D&AD Jury President and Kin Co-Founder, Kwame Taylor-Hayford discusses the value of creativity in solving social, environmental and economic problems. He shares what he looks for in the judging process and discusses advertising in the age of social responsibility.

For Taylor-Hayford, winning a Yellow Pencil is not only about creative and craft, the work needs to have purpose. “We think about a few areas that make the work truly groundbreaking. We think a lot about how the work is impacting the issue that it set out to impact, we think a lot about how the work is fit for purpose. Is it achieving what it was designed to achieve and there are a few other key criteria?”

He says that at least 50% of the jury has to agree that the work has achieved certain KPIs or impact. As the deliberations go on, they elevate the conversation from a Wood Pencil to a Graphite, to the iconic Yellow Pencil. The White and the more specifically the Black Pencils are reserved for work that is truly exceptional and has left its mark on the world. At this level a good idea on its own isn’t enough – a campaign has to have material impact.

“There’s an impact around the awareness it generates around a certain issue, but then that scale slides and you see that some of the projects led to deliberate behaviour change, some of the projects led to significant economic outcomes and some of the projects led to legislation and changes in how governments operate,” he explains.

There are many lessons to be learned from this enlightening conversation about what impact means today, from defining and maintaining goals of social change to navigating algorithms.

Originally broadcast on Adobe Live, the community where creatives share ideas online.