I donâ€™t really know what leadership is â€“ Josy Paul at his candid best

We are all used to seeing Josy Paul, Chairman and Chief Creative Officer, BBDO India, delivering one memorable campaign after another and leading BBDO India to reach newer heights. But it was a more candid, a more raw Josy Paul that we met at Adgully’s special event to launch the definitive industry compilation of India’s Powerful Influencers 2020, held virtually yesterday (December 22).

While delivering a special address on ‘The Creative Power Of Vulnerability And Empathy In Changing Times?’, Paul has several confessions to make, even as he spoke about the changing face of leadership in these crisis times. Paul channelled his inner Bob Dylan, whose song and lyrics work for him even today and are like a guiding light...

“Come gather around people wherever you roam

And admit that the waters around you have grown

And accept it that soon you’d be drenched to the bone

If your time to you is worth savin’,

You better start swimmin’ or you’ll sink like a stone

For the times they are a-changing”

He said, “I think it is so brilliant that somebody could write this 50-60 years ago and it still holds true.”

Speaking from the heart, Paul said, “For me, leadership is not a Zoom call, it’s like a Whatsapp message in today’s world. It’s a lot more personal and intimate and I am sure all of you know that and are going through that in your own way. So, just think of this delivery as a personal from me to your Whatsapp, like a voice note.”

On the changing times, he said, “We are all going through changes, we are being born again, it is a period of becoming. In the early days of the lockdown, I was wondering what I was going through, and everything that I say is a repeat of what all of you are going through too and I realised it at that time that it was like Vipassana – you can’t go outward, so you go inward. What we all are going through is rebirth. It’s like starting up all over again and it’s beautiful what’s happening – not the COVID infection, but what’s happening to us internally.”

He considered the pandemic crisis as a crash course for all of us and added, “we are all graduating at the same time – that’s how I try to see what we are going through. The other side is going to be very different, it’s like we are crossing over to something new. There’s a whole new world waiting for us and that’s the excitement. We are trying to control it, but honestly we know we can’t.”

Paul confessed, “For me, everything is a first and I have never really felt this way before. I do feel like a creative trainee, to be honest, more than a leader and I am eager and excited to see how things go. I feel there’s only opportunity and possibilities and I feel like it’s going to be good for me.”

Another confession that he made was, “Yesterday, we’ve had to let go of a really big client. We had to say enough is enough. It was not an act of bravado, in these times we needed the account badly, but we had to say goodbye. Why did we do it? We were seriously concerned about our people who were working on the account – the endless wasted time, effort, and mental harassment was not worth it in today’s time. There’s enough anxiety out there anyway. It was not an easy call. In our 12 years of building the agency, we had never done this. It was a test of culture, our values, our humanity, ourselves. One of our values is to do the right thing and we believe we did that in the interest of our people and the organisation. I am baring my soul to you – this is how it is, this is the reality that we all are going through.”

Watch the complete address here: