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Monthly dispatches on design thinking, brand evolution, and creative leadership:
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We’re a UK based agency working with clients across the world
Alex Waite is Strategy Lead at creative agency Shaped By, where he helps B2B brands find and express their bold. Working at the intersection of strategy and creativity, he partners with clients to uncover what makes them distinctive, and turn that into ideas that move people and business alike.
He believes brand strategy only earns its value when it works in the messy world of business, translating big thinking into decisions, actions, and creative work that sticks.Outside the studio, is family time, and you’ll find him exploring, eating, or laughing somewhere far from a screen.
Gary Survis is an Operating Partner at Insight Partners, where he leads AI Transformation across their portfolio to drive impact and revenue growth. He founded Insight’s Marketing Center of Excellence, advising the firm’s 500+ companies on branding, category creation, and scaling. A recognized voice at the intersection of AI and marketing, Gary writes on how generative AI is reshaping strategy, execution, and measurement. He spent 14 years teaching at the Wharton School on sustainability as a business strategy and has led ventures in solar and business services. He also served on the board of agtech platform CeresAI, and was previously CMO at data integrity leader Precisely. Gary currently serves on the boards of 6sense and Exactera, two leading AI-driven platforms in revenue and tax compliance.
Mette is an accomplished independent consultant, trainer, and facilitator focused on driving positive change for businesses and creative teams. Her extensive career demonstrates a clear progression from agency client leadership to strategic consultancy.
Mette spent years in major agencies, running significant accounts and leading a multi million dollar client portfolio as a Director at Publicis Sapient. She leveraged this experience to launch her own consultancy, With Mette, advising agencies on business strategy, leadership, training, and client development.
Mette’s current focus is at the intersection of creativity and technology as an AI Coach at Spark AI. She designs and delivers bespoke training for creative agencies and marketers, believing that the true difference with AI lies in empowering people to use it to propel brilliant, strategic, and boundary-pushing creative work.
Everett Katigbak is a filmmaker and creative director championing what he calls “Analog Intelligence”; the art of thinking with your hands to retain a human touch. He’s led creative teams at Facebook, Pinterest, Stripe, and Anthropic, and now runs Work By Everett, helping brands tell authentic, human-centered stories. As Brand Creative Director at Anthropic, he shaped brand voice and design; at Stripe Press, he produced their We Are As Gods documentary and a series of narrative podcasts. He co-founded Facebook’s Analog Research Laboratory and defined Pinterest’s early creative voice.
Now, through collaborations with artists, brands and via his documentary work (including the forthcoming “American Pachuco: The Legend of Luis Valdez” for PBS’s American Masters), Everett champions a future that belongs to creators who embrace beautiful imperfection, human storytelling, and mastering the fundamentals before chasing any shiny new tool.
Visit Everett’s website at : byeverett.com
Li-Anne Dias is a design leader who has shaped world-class brands and led high-impact design teams.
Currently she leads brand and enterprise growth design at Handshake, a software firm that enables schools, companies, and students come together to help students and recent grads make career moves. Her previous achievements include building Reddit’s first brand identity and design systems as the company’s first brand designer, and scaling Grammarly’s brand design team as the company grew revenue growth from $43M to over $250M.
An ambassador of embracing the art of simplicity, Tom enjoys ripping things apart to delve deeper and explore meaningful ways to create authentic and impactful visual communications.
He loves leading the talented Shaped By design team to push boundaries, build recognition and make a difference for our clients. He is passionate about collaborating with his team, partners and clients to land on creative solutions that help fulfil personal, team and business objectives.
Will Roach is a multidisciplinary designer and animator at creative agency Shaped By and a Member of the International Society of Typographic Designers. Working across both motion and design teams to help deliver bold and beautiful creative solutions to modern-day design problems.
With a love of creativity that breaks the mould and pushes boundaries beyond the norm, he believes great design always comes from intriguing, witty ideas crafted with care and attention.
Outside the studio, you’ll find him cooking up a feast for friends on the BBQ, jumping in a field at a festival or hiking with his dog. Unless it’s raining, then he’ll be at the pub.
As Client Services Director at Shaped By, Wei Kee leads the team to deliver on the promises they make, working closely with clients to kick personal, team, and business goals.
A true advocate of good design and innovative creative solutions, she works hard to ensure a strong, unified dynamic between internal/external creative, and wider teams.
Wei subscribes to an empathetic and human-centric approach to developing deep relationships with clients near and far, always ensuring that the process to achieving business success is collaborative and enjoyable.
Outside of work, she loves to cook, eat and feed.
After stints in editorial design and freelance illustration, Tom shifted his focus to branding. He works to capture a company’s culture, spirit and authenticity. His practice has taken him across Europe, collaborating with studios on event identities, art fairs, and projects spanning music and performance.
Outside the studio, Tom stays connected to the local creative community. He’s launched a magazine stocked in galleries and bookshops, curated exhibitions, spoken at universities, and written design briefs for colleges.
Si (or ‘Tandy’ as he’s better known) is a Design Director at creative agency Shaped By. His role lies within the creative team, where he collaborates with an exceptional pool of talent to deliver outstanding design that not only realises a brand’s vision but aims to capture their future aspirations.
A type nerd at heart (aren’t all designers?!), Tandy’s mission is to combine fresh design practices with unique storytelling to ultimately inspire and bring memorable design into our daily lives.
In his spare time, you’re most likely to see him running circles around Bristol’s harbourside or, to balance this out, sat in his local curry house ‘chewing the fat’ with the locals.
Scott Smith leads the Global Creative Studio at Intercom and Fin.ai, where he’s helped shape big initiatives like Intercom’s 2024 rebrand and the launch of Fin, the company’s AI agent. A business-minded creative with nearly 20 years of experience across agencies, media, and tech, he’s built brands and creative teams at TaskRabbit, Affirm, and Intercom. Scott’s philosophy is that the best creative work is inseparable from company strategy. It should be disciplined, collaborative, and designed to drive both resonance and real business impact.
Richard Shotton is the founder of Astroten, a consultancy that helps brands like Google, BrewDog and Santander apply behavioural science to marketing. He’s the author of The Choice Factory, a bestseller translated into 16 languages, and The Illusion of Choice. Richard is an honorary fellow of the IPA, an associate at Cambridge’s Møller Institute, and co-host of the Behavioural Science for Brands podcast.
Phil Lewis is a coach, consultant and keynote speaker whose work solves eight-and nine-figure business problems and transforms performance in organisations worldwide. His client list includes the BBC, Lloyds, Sony Music, Google, Nationwide and KPMG. He has also worked extensively with PE and VC-backed high-growth businesses across the UK, Europe and the US. His work has won multiple awards for business transformation, cultural innovation and consulting excellence (BCAs 2023, 2021, 2020). Phil has also been recognised as one of the UK’s leading innovation consultants by the Management Consultancies Association.
Parissa Motamedi is a Senior Motion Designer at creative agency Shaped By, coming to the role via a wide range of experience across broadcast television, social media and agency creative. Working within the motion team she helps shape animated content that feels authentic to the brand’s vision and elevates brand storytelling. Parissa’s main ambitions are to convince everyone to adopt audio driven motion workflows(she even made a video about it!), and as passionate advocate for the 12 principles of animation, she wants to combine more traditional animation thinking with innovative styles and techniques.
Nick is the founder of Shaped By and has spent the last 20+ years in working with B2B brands. He has an in-depth understanding of what makes brands work, live and breathe and knows exactly how to maximise ROI for clients. He is a passionate advocate for the use of creativity in strategic business thinking, and is well-versed in helping others tell their own story through design in a way that engages their audience.
Matt Maynard is VP of Global Brand, Advertising, and Communications at Asana, where he leads brand strategy, advertising, content, social, customer marketing, and PR. He specializes in evidence-based marketing and building systems that connect brand strategy to measurable outcomes. Matt has led brand functions at Asana, American Airlines, and McKesson, and serves on the Advisory Board for the University of Texas at Austin’s Master of Science in Marketing program.
Maria McLaughlin is an award winning Creative Director and Brand Strategist. She currently works at Abnormal, the second fastest growing cybersecurity company on the planet. Abnormal has grown 100% YoY for the past three years since Maria joined. Maria runs a team of highly inventive creative-generalists. Under her guidance Maria’s creative teams have won MarCom Creative Awards and Cannes Lions.
Kira Klaas is a brand strategy expert with deep experience leading global marketing teams and leveraging brand as a strategic growth lever. She is currently VP, Corporate Marketing at Later, and previously led brand and campaigns orgs at Notion and Brex through hyperscale. Her newsletter, On Brand (kiraklaas.substack.com), is the leading resource for startup and growth-stage brand operators and leaders seeking brand-market fit and making resource and investment decisions.
Feels. Right now, that’s Justin’s favourite word. But he loves them all. (Yes, even you ‘Unique’ :wink:) Because Justin is O-B-S-E-S-S-E-D about putting the right words together in the right voice and tone for the right times.
As Associate Creative Director at Shaped By, he leads our brand voice and human-centred messaging work. Using language and tone to emotionally connect and move people to action. The right action. Because nothing happens until somebody feels something.
Beyond his unconditional love of language, he’s a sucker for Vietnamese coffee, family holidays, Peloton climb rides and sneaker drops.
David Wall is creative director at Tines, coming to the role via experience in agency and independent studio practice. He has led and collaborated on award-winning design work for a wide range of organisations across technology, hospitality, culture, and publishing. David’s professional experience extends to education, writing, and public speaking, and he maintains an active presence in the Irish design community. He holds the position of President of the Institute of Designers in Ireland (IDI), as well as having co-founded the 100 Archive, a platform celebrating Ireland’s rich design heritage.
Dave Breckon is a seasoned creative designer and team lead, known for blending artistic vision with strategic thinking to build impactful brand experiences. With a diverse background that spans freelance gigs, creative direction and a decade spent in a boutique agency in Madrid, Dave has delivered compelling work across industries as varied as the music scene and corporate finance — seamlessly navigating both B2C and B2B landscapes. Currently based in the UK, Dave leads the brand and creative team at US fintech Carta.
Buck Choate is an award-winning brand strategist, creative, and marketing leader. He crafts strategies, stories, and ideas to captivate buyers and command categories. His obsession centers on bringing purpose to brands to make “the work” that works.
Buck is now VP Marketing at Pendo and has spent his 15+ year career working with iconic global brands like Microsoft, Intel, Fender, Walmart, Ubisoft, PepsiCo, and 7-Eleven.
As VP of Design at Radar, Audrey Na oversees Brand and Product Design for the all-in-one geolocation platform headquartered in NYC. With over 20 years of experience, she previously led creative teams at agencies serving major clients like T-Mobile and Alaska Airlines, and designed and executed a global brand refresh at AWS. At Radar, she led a strategic brand refresh and focuses on building thoughtful design teams while blurring boundaries between Brand and Product design to create meaningful customer journeys.
Alexandra Fletcher is a brand analyst with extensive experience across digital marketing, communications, and analytics in both B2C and B2B companies. With a background in journalism, she brings a storyteller’s curiosity to data. At Elastic, she helped launch and now leads the brand tracking program, integrating research and data-driven insight to surface the stories that guide brand growth.
Alex is a writer and creative director with 15 years of experience shaping global brands. He’s created two Super Bowl ads for Papaya Global, built Azimo into a $200m fintech success, and developed award-winning products for the Financial Times. He specialises in giving brands a distinctive voice that connects with audiences on a human level.
Adam Morgan is VP of Brand at Twilio and a creative leader with 30 years of experience in brand strategy and storytelling. Named one of AdWeek’s “Creative 100,” he’s the author of Sorry Spock, Emotion Drives Business, and host of the podcast Real Creative Leadership. A sought-after keynote speaker, Adam brings practical insights on creative leadership, content creation, and the value of emotion in business.
Rachel is an independent design executive and educator whose approach is informed by experiences both in-house (Airbnb, New York Times, Meta) and agency side (Godfrey Dadich, Giant Spoon, Loyalkaspar). Since founding her own small consultancy in 2020, she has collaborated with global organizations in a fractional leadership capacity, steering strategic change at the intersection of brand, culture, and technology. Named one of Creative Boom’s “20 graphic designers inspiring us the most in 2025,” Rachel has influenced many energizing projects for her clients—from launching publications from scratch to scaling brand identity systems. A queer advocate championing marginalized voices, Rachel addresses industry inequities through her mentorship commitments, speaking engagements, published writing, and active involvement in purpose-driven initiatives.
Tom Lewis is a CFO who supports growth and transformation for ambitious Professional Services businesses, including listed groups, owner-managed shops and Private Equity. During his time in adland, he assisted agencies in capturing greater value through strategic Pricing, Selling and Negotiation techniques.
Omar is responsible for building and managing the organisation’s in-house creative team, as well as designing and managing all external communications across all the three business units; Virgin Media, O2 and Virgin Media O2. Having worked across advertising, marketing, automotive, telecoms, prop-tech and education, Omar is able to approach briefs with a broad range of insight and experience, and believes good design should always communicate clearly, solve problems and have a strong/clean design aesthetic.
Nick is the founder of Shaped By and has spent the last 20+ years in working with B2B brands. He has an in-depth understanding of what makes brands work, live and breathe and knows exactly how to maximise ROI for clients.
He is a passionate advocate for the use of creativity in strategic business thinking, and is well-versed in helping others tell their own story through design in a way that engages their audience.
As the Executive Creative Director at Zendesk, I lead a talented and diverse team of designers, writers, and artists to deliver a distinct brand experience.
For over 17 years, I have defined brand experiences for companies big and small, all of which have shaped my perspective on the ingredients of a successful brand. I draw from a diverse portfolio that spans health and wellness, direct-to-consumer brands, retail, web communications, AI, and SAAS.
Global marketing leader, known for her passion in driving creative marketing approaches and shaping strong brands that fuel business impact. With a career spanning top ad agencies in London, Paris, Silicon Valley, and the Scandinavian tech spheres, she’s played pivotal roles in driving growth for B2C and B2B companies. In her current role as the VP of Brand at Sinch, a leading B2B tech powerhouse, Gwen builds global brand strategies, thought leadership, and impactful events. She is a passionate advocate for “BRAVE” brands – the ones that stand out, hold strong beliefs, drive demand and shape industries.
An ambassador of embracing the art of simplicity, Tom enjoys ripping things apart to delve deeper and explore meaningful ways to create authentic and impactful visual communications.
He loves leading the talented Shaped By design team to push boundaries, build recognition and make a difference for our clients. He is passionate about collaborating with his team, partners and clients to land on creative solutions that help fulfil personal, team and business objectives.
You’ll often hear Tom swooning over a new typeface he’s discovered, or discussing ‘Tittles’ (Google with care). In his free time he loves to disappear on his bike.
As Client Services Director at Shaped By, Wei Kee leads the team to deliver on the promises they make, working closely with clients to kick personal, team, and business goals.
A true advocate of good design and innovative creative solutions, she works hard to ensure a strong, unified dynamic between internal/external creative, and wider teams.
Wei subscribes to an empathetic and human-centric approach to developing deep relationships with clients near and far, always ensuring that the process to achieving business success is collaborative and enjoyable.
Outside of work, she loves to cook, eat and feed.
Maria McLaughlin is an award winning Creative Director and Brand Strategist. She currently works at Abnormal, the second fastest growing cybersecurity company on the planet. Abnormal has grown 100% YoY for the past three years since Maria joined.
Maria runs a team of highly inventive creative-generalists. Under her guidance Maria’s creative teams have won MarCom Creative Awards and Cannes Lions.
Make fun stuff for people to enjoy. That’s why we all got into this in the first place. And if you can do that while delivering strategic and purposeful creative that meets brand goals? Now you’re on to something.
That’s what Ben Long has been aiming at for the last six years at Rubrik, leading the global brand team as Creative Director. Ben loves nothing more than when a team comes together to pull off something that’s a little risky and a lot unexpected.
Ben lives in the Bay Area with his wife, two kids, and a giant dog that’s way too big for his house
As the Head of Brand Creative at Airtable, Alan leads the strategy and execution of engaging brand experiences that showcase the power and versatility of the product. He works with a talented, multi-disciplinary team of designers, writers, producers, filmmakers and marketers to deliver high-quality and high-performance creative solutions that align with the business vision and goals. Alan thrives on collaborating with cross-functional partners and stakeholders to uncover new opportunities and solve complex challenges.
Eduardo is a multidisciplinary designer with over 20 years of experience in Brand Development, Product Design, and Creative & Art Direction. As a principal designer for the creative team at HubSpot, he crafts impactful, goal-driven experiences through strategic approaches that prioritise scalability, consistency, and accessibility. With a focus on innovation, Eduardo integrates AI into his daily workflow, staying attuned to evolving design trends to deliver cutting-edge solutions.
Melissa is an award-winning marketing executive and the Chief Creative Officer at ClickUp, focused on making the world more productive through best-in-class SaaS marketing.
Previously Melissa was the CRO/Executive Vice President at Cheddar, a live video media company at the intersection of business news and culture. For her brand work, she was named to Forbes’ 30 Under 30, Business Insider’s 30 Most Creative People Under 30 and as one of Digiday’s “Changemakers.”
Prior to Cheddar, she led BuzzFeed’s Global Creative Team. Joining the staff in 2010, Rosenthal was a key contributor to the creation and early success of BuzzFeed’s branded content native advertising model.
Melissa Czapiga is the Chief Marketing Officer at Red Canary. Previously, she was a VP of Corporate Marketing at Salesforce, joining through the acquisition of MuleSoft. At MuleSoft, she played a key role in scaling the business from pre-IPO to its successful acquisition by Salesforce.
