I’m fascinated by every part of my job. From earning client trust, solving complex problems, building and executing strategy, to believing in universal beauty and fighting fears. Simplifying when things get complicated and romanticizing when things get dull. Even making mistakes and sometimes feeling like an imposter.
I’ve been involved on so many different types of creative projects over the past 15 years. I certainly can’t take all the credit, as it’s always been about teamwork. I’m grateful for all the brilliant minds I’ve met and friendships made.
Here are a few carefully selected samples of work out of the hundreds and hundreds of projects I’ve done in my career. I hope these help you understand what kind of work we can do together, and how I approach business and creative work.
You can hire me as a consultant working with your leadership team, a creative reporting to your creative director or a creative director leading your creative team.
Turning Conan O’Brien into a Public Relations King in Finland
Client: Finland’s biggest television network, MTV Media
Problem: Finns weren’t familiar with Conan O’Brien’s talk show
When MTV Media began airing Late Night with Conan O’Brien in Finland, Conan was still relatively unknown to Finns. Our ambition was to boost his TV ratings. We invited him to visit Finland, but our invitations were politely declined. So, we tried an alternative strategy and began bombarding Conan with postcards from Finland to convince him and his team of the show’s extraordinary popularity there. We created an old school algorithm: Conan read some of the postcards from Finland on his show, and more and more of his Finnish fans started sending him post cards.
As a result, Conan and his crew eventually did come over to freezing Finland. He met The President of Finland, made fun of her, was treated like a royalty, and took over the Finnish press. His crew produced two special episodes from Finland. Ratings skyrocketed.
Tripling Media Coverage of a Global Launch for the World’s Biggest Advertiser
Client: Samsung
Problem: How to strengthen Samsung’s position as a design powerhouse and maximize global media coverage for its latest device?
The team at Jack Morton Worldwide had overseen Samsung’s global launch events for several years, so we were no stranger to juggling the corporate politics and following their strict brand guidelines. This time we knew that the new product would be more powerful and beautiful than anything else out there.
One of the highlights was helping JK Shin, Samsung’s head of their smartphone business, with his opening speech. “I may not be the best public speaker, because my first language is engineering” Shin stated on stage and smiled.
We nailed it.
Result: The launch generated three times more instant media attention than the previous launch. That’s pretty good when you work with the biggest advertiser in the world.
Creating the Best Website of the Web
Client: Finland’s Speaker of The Year 2019 Honorary Award Winner, Timo Kiuru
Problem: How to make a virtual speech more engaging and boost sales?
The pandemic had just hit the world. We were scared and stressed out. Pretty much all event agencies had begun producing “virtual events” that were reminiscent of TV broadcasting from the eighties. I called up the homies from Dinahmoe and Veli. We had a lot of passion but not a lof of money. We created an interactive virtual speech that was visually inspired by the speaker’s latest book, and worked seamlessly.
The call to action was made crystal clear: Book Timo.
Result:BookTimo.com was selected as the best website in the world by The FWA. That’s pretty good considering there are approximately 1.7 billion websites on the Internet. BookTimo.com generated ROI of + 300%
Getting Paid for Rejection in Dongdaemun
Client: PyeongChang 2018 Winter Olympics
Problem: How to get Koreans excited for the PyeongChang 2018 Olympics in South Korea by launching the PyeongChang 2018 Olympic Mascot, Soohorang?
We formed a consortium with Jack Morton Worldwide, Weber Shandwick and Rainbow to pitch for all of the PyeongChang 2018 Olympics experiential marketing campaigns in South Korea. Our goal was to create buzz and excitement for the Olympics all over the fast-paced city of Seoul two years before commencement of the PyeongChang Games.
Our ambition was to have adults re-live an experience from their childhood together with their children. We wanted to connect the past and the future, and therefore chose Zaha Hadid’s futuristic Design Plaza as the venue in Dongdaemun – a neighborhood known for its traditional Korean markets. We brought back all the mascots from previous Olympic Games in 3D and created a physical timeline between the past and the future as we revealed Soohorang, the PyeongChang 2018 Olympic Mascot.
It was certainly a powerful cuteness overload since Seoulites were given the chance to take photos with Soohorang and all the previous Olympic mascots. The installation was based on deep cultural insights.
Solution: The Olympic Committee ultimately decided that our consortium was not large enough to qualify as a service provider. Rejection is a big part of creative work. The feedback was clear and we moved on to the next project.
Partying on a Pirate Ship on the Hudson River in New York
Problem: Rovio had just made quite possibly the most successful mobile game ever, Angry Birds. They now needed to turn eyes to their brand-new pirate-themed game, Plunder Pirates.
Client: Rovio Stars
Plunder Pirates was Rovio’s follow-up release to Angry Birds, which had taken over the world by storm. The team at Rovio asked for a launch that would not go unnoticed during Comic-Con in New York. We sailed an 1800th century pirate ship replica from Maryland to New York, and invited industry influencers to join the crew as we hosted a PR party on the Hudson River. Party like a pirate!
Result: During the event, my colleague Antti Kihlström and I decided to have a break. We headed to the nearest Dunkin’ Donuts for coffee. We were three or four blocks from the pier but we could still hear the bass bumping. I looked Antti in the eye and said to him: “The PR agency just told me this is the biggest launch in New York this year.”
We laughed, hugged and sipped our coffee. The coffee was terrible but we felt great! We did it!
Sometimes an idea seems ridiculous, but ridiculous often works the best.
Redefining Leadership in The Post-Industrial Era
Problem: How to convince companies to stop treating their people as human resources, and turn potential into a superpower?
Client: Laine Publishing
Ideas can haunt you. They won’t let you go. It happened to me with this book.
Several years ago, I had the idea of writing a book about commercial creativity since its impact was becoming more prominent and inevitable.
A couple of years ago, I was working on a speech and wrote the line: “If we want to learn to lead creativity better, we should listen more to people who have real experience in leading creative teams.”
Once I saw what I had written down, I understood the impact of the words. I knew it would be an incredible amount of work, so I tried to avoid it, but the thought kept haunting me.
Deep down, I knew: I need to write a book about this.
I spoke to dozens of the world’s leading creative executives. The question that resonated the most during the interviews was this: How do you spot when a person is special?
As we live in a time and age with such immense pressure to be perfect, leadership should be about seeing something special in people, and recruitment about embracing people’s strengths.
The reason I became a creative director is probably because I love creativity, I’ve done many different types of creative work, and I love working with creative people. I’ve produced TV shows, directed commercials, helped design visual identities, participated in running a Presidential campaign, directed photoshoots, led film crews across continents, dubbed commercials, run meetings with Hollywood producers, orchestrated fashion shows, made the most downloaded app on the App store, influenced influencers, and redesigned business models. I didn’t always know exactly what I was doing but I still wanted to try and do my best. Creativity is the only common denominator. I might be an idealist, but I sincerely believe that I’ve yet to do the best work of my career.
I’ve also made mistakes, missed flights, obsessed over the work, bruised egos, spoken the truth without sugarcoating it, ignored warnings, fired people, and been wrong. But my intention has always been to move the needle and genuinely help others. My goal is to transform the unthinkable into reality. If you’ve read this far, please reach out and let’s discuss how I might be able to help you. My way of working is always results-driven and action-oriented. Creativity and strategy cannot be separated if you want your business to succeed.
