Creativity Squared: Kelly Roe on Accomplishing Shared Goals

Kelly Roe is SVP, executive creative director at Jack Morton, based in Chicago. She is a team builder who leads with empathy, not ego, and challenges the norm by pushing for innovation, inclusion and collaboration in the industry.

Kelly’s background is a mix of traditional, social and digital marketing, with 20 years leading campaigns for some of the world's most loved brands including Mars Wrigley, JM Smucker, Visa, Unilever and Anheuser Busch. Prior to joining Jack Morton in 2023, Kelly built and launched The Kitchen, an in-house agency at Kraft Heinz focused on digital and social strategy, creative, and production for 22+ brands.

I’m a constantly curious and collaborative creative person. I love making and learning and learning through making. I continue to be inspired by this industry because I never get bored. Every project brings a new opportunity to dive into something new and learn, whether it’s a new industry or consumers we’re talking to, the business problems or cultural challenges we’re tackling, or the new people I get to partner with, and the technology and media and production partners to help bring that idea to life, there’s always something new to learn and wrap my head around.

I believe every opportunity is a creative one, if given the time, resources and freedom to think that way. It doesn’t matter what project I’m leading, big or small. My brain is always trying to solve the puzzle in the most creative way possible. 

I am naturally competitive (I blame that on being an identical twin and my own childhood struggles to stand out as an individual and have my own identity). This instinct served me well in the early years of my career, it drove me to work harder, study the award annuals, blogs and show winners, and push myself to bring the best ideas, each and every opportunity.

As a leader, I leverage my competitive spirit in a different way, pushing to ensure the team has the right information and resources to bring their best ideas. And a big part of that is creating a trusting and collaborative environment, that empowers everyone on the team, not just the people with "creative" in their title, by ensuring they feel safe to throw out brave and bold ideas, share their thoughts without judgement, and feel equal ownership when we win!

I ask myself the same series of questions when vetting ideas, of any type. From TV scripts, to headlines, to brand activations. They all have to answer these questions in my head to be deemed a good idea: 

Does it feel true? Is the idea grounded in a human truth or insight that gives it a chance of connecting with a person based on their life experiences, their passions, interests, and challenges. When you hold a mirror up to the idea, do people see themselves? Or just a brand talking to themselves?  

Does it make sense for this brand? Does the brand feel like a natural part of the story you’re telling – or does it feel tacked on and forced? For the marketing magic to work, you can’t just do bold ideas, they have to have an authentic connection to the brand, and what they stand for. 

Is the story clear? People are moving a mile a minute, these days more than ever. You’ve got to fight for attention in a very crowded sea with a very distracted audience. If you can’t explain the big idea in 2 sentences, there’s more work to be done to really hone in on what the idea is. 

Is it shareable? Would someone see this and tell their mom, sister, or best friend about it? If I saw this in my own feed would it break through the clutter, and would I turn my phone to my husband and say, holy shit look what X brand did?

About 7 years ago, my father-in-law, who was just my “new boyfriend’s dad at the time”, had ripped out a print ad in a magazine, to show me and my husband (who’s also in the industry) when we came over for dinner. He loved the ad so much, he wanted to show it to us. He didn’t know it was an ad that I wrote for Ziploc! That’s the bar. Will the idea resonate with someone so much that they want to share it with someone they love, because they see themselves or someone they know and love in the message.

Every idea is social, if you make something worth talking about. 

When I’m thinking on an idea, or helping for a brief, I like to start on my own. Then gather as a team to hear thoughts from other people thinking on the same challenge, bring my own ideas, and then connect some dots to make the idea stronger. But before I get to concepts, I start with defining my own insights and challenges, and then deep diving into the consumer to try and understand them.

The first step is really to just sponge up as much information as I can. I read articles, stroll reddit, consult my robot friends at Chat GPT, and study past work from the brand, and other brands, that have tackled a similar challenge, or territory.

Afterwards, I start pulling together thoughts and forming them into big ideas. And I encourage my team to approach work the same way. Starting with a one to two sentence insight, either pulled from the brief, or from their own digging and POV, and then a high-level big idea, two to four sentences explaining the idea. I like to form and vet ideas at that level and get other POVs and poke on it a bit, before diving into tactics, scripts and execution.

It’s important to get shared energy from the full team, to help them get on board with the idea, and add input so we are truly creating something together. This way, we avoid just passing things to one another at different parts of the project and working in silos. 

When I’m feeling stuck, and there’s a creative problem or any work-related problem I just can’t crack. I step away from it. I spend time with my best friend Ally Love on the Peloton, or I take a long walk with my husband and dog. Go to the museum to see how real artists make and think. Or just call my sister to trade knock-knock jokes with my niece and nephew.

Sometimes an awesome idea comes, while doing something mundane and human, when I’m not trying so hard to think of something BIG! And if I don’t come up with a big idea, the time always gives me clarity on what to do next, whether it’s pulling in new people, or pushing back on the ask all together. 

I didn’t go to a portfolio school. I looked into it, but I couldn’t afford it. I didn’t have the money to move to the city, and at the time, you couldn’t get student loans to help pay for that type of education. But I was lucky enough to land an internship, through my graduate program, at TwobyFour, a local creative boutique here in Chicago that I still hold near and dear to my heart. That’s where I really learned my creative chops.

It was a small agency back then, and I was one of three copywriters, and there was nowhere to hide, and everyone had to pull their weight. So, I learned fast. And it helped that the whole team had a shared vision of why we were there, to create amazing work. So, I stuck my nose in award annuals, and studied ads from amazing copywriters and creatives, I studied lyrics from my favourite song writers, and I followed blogs and advertising pubs to follow trends.

I didn’t do this because I felt like I had to. I was so hungry and eager to grow and learn, and I was entertained and inspired by the “idea envy” I got when seeing really awesome ideas. And 20 years later, I still feel that way. I think most creative folks I have worked with share that curiosity and drive to figure it out. 

Feedback is a gift! This one took me longer to accept than I’d like to admit. It can be so hard to hear judgement on ideas you work so hard on and are so passionate about, but now I find myself proactively reaching out to folks to get their input. Because while there certainly is often “too many cooks”, getting diverse perspectives and pushes is crucial to success. 

Another big moment in my career, that shaped how I think and lead, was my two years in Singapore leading global accounts at BBDO. It was my first time living abroad, and the experience helped me grow so much, personally and professionally. It helped me really appreciate different cultures, ways of life and ways of thinking.

My most recent achievement is building and launching The Kitchen, an in-house agency at Kraft Heinz. I went in-house because I wanted to work alongside the people who got to decide if an idea lives and dies.

The best ideas in my career have come through the trust and relationship I had with my “client”, which is a word I forbid at the agency. Because we’re all just people, who got into this industry because we love ideas. We all just have a different role to play in getting them made. So, I was thrilled by the opportunity to build a creative culture and process from scratch, to empower true collaboration, with less finger pointing and more shared ownership of the ideas and outcome.

I wanted to truly understand the challenges the brands were facing, and what their goals were for the year, with true transparency on what resources we had to make it happen. Then, we created a process where everyone could get involved, so we all had skin in the game.

Giving brand and business leaders a peek into the ideas as soon as possible allowed us to put our collective energy into the ideas we were all excited about, from a brand and creative perspective. So, my advice to “clients” would be, get the creatives involved, be transparent and share your hopes, dreams, business goals and challenges.

We can help you solve them creatively, and together, we can all accomplish the same goal: creating the best work of our lives, making our loved ones proud, and making our competitors envious.