in terms of pulling from social marketing, branding, and public/private partnership principles to create a landmark campaign and to launch a national movement around a critical health issue.

Speaking more generally, what makes me most proud to work for Ogilvy is the passion and the commitment of the people. The business imperative is passion for the clients' success, but I think the people at Ogilvy go beyond that and bring their personal passion to what they do, which is why we have the kind of agenda-changing programs that we have. There are very few places in the world where you can spend your day working on a number of programs that are agenda-changing and far-reaching. The ability to work on several at a time, let alone any, is a great privilege.