Be Equal

The most exciting days in advertising aren’t the days you are asked to create advertising, it’s the days you’re asked to create real change. The day IBM asked my team at Ogilvy to help create a more equal workplace for women was a great f***ing day.

Working closely with IBM CMO Michelle Peluso, I co-lead the creation of Be Equal—a messaging and action platform with the goal of achieving equal representation of women in business leadership. Instead of putting the onus only on women to make a change, this initiative is a call to action for both men and women to do whatever is in their power to promote 50/50 representation in leadership roles.

We not only created a design system, a messaging platform, an action plan, a social campaign, a conference track, and activations, we also helped create systemic change at one of the largest professional organizations in the world.

THINK 2019

Be Equal’s public launch was on the main stage at IBM’s largest annual conference, in front of 30,000 business leaders from around the world. We created a social campaign and experiential activations like a live billboard and Be Equal lounge. We also helped create a conference track dedicated to the cause that’s now now used at business and tech conferences around the world.

US Open 2019

To celebrate the one of the first Grand Slams to offer equal pay to both men and women, we created jumbotron and OOH ads for the 2019 US Open.

Design System

Starting with the bee in Paul Rand’s famous IBM rebus logo, we developed a design system that IBM now uses to identify all their diversity and inclusion initiatives.

ACD/CW: Anne West | ACD/AD: Gina Whitt

CW: Karen Miranda | AD: Aneta Kelkotko

ECD: Dustin Duke | Agency: Ogilvy