Ogilvy’s star shone very brightly at the 2016 Loerie Awards with an abundance of awards handed out, including the cream of the crop as Ogilvy EMEA was announced as the top ranked agency network in Africa & the Middle East.

That’s little wonder with the likes of Pete Case, chief creative officer of Ogilvy South Africa, ranked as top chief creative officer 2016, who has been in the role for 1.5 years and works across all creative in the group; Mariana O’Kelly, executive creative director for Ogilvy JHB, ranked as top ECD 2016, who has been with the agency for six years and is currently working on her tolerance and resilience levels as well as new work on KFC, DStv, Castle and a few smaller projects; Tseliso Rangaka, executive creative director for Ogilvy Cape Town, ranked as fifth best ECD 2016 who has been with the agency for three years now and is currently working on “everything”; and Katie Mylrea, senior art director for Ogilvy JHB, one of this year’s Young Creative winners. She has been at the agency for almost six years and is currently working on several projects for Metropolitan, Volkswagen, SAB and NSRI…

Ogilvy JHB with the Grand Prix for KFC's 'Everyman Meals' - Mariana O'Kelly is far left, Pete Case is far right.

From left to right: Jimmy Smith, CEO of Amusement Park Entertainment, Los Angeles; Nicholas Wittenberg, ECD at Ogilvy & Mather CT; Xolisa Dyeshana, ECD at Joe Public and chairman of the Creative Circle; Alison Hingle, associate creative director at Ogilvy & Mather CT; and Tseliso Rangaka, ECD at Ogilvy & Mather CT.

Katie Mylrea, one of 2016's Adams & Adams Young Creatives Award recipients.

Here they share how they feel about their wins, plans to extend their winning streak next year and who they admire most in the industry…

1. Share your top three emotions linked to your Loeries wins and 2016 rankings.

Case: Stoked for our teams and clients, happy that the hard work paid off and humbled by receiving so many accolades from our industry peers.

O’Kelly: Gratefulness, ‘screaming cat’ emoji, ‘waving hands in the air’ emoji.

Rangaka: Pride, gratitude, optimism.

Mylrea:

• Proud. I'm really proud of Ogilvy & Mather this year. We've all worked really hard, done some great work and it's awesome to see us at the top of the charts again.
• Inspired. There was a lot of great work this year, and the bar was raised considerably from last year. The work coming out of South Africa is fresh and agencies are pushing boundaries. It's great to be a part of that.
• Motivated. Every time I see a list with someone else's name above mine it drives me to do better. I want to be at the top of that list, doing the best work in South Africa. It's something any of us can achieve if we just focus and put in the required effort. And never sleep.

2. How do you plan on keeping – if not bettering – your rankings next year?

Case: There’s always a constant creative agenda within Ogilvy to push for great work that adds value to our clients’ brands. So we’ll keep pushing the same way we’ve always done next year – but with a halo of joy from our achievements this year and a feeling that we’re pushing in the right direction.

O’Kelly: The combination of a great brief, the most talented team and a brave and trusting client is only great on paper unless there’s magic added to it. And magic isn’t something I can sit and plan. It’s that wonderful added ingredient of grace and favour that lands on our heads every now and again and makes all the difference to anything I could ever have dreamt of planning myself.

Rangaka: We are in the fortunate position to work with some of the best brands out there. We also have a team of extremely talented and passionate people eager to do amazing work on those brands. If each one of our clients got to produce a piece of communication that excited them and moved their business forward, that would be amazing.

Mylrea: Working hard and smart. I think it's important to keep the momentum up, turn every brief into an opportunity and push boundaries.

3. How does this year’s Loeries flock differ from your haul last year?

Case: We improved our overall performance dramatically from last year – with our JHB office moving from third to first place in the regional tables and our CT office moving from 11th to third in the same tables. Both of these agencies placing first and second respectively in the SA ‘large agency’ tables. Additionally, we picked up our sixth Grand Prix in a row. The other big change for us was winning in such a broad number of categories. We’ve been pushing our craft hard in the integrated space as an agency and this was reflected by those wins.

O’Kelly: For the first few weeks after Loeries the statues go to the teams that did the work, so they would be on different desks throughout the agency. After that, they go on the agency’s awards shelf.

Rangaka: This year was undoubtedly better than 2015 in that regard. We are still working on a new layout for our studio, so at the moment the birds are still caged and in their boxes. They’ll soon take up their rightful place.

Mylrea: My Loerie for Young Creative is sitting proudly on my desk. It's a reminder of what I can achieve if I put my mind to it.

4. Tell us who you personally admire in the industry – both an established mentor figure as well as a newcomer making waves.

Case: There are many great people driving the creative and business agenda forward in our industry. It’s one reason that South Africa punches far higher than our size as a country when we enter international awards. This year it was fabulous to see Nunu Ntshingila step into the Hall of Fame after everything she’s done for our industry. From a newcomer point of view it was also wonderful to see the Young Creative talent award going to Katie Mylrea from Ogilvy Cape Town.

O’Kelly: There are so many people I admire in our industry, I could write an ode about them all! It would be about the independent ones, the old wise ones, the transformed ones, the parental ones, the strong brave ones, the young crazy no rules ones. And it would say something at the end about how they have all pushed me forward and made me believe there’s always a way to make things better.

Mylrea: I work under such awesome creative leaders every day at Ogilvy & Mather that push me to do my best. Prabashen Pather, Mike Martin, Alison Hingle and Tania Barker are just a few that have guided, taught and led me into the creative I am today. Working for leaders as humble, yet ambitious as Pete [Case] and Tseliso [Rangaka] has been amazing and taught me that arrogance doesn't have to be attached to success. Their drive and ambition for our agency pushes and inspires all of us to achieve great things.

I also have a lot of respect and admiration for Safaraaz Sindhi. He is a talented writer at Ogilvy & Mather who won Young Creatives last year [and ranked as third best writer this year]. He went on to win the TV Grand Prix for his hugely entertaining Chicken Licken spot. He not only works hard, but also clearly enjoys what he does – this is evident in the work that he produces.

Rangaka: I would like to take my hat off to Molefi Thulo, [ranked as top creative director for 2016], and the radio dream team from our Johannesburg office. In just three years, they have managed to do what only few can achieve in their entire careers. What’s even more amazing is that they’ve managed to do this while keeping their heads fairly proportional in size to their bodies.

Looking forward to seeing what 2017 holds! Click through to our Loeries special section for more and be sure to follow Ogilvy JHB and Ogilvy CT on Twitter.