The brief: As part of Diageo's Press for Progress initiative, the company wanted to portray the talent and perspective that women bring to the company and showcase that Diageo is a progressive, diverse corporation to work for. International Women's Day on March 8th 2018 provided a perfect opportunity for us to publish a video series that portrayed some of the senior female employees at Diageo in a truly different, inspiring way: as human beings rather than as career women, as ambitious yet passionate.
The idea: This was not about the business woman nor the career woman - it was about their character and personality. Where did they come from? What makes them who they are? What gives them their perspective on life? What shaped them? We had to find a way to give them a safe environment to open up and talk about things that have challenged them in their lives and made them become who they are. The tone and approach had to be honest, caring and extremely intimate.
The project: Pre-production was vital: we spent a lot of time prepping each interviewee ahead of their shoot to reassure them that our approach was not to expose or take advantage of them but instead to show them as uniquely human beings in an honest and caring way. We purposely framed our shots so that they looked very open, wide and exposed to accentuate the personal level of the interviews.
The results: The interviewees' feedback was remarkable: 'a beautiful initiative', 'pure brilliance', 'terrific', 'so emotional'.
