Ashley Johnson on Breaking Into Pentagram, Owning Your Voice and Leading with Bravery

0:06Katy:What happens when a journalist swaps breaking news for brand storytelling? Well, today I'm joined by Ashley Johnson, head of brand narrative at Pentagram in London. We talk about squiggly careers, the grits of journalism and how copy and design work best when they speak the same idea in two languages. Ashley shares why safety makes bravery possible what an intersectional feminist studio can look like and how to keep things simple without dumbing them down we get honest about confidence, persuasion and that tricky dance between authenticity and the game yeah, that old chestnut of course there are laughs, there are tender bits and there are plenty of good lines you'll want to steal

0:59Katy:This season of the Creative Boom podcast is proudly sponsored by James Cropper, the last mill standing in Britain for premium coloured paper. Its new colour source range puts designers first, giving you direct access to 50 stunning shades in a range of weights and textures straight from the mill. Incredible colour, crafted in the Lake District and delivered straight to your door. discover the paper that brings your ideas to life via paperandpackaging.jamescropper.com

1:35Katy:it's so lovely to be chatting with you at long last I know this has been a long time coming and I always love meeting a fellow journalist because you've been through the same pain and suffering as I have well probably for a lot less time I was a real wuss about it and I didn't spend long in the industry. But yes, I did imagine my life as one and went to undergrad for journalism school. Why did you leave journalism? Because we all have our reasons. Yeah, I mean, first of all, I think I started journalism because my parents wouldn't let me be an actor. So I want, there was a kind of performative streak and I knew I wanted to sort of write or communicate, but I didn't know how to do that and get a job out of it.

2:17Who knew that journalism was maybe not the best industry to move into. But I became a TV reporter in rural Canada and I was 21. This was just kind of the dawn of social media. So really early days for Twitter and that sort of thing. And to be a woman on the internet in any year since its founding has been hell. But I found that really difficult. And, you know, I was young, nervous, interviewing people on the street. I would put out reports at that time. Canada was, the military was in Afghanistan. And so I was doing like these pieces about soldiers coming home. And instead of any kind of sort of positive reinforcement about the work I was doing, you'd get to work the next day and there would be voicemails or things posted online saying, Ashley Johnson looked fat.

3:06Ashley Johnson, her haircut is horrible. And I just couldn't take it. So I thought I can't spend a career like this. So I left.

3:17Katy:Yeah, I've just started this, you know, YouTube channel push and I'm looking at myself on camera on the on the reruns and I am ashamed to say it. I am being very vain and I'm looking at my face and I didn't realise I had jowls or crow's feet up until this point. I thought I'm doing all right for 47. I mean, isn't it a terrible thing that we have to think about these things as women? I mean, do men ever stop and think they just sort of have the luxury of being told that they age like fine wine, like the lovely late Robert Redford? Oh, I mean, yeah. I mean, he was a babe. But I think I say this to everyone.

3:56I think it's a really political and feminist act just to, like, give yourself grace and be. I heard someone on the Internet one time say you're thinking too much about yourself. And I really, I appreciated that perspective because it's true, our job, our industry, so much of what makes people successful now is about projecting a version of themselves out into the world and, you know, preparing for critique. but actually it's about the work that you and I do it shouldn't be about what we look like and if I just try and shift that lens a little bit away from my own crow's feet and towels and instead to the other stuff that actually is more important like when was the last time you gave blood I think that like that is how I try and think about my body these days I I love that and

4:44Katy:I I read something similar it was it was um somebody had said you know nobody cares about you. Nobody gives a fuck about you. Nobody cares. They're all in their own little worlds. And it's true. I'm in my little world. And so when I watch people on YouTube, women or men, I don't look at them and think, oh, wow, they're gels. Oh, I just don't think, I think this is a character. They're interesting. They're fun. They're having the time of their life. That's the kind of energy I hope to bring. But I get that totally with the journalism aspect. I left because it was quite seedy at times, the stories, the way you would have to go about trying to get a good, you know, angle, a good break.

5:23Katy:It was, it was quite, it wasn't, it didn't feel very me. So I ended up going into PR, but in your case, did you, did you follow a similar path? Yeah. I mean, how I wound up here is kind of, I think the term is squiggly career. So I left journalism and I think I was a very, I mean, I was young and I was a pretty naive Canadian, maybe still am. And I thought, OK, I want to work in kind of international development, the charity sector. I'll be able to apply all these skills in comms and marketing, but I'll do it sort of for purpose. And so I came to the UK to do my master's degree. And I was working in kind of nonprofit philanthropy, international development.

6:06And I actually hired Pentagram to do a job for me. Dominic Lipa, one of the amazing partners here. and Naresh Ramchandani, who was my boss for many years. And that's the sort of to give it away. After the end of that project, Naresh asked if I had ever considered working in this industry. And to be honest, I hadn't. I grew up with parents who, you know, they expected you to move into a job that it was teacher, doctor, lawyer, the kind of things that you get in little kids books, right, about what kind of job you'll have in the future. And I hadn't ever really considered it. I said no at first, not because I didn't want to, but because I didn't think I could succeed.

6:44And then six months later, I was still kind of regretting that answer. And he asked me again. And I said yes. And so that was 11 years ago. And I started out as a writer on his team. Four years ago, he left and I lead the team now.

6:57Katy:That's incredible. And you know, I've been into Pentagram a couple of times. I was there on Wednesday and it really feels like there's a family vibe, if that's, would you say that was true? Yeah, I mean, what is incredible about Pentagram is that its independence and that sort of fierce independence over many decades now, and lots of generations of partners, has allowed it to have this kind of radical position on creativity, on just being an employer. And yes, I think some of that family dynamic that you feel is because of that kind of equity that is insisted upon by the model itself. And you are there doing brand narrative.

7:43Katy:And I think all the writers out there will appreciate this next question. The copy, the copywriting is as important as design, if not more important. Whisper that in these words. Yeah, I mean, I find it so inextricable. Like the best ideas, the best work that we put out into the world is sort of one powerful thought expressed in two languages, design and copy. Copy has different jobs to do depending on the client. Sometimes it's about adding mystery. Sometimes it's about removing mystery, right? It really does. It does depend on the client and the brief and the kind of communication challenge.

8:27But I'm really grateful that I get to work with so many of the partners here and they recognize that narrative. And the reason it's called narrative rather than copy is because it's sometimes about framing and storytelling kind of from a meta kind of strategic level. And sometimes it is that kind of executional application that you would see out in the world. But both do matter. A lot of my favorite work that I've done is work that people won't ever read in its entirety because it's internal. It's the story that our clients tell themselves first before they tell the world. I often say it's sort of like the flirting stage of our job where it's like you just have to tell them all the best bits of themselves and the bits that they kind of and sometimes that's you know being humble about things or being really like clear-eyed about stuff but that piece of it is one of my favorite parts of the job because it sets them up for success.

9:19Katy:Oh I see so that's part of the creative process where you sit down with the client and you you as part of the brand work you create a story for them that then sort of everything else follows. Yeah, exactly. It's quite upstream. But, you know, the way that our industry often talks about, you know, what the positioning of the organization, da-da-da-da-da, it's not really about positioning, it's about the position you have on the world, your industry, the future, what your hope is, how you treat people if you're an employer, all of that stuff. you kind of just need to have locked down. It's like the principles that you're living by.

10:01And once you do that, then it gets translated in many different kinds of ways out into the surface areas of your brand and out in the world and then some internal stuff too. But that kind of one powerful document, that kind of source code for who we are, what we believe, what we stand for, what we're here to do, that is my kind of favorite piece. It's basically like writing a speech.

10:20Katy:Yeah, I love that. And also being a journalist, you will know, you know, from your foundation, of course, you will know that communication doesn't have to be highbrow or complicated. The best communication, which is often the most difficult, you know, forget all the kind of fancy language and writing, the hardest form of communication is keeping things simple, I think. You are so right. Actually, a lot of my memories in this job are trauma memories. They're sort of the moments where I felt like my stomach hit my throat. And on one of my first days, remember, I had never done this work before and I didn't know what I was doing.

10:58My boss asked me to write something for a client who would come in. And it was, you know, it was sort of like tagline exploration. And I proudly presented my first draft. And he was like, Ashley, this is too clever, like capital C clever. You're trying too hard. And it's true. No, I mean, a lot of great copy, especially when it's working with such brilliant design here at Pentagram is about getting out of the way about being as simple as possible. There's like this little bit of magic that happens between the intent and the audience and like building that bridge between it. You know, you're trying to keep a distance as short as possible and as powerful, you know, an impact and landing as possible.

11:38And so, yeah, that I think about that a lot. And I say it a lot, the sort of capital C copywriting is sometimes like a bit of an eye roll.

11:45Katy:Yeah. And did you find the sort of switch from journalism to this kind of way of writing quite difficult? Because if you would have done broadcasts like me, then you know that one word is three seconds. Yes. Yeah. And everything had to be short and punchy. So it's like trying to develop your writing style after having been in that headspace for so long. Yeah, it's super true. I mean, I think that's where maybe some like ADHD coping skills come in because it's so much about like reflecting who you see and me in the world. And so I have, I've become very practiced at mimicking what, you know, the kind of the, the communication style that's expected in the moment, but that has over time, I think translated into, or like metastasized into what I think my professional expertise is.

12:34Katy:Yeah. I think it's, it's, we all suffer from it, don't we? And there's nothing more unnerving than switching from one kind of discipline to another. And a lot of us journalists have had to do it because of the changing industry. And, you know, the pay is terrible. I'm not sure what it's like in Canada, but it was awful here in the UK. And you kind of think, gosh, well, I'm a journalist. I have transferable skills, but this is a whole new ballgame. Yeah. But it's yes and no. I mean, And I really appreciate that because it's hard to get your foot in the door when, you know, AI bots are looking at resumes and they don't see the types of things that you might expect.

13:15But there are always places for journalists on our team for many reasons, not just because that's my own background. And I think journalists are brilliant communicators and also really good listeners. But because this job, at least to me, and the difference between marketing and brand, if I'm allowed to sort of make that distinction, is truth. And journalists know how to find the truth of the thing, right? You listen, you look for those patterns, you shape that story, but ultimately it's about that kind of authenticity. And that's what we do in brand narrative, or that's how I think it's supposed to work.

13:47Katy:Now we're taught as journalists to, it's not about us at all. You know, and it does, you're right, it makes us great listeners. How do you stay authentic to yourself? How do you remember that you actually are, you know, of value and you have something to give? Because I found that I lost myself quite a lot over the last 20 years and I'm sort of going through a rediscovery phase. And it's true. You can get so lost in that role that sometimes you forget that actually you've got a voice as well. Or do you not have that problem? I definitely have that problem. I do think it has probably something to do with a white supremacist capitalist heteronormative patriarchy that we exist in.

14:30Straight in there.

14:32Katy:Hardcore. Yeah. I mean, actually, I will answer your question, but we've just moved studios. So we were in Notting Hill for many years in London, and now the Pentagram Studio is proudly in Islington. And so I'm not that nostalgic a person, but I kept a few of my, it turns out, I think I'm maybe just messy. I had kept a few of my very early notebooks from when I first started at Pentagram. And I am looking at basically the anxiety on display in these pages. But, you know, I was writing about like little quotes from Lennon's April thesis and Kierkegaard's theories and different heuristics and also like bell hooks.

15:14I think I was like trying to figure out how to apply like philosophy and like some of my principles and find you know sort of find a way to embed it into this work but to answer your question I think when you are client facing so much of your self-worth at least in my case um is like is a bit transactional or dependent and to break that has just been about time. Maybe some people have it from the beginning and honestly, great, more power to you. But I've had to learn over time that my worth and who I am as a person has actually very little to do with the job that I do, but a lot more to do with how I do it, which is why we try in our own little way, just behind me, to run a sort of intersectional feminist approach to leadership within our team, which is, you know, it's non-hierarchical.

16:16It's thinking about wellness and well-being as sort of leadership values. It's intersectional by sort of insistence. And it's about recognizing that we're sort of people in the world and actors in the world. And that what kind of writer would I be if the most beautiful thing I made was only on the page, right? It's about how we treat each other. So I have, it's taken me a long time to feel comfortable enough to say that stuff and to really focus on that. But that is what I believe.

16:45Katy:Have you got, you were looking at the table. Have you got some of your old notebooks there? Yes, they're very embarrassing. Oh, read us a passage, read us something, if you will. I mean, this one literally says men are a national problem. I didn't write that myself. It's a piece I was reading about patriarchy, you know, has no gender and masculinity is not exclusively owned by cis men. Anyway, I was learning about intersectional feminist practice, and I have since done a few courses on how to apply that to leadership. But I've also got like, you know, here's my, here's how, what a squinting modifier is, because I need to know these things.

17:24I mean, now AI does most of that for people, I'm sure. But back in the day, I had to understand the difference between a squinting misplaced and dangling modifier. So I had a little sheet of paper that explained it all to me.

17:34Katy:I love that back in the day is like 11 years ago. I know. I know. But so actually we're living in such crazy times, aren't we? That actually it does, even just five years ago feels like a massive change away. It's just been an insane time. You're so right. And I mean, that time for me has also coincided with becoming a parent. And so sometimes I'm like, what, you know, what is the source of this change? Is this unique to industry and our work or is this also related to a sort of the great sort of unbuilding and rebuilding that takes place when you birth a child or have a kid? Yeah, I think that's probably a very good marker of the passage of time, isn't it?

18:19Katy:This is why I'm just a big child because I have no children and I have no idea what year it is. but to go back to to how we sort of present ourselves as women in the industry and not to say that the this is anything related to pentagram just the wider industry in general there is a game that we have to play isn't there and it's frustrating you know all the kind of hushed and behind the scenes conversations you have with your you know female friends who work in design and creativity and you realize that um yeah there's a lot of there's a lot of problems and a lot of problematic people yeah absolutely and I I really recognize my like lived experience as a straight passing cis white woman and even you know that even then to present work to to people and to not be made eye contact with even though it's it's my work I'm the one saying it out loud but all questions and sort of like deference is paid to other male members in the room.

19:27That is really, it can really wear on you. I have said this a lot over the last few years to myself and to people that I love and get inspired from and support by in the industry. but one of the things I have tried to work on is persuasion because it's just how you show up at the table I am you know we talked about it earlier like fairly young looking despite being an elder

19:56Katy:a geriatric millennial I think you look great you look great but I think people you know they the people in positions of power still tend to look and come from a certain background and look a certain way. And because of that, we are expected to persuade them in their style. And that is harder for me. So to show up authentically as possible and still get the work over the line, still get them to respect me, buy into them, that has gotten easier as I've gotten older. And also I'm so grateful for the partners and people I work with here that they have elevated, you know, a senior creative woman in our company.

20:40And I never feel anything other than that kind of equity amongst the people that I work here with. But, you know, we still are in the world. And so, yeah, that does come up. But I have to say, like, I changed industries a lot before arriving at this one. And, like, it's not, it's the same everywhere. And to be honest with you the level of like actual harassment and real like vile shit sorry that um I I experienced in other jobs that today if it happened I would be like screaming from rooftops but back then when it happened I just felt ashamed and left the job that happened so many times and I've been here for as long as I have because I feel safe and I'm so grateful for that safety because when you feel safe then you can feel brave and like our work sorry I'm gonna cry um making me emotional our work requires bravery so I'm really grateful for that safety because it's the only thing that allows me to be the creative person I know I can be wonderful um yeah it's emotional stuff um

21:52Katy:I um wonder how many women have left their careers because of the the shit they've had to put up with they've just reached a point where they're like I just can't do this anymore I'm just gonna go home and look after my children and and not give up but there's just this element of I'm just I'm done fighting yeah it's it's too many walls and it's women non-binary people like queer people people of color there are so there's so much extraordinary talent that is yeah is um We're never going to see or never see the full kind of impact of what they could do because this industry wasn't safe for them.

22:34But like I said, I think that is true. Lots of other places do. And there's probably there's so much we could be doing. I mean, I had occasion this year to go to a couple awards ceremonies and it was really interesting. Interesting is doing a lot of heavy lifting by using that word, but it was really interesting to see who was coming up to receive awards, despite, you know, a lot of good effort in our industry to move things forward and to be more inclusive and to demonstrate more diversity across every level of our organizations. that people still picking up those awards looked a certain way.

23:12And also, none of them talked about the stuff that, at least to me, really mattered. Like, nothing about the climate crisis, nothing about Palestine, nothing about all of these crises and humanitarian disasters in the world. And I was like, what are we doing here? We're supposed to be so connected to culture and so connected to the world. I think that's what we're supposed to do. otherwise because all the people we're trying to connect with are in the world and yet it just seems so disconnected from all of that and I left really sad to be honest with you.

23:45Katy:You share the same sentiments as a friend that I spoke to who said something similar and she said she looked around the room and everybody was like you know drinking champagne and eating expensive food and and then when they were accepting their awards they were talking about how much money they'd made and she just felt really bleh. Yeah. And you can imagine it's just, yeah, one big hypocrisy. Yeah. Moving swiftly on, we're getting into some deep stuff here. I love it. It is tough. And the thing that annoys me when I talk to other, like I'm not saying I'm brilliant, but when I talk to brilliant women in the same field, it amazes me that the same male names come up again and again and they do exactly the same things to them as they've done to me over the years.

24:32Katy:And it's usually when I'm sort of, I've just released a really big project or a brilliant article or done a big campaign or whatever, and they creep out of the woodwork and pounce. And when I started to ask discreetly other people I trusted, does this happen to you? And we started, is it him? Oh, that's interesting. Why the hell? I don't understand. And, you know, do they treat men the same way? I presume so. Yeah, I mean, that's a really good question. And I hadn't, I maybe thought that experience was mine alone. I hadn't really thought about it in that way. Because we don't talk to each other because we're all like playing it safe.

25:16Katy:We've worked so hard to get our, you know, positions that we don't want to sort of be seen as the whiny little feminist. Yeah, that's really interesting. I mean, I have a really uncomfortable relationship with sharing any work anyway. I mean, I already told you my journalist sort of origin story, which is part of that. But I struggle with the kind of the tone of voice that one I think is expected to have, let's say, on LinkedIn or that sort of thing. And also because I'm always really afraid of critique. I mean, I mentioned that stuff about the awards. and I think that there can sometimes be this sort of, I mean, part of the maybe problem with awards more broadly is that it like, if the sector is sort of giving advantage to one type of view of the world or one type of view of creativity, I just get a little bit scared that like, oh, it's not everyone's taste and oh, they're going to think I'm a bit shit and so I don't do it anyway.