Chapter 04.2 · The Agency Decade
Jack in the Box — the place I grew into, twice.
The only company I joined, left, and chose to return to at a more senior level. That return says more about how I think than any single campaign.
I wanted to cross the line from making the work to owning the business behind it — client relationships, new-business pitches, the commercial engine. Jack in the Box gave me that as Business Manager, on brands built for cross-market work with global teams.
How good work becomes won business: how to read a client’s real problem, how to pitch, how to turn a relationship into growth. This is where marketing started looking like commerce to me, not just craft.
Here’s the part people expect me to skip: I left, and then I returned as Associate Business Director. If my instinct were simply ‘always forward, always new,’ I’d never have gone back. I did, because the mandate was bigger than the label — unfinished growth and a more senior seat to drive it from. Knowing when to re-enter is its own kind of judgement.
A senior, business-owning role made the next step obvious: not just owning relationships, but leading the teams and the room. That was Isobar.
The work & the rooms: Sony Pictures Network · Knorr · Surf Excel · Tata Motors. Cross-market campaigns with global brand teams; new-business pitches.