Paul: 0:29

Hello and welcome back for another episode of MarketPulse Pros and Pioneers. This week I'm really excited to be joined by Ivonne Kinser. Hi Ivonne, how are you?

Ivonne: 0:38

Hi Paul, how are you? Thank you for having me.

Paul: 0:42

That's fantastic. Ladies and gentlemen, if you're watching along on the show, we've had some amazing guests over the last year. Ivonne is true market and royalty and I will explain why in a moment. I'm very privileged to have you on the show today. Really excited to dig a little bit deeper. So this is a little bit of an out of the ordinary episode for us because of your level of expertise across lots of different industries. I want to run this as a, as a bit of a special edition episode and, and really dig into your knowledge a little bit. Without further ado, just a bit of background for Ivonne, for anybody who doesn't know who she is. Ivonne is the Chief Marketing Officer at Hoplark, which is a disruptive brand redefining the beverage space in an emerging category. She's also the CEO and founder of Vantage Creative Group, where she and her team develop marketing, innovation, and tech driven growth strategies. As the former head of marketing for Avocados from Mexico, she led the brand's digital transformation, earning it recognition as one of the world's most innovative brands by Fast Company. She authored the creativity book, Think. I will put the notes in with the show description so that you can find that. And became the first Latina to receive the DFW AMA Marketing Lifetime Achievement Award. Amazing, amazing career.

Ivonne: 2:07

Thank you.

Paul: 2:08

Ivonne's renowned for her bold and creative marketing approaches and continues to push boundaries and redefine industry standards. But 23 years ago, and I love this, 23 years ago, Ivonne walked into the building of her dream job, resume in hand, and just two weeks later she was managing the advertising account for the largest airline on earth, across 20 Latin American countries. And went on to spearhead American Airlines very first digital marketing effort in that region. I don't even know where to start with all of that Ivonne, that is an amazing career, that is an amazing career. Um, first up, what was the motivation behind writing the book,'Think', from your perspective?

Ivonne: 2:51

I had a lot of thinking behind the concept of creativity. I lived in an industry that is created by default, which is marketing and advertising. However, I noticed that sometimes a lot of people within the industry, even Misunderstand creativity as a, their, the first misunderstanding is that there's people that is more creative by nature and others that are less creative. That's, that's not truth. It's the way that how we approach the notion of creativity. The first thing is just how How do we believe in creativity? So I started digging and researching and understanding and learning as a creative person myself. When I start noticing that people will, way before, years ago, people start telling me that you are very creative. I always, I have a say that, that is that the fish doesn't know that it's wet. So you think that everybody else thinks the same way that you think. So that was very intriguing to me and I wanted to understand why they think that and and wondering, they, they don't see the same connections that I see. So that led me in a, in a long path of researching and understanding the creativity through my perspective, through others perspective, and through the research perspective. And And I felt at some point that I have so much to say and so much to share. My book is not a, I'm not a doctor. I'm not a neurologist. So it's not from that point of view, although I know enough through the research that I have done, but. But it's more a philosophical approach to creativity, understanding the concept, not only of creativity, but all the areas around creativity, like critical thinking risk taking. They so many things that are around creativity. that allows those great ideas that we value so much.

Paul: 5:01

let's rewind just a little bit then, by your definition then. What is your definition of creativity? What does creativity mean to you as a person?

Ivonne: 5:12

I say first that I'm not a neurologist, but I understand the neurological process. It is a neurological process. We are all equipped to be creative. Our brain is equipped and wired to be creative. It's a matter of we let It or not. So we have different areas in the brain. We have the prefrontal cortex, where the decisions are made, information is gathered and understood. And then we have other areas that manage other type of activity, like for example, another one that holds the memories, another ones that understand patterns. So for a creative idea to happen, All those areas have to connect. So there's connectors in the brain, the neurons that connect all those areas. And it's in those connections, the new information with the memories, with the intuition, with the ability to visualize patterns. When those connections happen, it's when creativity happens, with the great ideas happen. What we need to do is not brainstorming. Brainstorming is a great tool, but if we really, really want to develop creativity in our teams, what we have to do is to give them the space to calm the brain so that those connections can happen because it has been scientifically proof that when the the brain is come that. area is more active. So that's, that's the first step is, in a lot of advertising agencies, they, they put people on tables and put tables and maybe they do it because of a trend and it's cool. Maybe somebody understood, but I think that the underlying motivation is that it's just to calm the brain. So those ideas can happen. So there's not such a thing of, let's be creative or let's come up with a creative solution for these. Let's get all together and think it doesn't happen that way. So many companies wants to pay millions of well, maybe not millions, but thousands of dollars in consultants to come and do that type of sections. When the reality is that is much simpler than that, it's just giving the mind the space to be creative. And not all the other things, right? There's exercises and practice and all that, but the core is really that. And anybody who trains and gives themselves the space to put their brain in that situation can be creative.

Paul: 7:53

And do you think that companies lose sight of that and Try and get their money's worth out of their employees too much by keeping them so busy that they can't be creative, that they don't have time or space to be, to take that step away and just think clearly about what it is that they're trying to do because we're always trying to twist that last screw to get the most value out of our employees, right?

Ivonne: 8:15

Yeah. and alignments and brainstorming sensation and processes. None of that is counterproductive. It's just, it's just overwhelmed the brain. And the other thing is that one of the one of the things that like kill creativity is the stress. So the more we pressure our teams to come with a creative idea, the less creative they become. And I still haven't heard the. When a company say, you know what, just take a walk in nature, go take an hour, don't think about anything, leave your phone on the office and then come back and think about this problem that we're trying to solve. It's not happening. That kind of things. Those kind of breakthrough ideas never happened inside an office. It just happened. That's why, people misunderstand that, Oh, I had a hot moment when I was taking a shower. It's because your mind is calm. So if we have more of that freedom, Then we have more of those great ideas, but nobody's doing it that way. I don't want to be so like, I don't want to say never or nobody, but most people don't, don't look at it that way.

Paul: 9:31

prime example, if, my son has been learning Spanish on an app for a year and a half But if I ask him to speak some Spanish to someone, he can't do it. He won't do it. But I know when I watch him on the app, he knows loads of Spanish. He's very impressive. And I remember being exactly the same with languages and lots of different things when I was a kid. You don't want to perform when you're asked to. It has to come to you.

Ivonne: 9:56

It's exciting that what you say is very interesting because again, you give your brain a mission. So when you are in a situation where you need to respond, your brain is busy understanding the external stimulus, decoding the external stimulus and finding an answer. So if you are, if you had your brain busy, Doing that, then it doesn't have the energy just to create, to connect, to make new connections that eventually leads to new ideas. So it's just two different functions. And if we overwhelm the brain with some, of these functions, we don't give the space to, to come up with the creative, creative ideas.

Paul: 10:41

So when you're looking for new team members or people that you'd like to be working with, do you find that there's a lack of creativity in younger, is there an age relevance to creativity? Are older people more likely to be creative thinkers? Are younger people more likely to be creative thinkers? Is there any kind of Pattern that you see, cause I, the reason I ask, and I've got a big bugbearer around creativity in schools, and I think we drum out of kids, children, their creativity, and we push them towards an academic route. And I, I, there's a, that's a whole other episode on its own. But I'm curious to see what your experience has been working in that industry and trying to foster people who are creative thinkers. Do you see any alignment with that?

Ivonne: 11:28

I don't think, I don't think that it's a matter of age. Interestingly, I think this is an opinion based on the information that I have and how I connect that information. I think that it has to be with a little bit of rebelliousness. And, and let me, let me explain. Let me give you the context. There was a very famous experiment research actually done by NASA, where they hire a researcher because they wanted to understand creativity and to be able to hire the most creative people that help them to solve the most difficult problems. What they, they start Measuring creativity. Creativity in their definition is the way to solve problems in novel ways. They started measuring that from kids all the way to adults. And what they found is that at two years old, 99 percent of the children are creative geniuses. When it goes to 12 year olds, that goes to 30%, then 15 year olds is 12%. When we get to adults, only 2 percent are considered creative geniuses. It's not because your creativity at a neurological level decreased, but it's about society by judging your ideas giving you or training you to accept one information instead of using your critical thinking. So all those things are modeling the way you approach creativity and you get to a point that you have, you have what it takes to be a very creative person, just is dormant. So that's why My conclusion is that someone that is more rebellious tend to hold on more firmly to their ideas and their conviction that. their ideas that come from their mind have value. And those are the people that stay more creative.

Paul: 14:14

That, you've described something that I find really interesting because I'm a very rebellious person. That's why I don't work in corporate anymore, Ivonne, and why I'm quite happy to be running my own business. I wonder though there's a dangerous aspect to that as well for a business as well. Somebody who's rebellious and creative. There's a lot of risk associated with that. So what's your approach to managing that risk taking environment where you want people to be going out and being creative, but at the same time you need to shield them from making decisions that are, let's, let's call it too creative or too out there, right?

Ivonne: 14:53

That's a great question. That's a great question. I love it because that's another misconception is that creativity means good ideas. Not necessarily. Creativity means connections that are novel, novel connections. New, didn't exist before, but it can be terrible. Someone very creative can, can come up with a terrible idea. So it's a matter of, How do you connect that idea to a strategy, but even that before the idea, when you have that foundation, we talk about the different areas of the brain, previous knowledge, experience, intuition, when that base is solid, when you have enough Information and of knowledge of the industry where you're trying or attempting to create, that gives you a really good foundation. The other thing is how you approach that moment of creativity is with, you need to approach it with the goal of finding a solution to a problem that you have. Random ideas, I have an idea, let's do this, maybe cool, those are terrible ideas, but when you're really know. You know your area, you know your industry. If you're in marketing, you know your brand and you are really, really clear on the problem that you have and the solution that you're trying to find, and then start the connection, start the creative process. process, retrieving information, retrieving data that you already have, stimulus that you're reading in that moment. If you feed your brain with all that, those foundations, then when the connection happen, it's going to be a good idea. And a good idea doesn't mean that it has to be cool. It means that it's going to solve a problem in a real way. For example, in advertising agencies, you have a, the strategic planning team, and then you have the creative team and they work together. It's because they offer the strategic planning team, offer the creative team with that foundation. But sometimes, the same, The same people that is within the creative team can have that foundation. It's just another layer, layer of strategy. But when creativity and strategy are together, typically the ideas should be good. Bad ideas is those that are disconnected from a real purpose to find a solution.

Paul: 17:21

For the longest time, I always branded myself as being not creative. I didn't see myself as a creative person. And it's only in the last four or five years that I've I found that creativity but not where I thought it would be and I think this is a common challenge for a lot of people is that I only ever hear the word creativity mentioned alongside art and drama and music and graphical design and all of the really obvious visual and auditory studies that you can take part in. But I actually found my creativity is in connecting technology together and connecting people together and I've come to reframe that a little bit in my mind but that was a really hard long journey to go on to give myself that freedom to say yes I am actually creative just in a very different way to the traditional sense. Is that something you see a lot in as well?

Ivonne: 18:16

Yeah, I love to ask you this, but what made you think it was a message somebody told you? What made you think at some point that you were not creative?

Paul: 18:26

Because I don't enjoy a lot of the creative, the typical creative works. So again, I think just because I'd heard the word creativity around art, for example, I'm a terrible artist. Partly because I never practice it, right? then there's the other side of things, is, is it because, because I don't enjoy it, I don't practice it, therefore I'm not very good at it, so it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy. But actually that, creativity for me is much easier channeled into things like technology, Because I can just see it without having to, I've done that practice because I enjoyed it when I was a kid.

Ivonne: 19:03

Yeah, yeah, totally. So that is leading us to a very interesting path, because it's exactly what you said. It was the wrong definition of, or the wrong perception of creativity. Anybody can, an accountant can be creative, a doctor can be creative, a lawyer can be creative. Because remember, it's about, enabling those connections in the brain to connect new information with all information, with pattern recognition. So you were not a good creative in the art space because you didn't have the foundations in that space. But let's say if you are in a lawyer and you are a forum in that space, and you know the constitutions and the laws and et cetera, what do you think that there's great lawyers? It's because they are able to connect, to find, they remember a case that happened in whatever year, they retrieve that information, they find new ways, they, new tools in the constitution and, and create cases and present cases in ways that are, that set a precedent. So that's creativity within law. So it happened in every territory, but we need to erase that idea that creativity is just coming up with great ideas in the art. space. It's just learn to connect, connect all areas of our brain so we can produce solutions. For whatever problem that we're trying to solve.

Paul: 20:36

I think it's a much more wholesome definition of creativity than when I was growing up, that's for sure. I think things have moved on a lot and I'd like to think that, if most of the time that there's a much better attitude and, and framing of creativity in schools in the modern day than, than there was 30, 40 years ago. how much impact does creativity have in your guiding values and your decision making then?

Ivonne: 20:58

I think that, interestingly, I think that it was the other way around. I think my values led my creative path. And I am very introspective. I think that self awareness is one of the best gifts that you can give to yourself. So I really, I have worked to know myself. I story my values. I understand. So I think that from the freedom value, it came that need to express myself, to find solutions to any problem that I have, whether it's in the personal life or professional life. Solving problems set you free. Set you free from the constraint of having to live with something that you don't have a solution for. And that happens every day in our professional life. We have to, as a professional, it doesn't matter what you do. But you have to solve problems every single day. And if you don't solve them, you're trapped within the problem. So my value of freedom led me to first to be very curious and explore different options. Curiosity helps you to gain information and knowledge in a very fast way because you're always looking what is new, what is there, what is available and that stays in your brain. So when you receive new stimulus and you allow those connections, You really have a true, rich, creative output.

Paul: 22:35

So then taking those, those kind of guiding values, the decision making, what we've talked about in terms of creativity, how do you apply all of that to create a culture of innovation within your teams or the projects that you're working on?

Ivonne: 22:49

First of all is making sure that everybody understands this that we're talking about because a lot of people come with that misconception, Oh, I'm not creative. Or maybe, maybe everybody can be creative, but maybe you don't like it. Maybe you have other skills that are stronger. That's possible. Maybe your brain is not, doesn't find that that's stimulated with finding connections and solutions. Maybe you are the type of. You'd like to accomplish things, which is the type of the brain of project managers. For example, they find satisfaction in completing tasks. And that's great. You need that. You need all of that. I don't think that a team with a team with a team. Everybody being a creative let's say lover, to call it somehow, will work. You need the people that enjoy being creative and creating, and you need the people that enjoy executing those ideas and make it happen. You need both. But if For those individuals that find joy in creating, the first thing is to, for them to understand they can be creative and how to motivate themselves and how to allow their brains to create those connections and giving them the space to do

Paul: 24:15

So then to Zoom out a little bit. So we've talked in depth about creativity. We've talked about how we'd manage that within teams and, and projects. Looking back at your career, you've, you've achieved some fantastic awards and achievements. What's, what is the defining moment in your career where you realized that you'd gotten to where you wanted to achieve when you'd, you'd reached your potential that you saw in yourself?

Ivonne: 24:44

I think that the greatest potential I haven't accomplished it yet. If I will, then that means I wouldn't keep, progressing. So I always think that the best is ahead. But I think that at the defining moment in my career, was with America, working for the American Airlines brand. It was in the year of 2001 and the internet was in the early stages. Digital marketing was in the very early stages. I saw the opportunity to develop the digital presence. For American Airlines across 20 countries in Latin America, there was none before. I didn't know anything about digital marketing, but I saw the opportunity to first explore, learn. You learn by doing, and it was very hard in that time. You wouldn't have that. Found a digital marketing expert, they were like, pretty much nobody knew about it. So it was a great opportunity for me to learn that. And, and I, I lead that. I led the, the process that for developing the pres, the digital presence of American Airlines in Latin America. I think that moment, that project, which was a gigantic project, said the rest of my career, because I fall in love with digital. And up to today, you cannot talk about digital, you cannot talk about marketing if you don't talk about digital marketing. And the opportunity that I had to learn from when web, digital marketing was websites and banners. all the way to all the complexities that exist today, like a marketing technology ecosystem of over 10, 000 platforms and tools. And I saw it all throughout the time. I'm very curious. So I thought, not only I follow it, I follow it. I started it. I understood every single step. I think that, that really define My career.

Paul: 26:52

What was that first conversation like when you walked into American Airlines office with your, with your resume in your hand? Because, obviously, less than two weeks later you had the job, right? What did you say to anybody who was out there and thinking, I know who I want to work for, I know what I want to do. How did you get that result that you wanted?

Ivonne: 27:12

That's a, that's a super interesting story. Funny, but also I think encouraging for anyone to take the step. I, I didn't go for a specific interview or for a specific job. Actually, this was the agency of Global Agency for American Airlines in Dallas, Temerly McLean. I just knew that they were opening a new department and I went Ask him to talk to anyone in that department. I figured they are opening a new department. They are needing people. So I went and asked, Can I talk to anyone in this department? Of course, they say, Do you have an appointment? And then I don't think that you can see anyone. Do you have an appointment, etc. But I was so determined, especially when I knew I was so determined, especially when I knew I was going to be in a lot of trouble. It was the best agency in the region, the building was spectacular, and I thought, I'm not leaving. I'm not leaving until I can talk to anyone. pretty confident of my abilities to communicate to anyone and to show myself. I stay there with it's when luck and opportunity come together. So the receptionist, after 30 minutes, told me like, Hey, if what you're looking is the opportunities here, I don't think that you're going to talk to anyone today, but here's a, a list, and she handed over a piece of paper with all these depositions that are available. And when I read that one, they were looking for someone for American Airlines that was bilingual because it needed to manage Latin American, the Latin American region. And we experiencing Latin American markets, advertising, et cetera. So I thought, you This is me. They're looking for me. What is serendipity, right? And then I told her like, Hey, forget, I don't, I don't care about not talking to anyone, but I want to leave my resume for this position. And yeah, two weeks later I was working there and that was my next six years for the next six years.

Paul: 29:14

What an amazing story and fantastic self belief to be able to do that and have the confidence that you would. And I firmly believe that we make our own luck as much as we receive luck, right? I know that if you can draw on a wall and draw a door, sometimes when you knock on that door it will open and you've got to be brave enough to draw the door and believe in it enough that it will. So fantastic story Ivonne. It's been fantastic to have you along to the show today and I honestly, I could sit here and ask you questions for the next five or six hours. It's, it's some fascinating answers that you've come back with. If anybody who's listening along wants to find out a bit more, what's the best place for them to find out more about yourself or for any of the businesses that you're working with?

Ivonne: 29:58

The best place is LinkedIn, Ivonne Kinser. That's my, I'm the only one on LinkedIn. If you like what you heard about my book, you can find it on Amazon. I'll make sure that's in the link in the comments so nobody has to go looking around for it. But, thank you very much for your time Ivonne. It's been a privilege to have you along for the show. Hopefully you've enjoyed it as well. Thank you. for having take care. Bye bye. I'll see you next week on Marketpulse: Pros Pioneers