Duncan Shields

The Ad Man

My career hasn’t followed a particularly straight line. This is an honest look back at what I remember, what I learned, and the bits that have stayed with me.

2003 to 2007

First Gigs and Flash Games

I got my start at Chrysalis Radio in London, brainstorming on-air competitions and making online Flash games for Heart 106.2 and Galaxy FM and then my first proper agency gig at JWT/RMG Connect shortly after that.

A highlight of this period was conceiving (and then being responsible for creating) a pre-Facebook social network for Vodafone UK’s European Championship sponsorship. It was a big, ambitious idea that gave me an early taste of what happened when digital stopped being an add-on and became the core of the idea itself.

Lesson

Where the medium is changing, there's opportunity for interesting ideas.

2007 - 2010

Big Moves – Bigger Responsibilities

I moved to Australia in 2007 and, like many a pom before me, joined the freelance ranks. My first gig in my new home was making ads for the Kevin 07 election campaign. Not a bad intro for someone fresh off the boat.

When job security became more of a priority, I joined Y&R’s Enfatico and became their AU Creative Director at the age of 29.

It was a quick education in scale, politics, pressure and the gap between getting the title and actually knowing what the hell you were doing.

Lesson

Ambition gets you into the room. Judgment keeps you there.

2010-2015

The DDB / Telstra Years

This is still what I think of as my proper big-agency chapter.

As Creative Group Head, I led creative on Australia’s largest advertiser, Telstra, through a major brand shift and the launch of 4G whilst also working across Audi, McDonald’s and Volkswagen – plus a gazillion pitches for clients I can’t even remember anymore.

DDB was also where I devised the idea for BLURTL – audio updates for Facebook that you could call in direct from your dumbphone (that’s what poor creatives had back then). We had to get Mark Zuckerberg to approve the idea, and I remember how thrilling that was at the time. If only I’d known then what I know now, eh?

Getting to make big things with smart people felt great, but the more useful education was learning how to protect a strong idea through layers of clients, stakeholders, media, production and scale without sanding all the edges off it.

Lesson

Scale changes the job.

2015 - 2017

Transition, Animation, Consultation

Following DDB, I undertook a couple of senior creative leadership roles at McCann and VML, stepping into high-level oversight during periods of transition, pitching like crazy again and delivering integrated campaigns for major national brands.

In this time, I got an offer from a small animation studio to be their new CD. The job came with the opportunity to try my hand at directing so I said yes!

About a hundred scripts, a big-budget TV title sequence and a well-played music video later, the business was acquired by Deloitte, and that unexpectedly turned me into a consultant at one of the Big Four pretty much overnight.

It wasn’t the path I thought I was taking, but it changed how I thought about strategy, narrative and the business underneath the work.

Lesson

learning different games can teach you lots of new ways to play.

2017-1018

Return to Agency  @M&C

M&C had originally offered me a role before the Deloitte acquisition. I stayed through the deal, but once my obligations were done, they reached out again and asked if I was still interested.

I was.

So I went back to advertising proper, working across sport, sponsorship and entertainment and had an absolute blast making fun stuff for big brands again.

Lesson

You can't be sure what you'll miss until you actually miss it.

2018-2020

Smaller Shop, Larger Remit

The outgoing CD at Redengine SCC reccomended me as his successor and the opportunity intrigued me. This was the first place where I felt genuinely close to the running of an agency, rather than just the creative department.

I joined as ECD, helped win a stack of new business and got much more involved in the commercial side of agency life. It was also an education in how vulnerable even good businesses can be when the economics get tight.

Despite its modest size, Red Engine had a big-city cost base and significant exposure to the cruise-line travel sector, so when Covid arrived it hit almost twice as hard. The agency ultimately closed in 2020.

It wasn’t the ending anyone wanted, but the experience taught me an enormous amount about the realities of running a creative business. Lessons that became very useful very quickly when I decided to start one of my own. Red Engine is also where I met HUMBLE’s co-founder, Brynn.

Lesson

Good work matters, but the business underneath it has to work too.

2020 to now

HUMBLE.

Between myself and HUMBLE’s Co-founder, Brynn, we found just the right amount of creative experience, production knowledge and industry relationships to start something new.

My ambition was to build the agency I’d always wanted: ethically sound, strategically sophisticated and close to the work.

What HUMBLE has become continues to be its own education.

Lesson

The work has more meaning when the stakes are personal.