merit
Adam Gong
Content partner
Misfit
Adam is a reflection of a new generation of producers who don’t fit into the ‘producer lane’. He’s plugged into why we’re making what we’re making, and that requires understanding consumers and marketing strategy just as much as creative craft.
He’s obsessed with the ‘what’: making work that competes with consumers’ media-of-choice not just with the rest of the ads out there and the ‘why’: producing in a way that reflects the reality of content creation today, meaning more varied outputs, never-been-done-before usage of tech and platforms and processes that liberate, not constrain.
He cares deeply about art and culture and knows that advertising at its best can add - but also knows that painting by numbers will never get you there, and that the ad industry has become so insular that even the best can find themselves pulling from the same playbook.
He’s a producer who cares more about Effies than Lions.
The idea that creative-to-execution is a linear process. Adam has shaped the agency processes so that the people responsible for making the work have a key role in creative decision making to start with, this allows the three pillars of strategy, creative & production to reinform one another, developing and improving ideas, not just simply executing.
Adam’s north star is the mantra that great work is work our audience cares about - regardless of budgets or who came up with the idea he is driven by making the stuff that’s going to hit people emotionally.
Adam’s always-questioning mindset has given him a kind of outside perspective on how the ad business works. Additionally, not being indoctrinated into ‘the way things are done’ from an operations point of view (i.e. spending the majority of his career downstream at the executional stage) has helped us diversify our offering and make sure that our structure and approach to work across our entire business reflects the world outside of the ad industry bubble.
Obsession with getting under the surface of everything - even himself - even if that means climbing El Capitan for the chance to “actually meet himself” - even if that journey ultimately ends in an icy 1,000’ vertical retreat with a wag bag half-full of #2.
After his 5th or 6th missed or lackluster annual review. Adam felt that if he wasn’t going to get mentorship or guidance any more than he’d have to go his own way and trust his instincts. Reflecting on the ceiling on impact potential and growth in production and deciding it was very low within the traditional agency structure Adam decided to strike out on his own with No Problem and rather just taking orders, start to create new ways of doing things that better reflect the possibilities of the world we live in.
