After 16 years of working in the Advertising Industry in big entrepreneurial Agencies, for local or international clients I have now gained enough theoretical knowledge and practical experience to successfully build brands and lead communication projects as a freelance consultant, together with a carefully selected mobile team of specialists in design, copywriting, digital, events, PR or media with whom I worked closely along the years.

Among other big national campaigns, one key project I coordinated while at GMP has been the rebranding of Cosmote & Romtelecom into Telekom. A successful, tough and very interesting journey with many learnings along the way. PROJECT. The Telekom rebranding in a nutshell was about making the country "magenta" for a while (and that kind of explains a lot :-)). National campaign, many zeros budget, 360 touch points, very tight deadlines, extended client-agency team, multiple decision makers (both local and international), very ambitious creative objectives but a very strict brand guideline with little room for play. CLIENT. Combining two very distinct corporate cultures, such as the passive "state employee" culture in a Romanian state owned company (Romtelecom) with the more reactive "entrepreneurial spirit" in a Greek company (Cosmote) made it hard to fit the expectations of a rigorous, proactive "structured planning" management style of a German company (Telekom). Wish I had anticipated how this clash of cultures and personalities would reflect in both their internal team dynamic and in their collaboration with us, but I learned the hard way. TEAM. A big team, juggling the pressure of big clients, requires not so much management but rather leadership skills. So I polished my micromanagement OCD to extinction, I learned to pick the right team player for each job, empowering and motivating them and, thus, delegate more freely. I had to lose some players along the way, find better ones to replace them all the while keeping a balance between tight budgeting, my team's satisfaction and meeting the client's objectives. MY OWN LIMITS. Balancing long working hours, stressful projects, tight deadlines, restrictive budgets, client pressure and demands, internal teams frustrations and creative egos have not always been a bliss but it sure was a journey I had a lot to learn from about myself, my values, my limits and how much I can stretch them.

Coordinating the communication for 2 of the top 3 clients in the Agency.- Rompetrol- Raiffeisen Bank Motivate and inspire the Accounts team.Providing support, managing the client's expectations & acting as a brand and communication consultant.Supervising the support departments involved in a project: from initial brief to post-evaluation report.Managing the client's communication budgets. Monitoring KPI's and suggesting corrective measures.

Assisting as a Strategy Consultant on various branding and communication projects for local start ups or well established brands.

Branding projects- brand background: assessing the strategic premises for the upcoming brand;- brand foundation: establishing the brand basics - objectives, market approach, positioning, personality, values, promise & essence;- brand construction: developing the brand identity (visual & verbal), brand intended associations and brand communication matrix;- brand evaluation: brand assessment & brand audit. Brand Communication planning- market, competition and target assessment, identifying opportunities & threats;- developing brand communication strategy, including creative planning & touch points mix;- supervising the creative process from the strategy alignment p.o.v.;- evaluating brand and communication KPI's and suggesting corrective measures.

Coordinating the implementation (from initial client brief to postevaluation report) for all Direct Marketing campaigns conducted by Philip Morris Romania.