Twenty/Twenty: time to make the leap

Twenty/Twenty pairs rising industry leaders with some of the most respected and esteemed figures in design. Taylor participated five years ago, and he’s clear on the long-term impact: “100%, it’s helped to shape my thinking about how we can continuously look to improve the business at every juncture.”

Brandon today is a very different proposition “to what we were a year ago, let alone five years ago,” says Taylor. “We are fast approaching 50 people across our London and Manchester studios, working with multinational brands across the globe and producing the best work of our lives. Plus, we’ve managed to have a lot of fun and games along the way.”  

Taylor signed up to Twenty/Twenty in 2019 seeking new thoughts, ideas and provocation from the mentoring programme. “We often live in our own bubbles and as leaders in a design business it’s bloody hard to make decisions without the context of others who’ve lived and breathed similar challenges. The Twenty/Twenty programme delivered that for hardly any investment at all,” he says, “I couldn’t recommend it more highly.” 

It’s a decade since Andy Sexton, Executive Creative Director at 2LK took part as a mentee – an experience which was “genuinely pivotal” he says. “It was a time of fast change for me personally and professionally – and to be able to take outside inputs along the way was powerful, I learned a lot – far more than I expected.”

At the time, Sexton had been on the 2LK Board for a few years and held a minor shareholding, but things were changing in the business, and he was anticipating becoming co-owner. “At 31 years old I had spent most of my career in one agency and I really felt that I needed some external guidance and inspiration, some input and support that came from a different context.”

With a significant milestone approaching, it was a less usual route into Twenty/Twenty for Point 6’s Managing Director, Sally Forsyth Spark. “I applied to be a mentee having previously been a mentor,” she reflects. “My 60^th birthday was coming up in a few years’ time, and I wanted to explore complementary or even different career paths in a safe space, and with someone who could help me realise what I wouldn’t be able to see for myself,” she says, citing David C. Baker’s mantra “you can’t read the label from inside the jar” as the inspiration to join 2022’s cohort as a mentee.

For Forsyth Spark, the match making between her and her mentor was spot on: “My mentor also had experience in psychological testing which was a useful underpinning for understanding some of my motivations (and realising some of them were not very true to my real self).” Reflecting on the personal impact of the mentoring, “I’m definitely more comfortable with uncertainty and change, both in the present and the long term,” says Forsyth Spark. It’s also meant she doesn’t need to feel that she had to have her entire future planned out, “I can shape-shift around a rough goal and be fine if that moves. For a growing business this has been invaluable,” especially now, with the trajectory the agency is on, “We’re in a period of rapid growth, driven by recommendations from our existing clients. It’s the most exciting time I can remember at Point 6,” she says.

To his knowledge, Sexton was the first person at 2LK to take part in any form of ‘official’ mentoring. Paired with Darren Bowles, he’s still in touch with his mentor 10 years later and they’ve had the chance to collaborate along the way too. “For me, the access and exposure I got to another creative business through the programme was as impactful as the relationship I built over the year. I came away from the experience with a whole network of new contacts and learning, many of whom I am still in good contact with today.”

Since his participation in the programme, 2LK have embraced mentoring agency-wide, with lots more of the team taking part in DBA Twenty/Twenty both as mentees and mentors (including Sexton who’s had the chance to “pay-it-back four times over the last decade” as a mentor), while they’ve also supported other programmes like Elevate and BIMA too.

“We’re a different business in lots of ways,” says Sexton of the agency today compared to ten years ago, citing how 2LK has a tighter positioning, an increased commercial confidence, a better sense of what a great (and terrible) client looks like, stronger finances and a much greater sense of its purpose within the wider creative industry.

“My (and our) involvement in the DBA has been a big part of lots of this growth and clarity,” says Sexton, “The future for 2LK is full of optimism, we’ve just wrapped up our first year as an Employee-Owned business which has been an incredible journey, being able to transition the company in this way is something I’ll be forever proud of.”

Since 2011, the DBA’s Twenty/Twenty Mentoring programme has transformed the careers of nearly 600 design leaders and the impacts are long-lasting. For Taylor, “it made me realise that there were a lot of people who’d lived and learned through similar challenges I was facing,” he reflects, with the programme providing “empathy to help navigate challenges” and a clarity of direction that “I was missing” he says, “Sometimes you need a running mate to bounce ideas off. They delivered just that.”