My Cannes takeaways 2024

I was a judge this year, of the Glass Lions category, which meant that most of Cannes experience was about the jury room.

Everyone that I know that has judged, always talks about how wonderful the rest of the jury are, and I can report that my jury were more than wonderful.

We were judging the category that celebrates culture shifting creativity. It recognises work that addresses issues of gender inequality or prejudice, ideas intended to change the world.

Jury president, the inimitable Cindy Gallop , had served as president of this jury in its inaugural year a decade ago. This particular award was set up with the intention and hope that it would become redundant, because the world would become a fairer place. So far, it seems as though it is more needed than ever.

Our jury included a mix of people from around the world. Maiko Ota, ECD Hakuhodo, who brought her translator. KR Liu Liu, global head of disability innovation at Google, who brought a distinct and important perspective on accessibility in the work we reviewed. Ren Rigby , who has their own design agency Proto, and who has recently transitioned. Raphaella Martins Antonio , Creative X manager at Meta in Brazil who brought her 2 week old daughter into the jury room. (Olivia had her own badge and I look forward to her returning in a couple of decades perhaps and winning her own Lion). Nayla Tueni is ceo and editor in chief of Annahar Newspaper, which has its own heritage of award winning work, defending freedom of speech. All the jurors were exceptional, shout out to Suresh Raj (He/Him/His) , Pia Chaudhuri Koo Govender .

Our chair Cindy instructed us to be skeptical about claims, and look for evidence of real change. Our panel was an object lesson in mutual respect, divergent opinions, strong evidence based arguments, open mindedness and decisiveness.

Our shortlisting process was rigorous, but the judging process was at another level. For Glass (and Innovation and Titanium) the shortlisted entries are presented live, two presenters, ten minutes of presentation and ten minutes of q + a. This phase was extraordinary, and in every case our minds changed, in one way or another, because of the presentations, and the answers to our questions. The judging sessions are open to delegates to watch, and I will certainly be attending them if I am fortunate enough to go to Cannes next year.

At the press conference Cindy talked about the outstanding Grand Prix winner, Vaseline Transition Body Lotion.

Part of our debate was about the difference between a brand taking positive action for a small community versus a smaller action for a big community. A crucial insight for me in the decision making process was that when a big brand does this, this action can have meaning for every underrepresented community.

Our gold winner is Pink Chip, which for the first time tracks women run businesses to give proof of their success. In the UK there are fewer women ceos of FTSE 100 businesses than a decade ago. Share prices can fall when a women is announced as boss. The Pink Chip allows evidence, not prejudice, to inform opinions and investments.

Our silver and bronze winners were wonderful work too. Silver Lions went to the Harpic Loocator, a crowd sourced app to locate and rate women’s loos. (Please Harpic, bring this to London!), and to Lays Project Farm Equal, where there was significant and game changing investment in tools for women potato farmers, and help with creating pride in their community. Bronze Lions went to Welcome to the Group, Child Wedding Cards (both of which are an object lesson in how to get politicians to change their minds), and 5 days, Give me a break (a revolution in paternity leave).

Cindy Gallop made a final, and crucial point at our press conference. She said that she has in the past challenged our industry to ask whether its own patterns of behaviour are worthy of a Glass Lion. We had seen, and debated at length in the jury room, some evidence that this is not the case, still. We decided to judge the work on merit, but the behaviours exhibited when presenting, are indicative of the behaviours and attitudes behind the work. Our industry can and must walk the walk as well as talk the talk on equality and equity.

Belonging for everyone, whoever they are, is not the norm in our industry still. It was absolutely the experience for this juror of the Glass Lion experience at Cannes, and my gratitude goes to everyone involved in making this experience stand out as best practice in this respect.