You’ve led brands both from the inside and as an external partner. What’s one hard truth about brand transformation that only becomes clear when you’ve lived on both sides of that divide?
One absolute truth is that brand transformation, more often than not, has aspects that go beyond strategy – and those include legacy and emotion. When you are on the inside, you realise that brands are held together by people, history and decisions made years ago under very different circumstances. I have seen organisations spend months debating a brand shift that looked obvious from the outside, because internally it represented letting go of past success.
Externally, we often underestimate how risky change feels when quarterly numbers and organisational muscle memory are in play. Internally, I learned that even the best transformation programmes fail if leadership is not aligned beyond the presentation stage. This can weaken the organisation’s resolve to transform, resulting in slow erosion, not dramatic failure.
The insight that stayed with me is that:
“Transformation does not happen when a new idea arrives. It happens with intent, alignment and a deep understanding of the brand currency that one may need to leave behind, to signal a new era in business.”
You often frame brand identity as a business asset rather than a creative output. How should leadership teams rethink the role of design when growth, not aesthetics, becomes the primary measure of success?
Design has never been about aesthetic, but rather the creation of a deliberate and thought
through system of assets for the long term. Brand identity today is understood as a logo – however, that is just a starting point. The role of design is to truly create a multi sensorial system of assets that can be codified to flex across channels and cultures and context – systems that are elastic, yet never lose their core. These assets continue to drive recognition and relevance over time, embedding the brand meaningfully across touchpoints.
The other important consideration is that when growth is the ultimate measure, design has to move out of the brand department and into the operating system of the business. Strong design is not about visual novelty, it is about reducing friction. In organisations I have worked with, the most effective design systems were the ones that helped teams move faster, make fewer decisions repeatedly, and show up consistently across touchpoints.
There is a McKinsey study that shows companies with strong design outperform peers by up to 32% in revenue growth. That number resonates because I have seen it play out in practice. When design is treated as infrastructure, teams spend less time debating aesthetics and more time delivering value. Product launches accelerate. Customer trust builds through consistency. Leadership teams often underestimate how much poor design costs them. Inconsistent
interfaces, unclear messaging, and fragmented brand experiences quietly slow growth. When leaders start asking whether design is enabling scale, alignment, and speed, rather than whether it is attractive, the conversation changes. Design stops being a cost and starts behaving like a growth multiplier.
As AI becomes embedded in creative and strategic workflows, where do you believe human judgement matters more than ever and why is that distinction becoming critical for brand leaders?
Human judgement matters most at the point of consequence. AI is incredibly powerful at generating options, patterns and efficiencies. What it cannot do is weigh long-term trust against short-term gain. I have seen early AI-led creative tests deliver high engagement numbers but also raise uncomfortable questions about tone, bias and intent that no dashboard could answer.
A recent industry survey showed that over 70% of marketing leaders are experimenting with AI, but fewer than 30% feel confident about its governance. That gap is where human judgement becomes critical. Deciding what a brand should automate and what it should protect requires context, empathy and values.
“For brand leaders, the risk is not using AI incorrectly. It is using it uncritically.”
The distinction between what can be generated and what should be expressed will define credible brands. Judgement is required to say no to ideas that technically work but feel misaligned. As AI accelerates output, restraint, clarity and responsibility will increasingly become leadership skills, not creative ones.
India presents immense scale but also sharp cultural complexity. From your experience,
What is the most common mistake brands make when trying to build relevance across such diverse consumer realities?
The most common mistake is assuming scale comes from uniformity. India does not reward one-size-fits-all thinking. Brands often identify one powerful insight and try to stretch it nationally, only to discover that what feels relevant in one region feels distant or even inappropriate in another.
Relevance in India is built through listening, not broadcasting. Brands that succeed here design flexible frameworks rather than rigid ideas. They allow local interpretation while protecting the core. The mistake is chasing efficiency over empathy. Visibility can be bought.
“True belief must be earned through a nuanced understanding of context and consumer.”
The shift to system-based brand thinking allows brands to scale and connect across these variables in a manner that is authentic and emotionally engaging.
Building high-performance creative teams is a recurring theme in your leadership approach. What behaviors or mindsets tend to separate teams that consistently deliver impact from those that only deliver output?
The clearest difference I have observed is ownership. Teams that deliver impact take responsibility for the opportunity or challenge at hand, not just the brief. They ask why something matters, who it affects, and what successful outcomes actually look like beyond delivery. Output-focused teams tend to optimise for approval and timelines.
In one organisation, we noticed that high-performing teams spent nearly 30% more time upfront clarifying context and constraints. That time was repaid many times over in sharper thinking and fewer iterations. These teams were also more comfortable saying they did not know, which created space for better ideas.
Psychological safety plays a huge role too. When teams feel safe to disagree, challenge assumptions, and admit uncertainty, the quality of work improves. Impact-driven teams are also deeply curious about the client’s business and this shows up in the solutions we shape for them.
In 2026, what will distinguish brands that truly earn belief from those that simply look relevant?
Belief will be earned through consistency over time, especially when conditions are difficult. Many brands can look relevant when growth is strong and sentiment is positive. Far fewer remain coherent when facing scrutiny, slowdown or social pressure.
Data shows that trust in brands is declining globally, with Edelman reporting that over 60% of
consumers now buy based on belief-driven factors. In that environment, brands that overpromise or chase every trend will struggle. Those that earn belief will make fewer claims and back them consistently through action.
“I believe the brands that stand out in 2026 will be the ones that choose restraint over noise.”
They will show up with clarity, not constant reinvention. Their leadership decisions, internal culture, and customer experience will align in visible ways. Relevance can be engineered. Belief is built slowly, through behavior.
