With over 400 awards under his belt over a 20-year career, Ali Rez, Regional ECD, Middle East & Pakistan, BBDO Worldwide, has been listed on the World Creative Rankings’ Global Top 20 Executive Creative Directors list 2020. The World Creative Rankings (WCR) is “the definitive guide to the advertising industry’s most creative brands, agencies, and people”. According to Rez, in order to shortlist an ECD for the prestigious list, WCR collates data by reviewing large bodies of work exhibited in shows over a period of time.

Rez believes that this is not only a milestone for himself and BBDO but for Pakistan as well, as it is the first time the country has shown up on the list. Elaborating on how he (and BBDO) usually manage to gain international recognition, Rez says “BBDO is all about the work. We put everything into it; heart, soul, sweat, coffee. We uncover specific human truths add some magic and constantly ask ourselves whether it’s the best possible solution. This is not a team that settles for the easy solution. We don’t think an idea is big enough unless it scares us.”

The top three ECDs listed on the 2020 WRC include Adrian Botan from McCann Worldgroup, Alex Grieve from AMV BBDO and Adrian Rossi from Grey London. Accoding to Rez, Grieve is “an absolute inspiration” highlighting his work for Snickers, Libresse and Guinness as “truly outstanding and culture-defining.” He adds that “Tim Gordon from Droga5 (#9 on the list) is another superstar. These are people who go beyond making successful advertising that lifts brands: they make un-ignorable art that influences people to greatness.”

Commenting on the future, Rez says the most important thing is to survive the current climate. “We don’t know where the world is headed, and I am sad for the negative impact this pandemic has had on so many people’s lives. I have always tried to focus on advertising as a force for good, and for helping people’s lives improve, so perhaps this would be a good springboard to double down on this. Nobody knows where they will end up, so it’s good to keep our heads down and focus on where creativity can lead us to, and how it can make the world a better place.”

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