Creative Q&A: Euro RSCG India's Satbir Singh

I was well on my way to becoming a, er, respectable lawyer when my younger brother joined JWT as an art director. Very often, he’d bring work home and, like nearly everyone else, I’d be convinced that I could write better.

I found myself an appointment with Swapan Seth, then ECD with Trikaya Grey. Swapan asked me to locate an ad for Mauritius Tourism in a week-old Delhi newspaper and change the bodycopy keeping the headline.

Easy. But for a couple of minor problems. For instance, there was no internet those days. And, you had to look for a week-old Delhi newspaper in Calcutta.

To cut a long story short, I found the newspaper, the courage to write some 850 words and the job I thought I was looking for.

What was your first ever ad?

The first piece of work I did was in my first hour in advertising - a tag to go with a pair of Adidas tennis shoes. I wrote ‘Advantage You.’

What was your first ever job?

For a couple of months, straight out of college, I sold electronic typewriters and their accessories like carbon ribbons, daisy wheels and correction tapes. Daisy wheels were a disc like thingy with embossed fonts that you could keep changing to type letters in different, well, fonts.

In those days, auto spell-check was as effective as your secretary’s hold on grammar. And, correction tapes helped you ‘delete’ mistakes committed while typing.

A top-end electronic typewriter could store as many as, hold your breath, four letters.

What was your worst job ever?

While my first job as typewriter salesman doesn’t quite qualify as my 'worst' job, it wasn’t quite my type.

It was difficult explaining to secretaries, who didn’t take purchase decisions, why they needed different typefaces for different letters.

“Use Courier Italics to requisition air-conditioner repairs and American Typewriter for increment letters.” Bollocks.

What does it take to impress you?

It’s a trick question, right? And I’m not going to answer that in public.

Where do you go to be inspired?

Inspiration is seldom transactional. It’s also bit of a job coaxing it out of your system.

There’s been the odd occasion when one has found inspiration, willy nilly, in restrooms.

It’s mostly on my tattered, but immensely comfortable, couch in the study at home. I’m certain if I leave home for more than a couple of days with advance notice, the missus will have it reupholstered.

If you can spend one day with a celebrity or historical figure, who would it be? Why?

The first person that immediately sprang to mind was both, a celebrity and a historical figure. No, not Mickey Mouse, Marilyn Monroe. But then you think she’d be about 86 now and that kind of isn’t when you want to meet her.

So, I guess an award-winning cliché seems a better alternative: Gandhi.

Gandhi started perhaps the most viralled idea ever: non-violent, non-co-operation (ask Martin Luther King, Mandela or even the one at its receiving end, Mubarak). He also gave India a single-minded slogan targeted at the Brits: Quit India. He led Indians on the Salt March, a most splendid example of on-ground activation.

Gandhi’s 360 campaign would qualify for the mother of all Effies.

Wouldn’t it be interesting to know how he thought of it? Do you think he had a briefing format?

What is your guilty pleasure?

That would be pleading guilty, no?

If you have to come back as an animal, what would you be? Why?

I’m reasonably nocturnal so that limits my options to roughly half the animal kingdom.

What is the last book you read?

Eric Carle’s From Head to Toe. Read it out aloud to my three year-old son just last night. First chapter goes: “I am a penguin and I turn my head. Can you do it?” At this, the child says “I can do it.” And turns his head.

What is the first thing you do when you wake up?

An hour of intense Yoga, aimed at losing weight around my tummy, bolstering tantric sexual prowess for five hour-long love-making sessions like Sting and Trudie and generally improving bowel movement is something I’ve been planning for about ten years now.

But I make do with light exercises like stretching my arms as I yawn. Thereafter, I make myself a large mug of tea.

Worst haircut you’ve ever had?

Easiest to answer: I’m a Sikh and I’ve never had a haircut. In. My. Life. Which means when I’m partying, I can really let my hair down.

Describe your typical day.

3:00am Nearly the crack of dawn, the odd bird chirping insanely as it spots a hungover worm is when I go to sleep.

6:30am Wake up for the first of several times, the alarm clock must be prevented from waking neighbours up.

9:00am Drop son off at school.

10:00am Leave for office. Use gridlocked traffic to answer mail.

11:00am Arrive at the office.

11:02am Explain the virtue of punctuality to a junior writer walking in late.

12noon: Sit in on a creative meeting. Discuss briefs, ideas. Listen patiently to rants against servicing. Agree.

1:00pm Sit in on a servicing meeting. Discuss briefs, ideas. Listen patiently to rants against creative. Agree.

1:30pm After much deliberation and debate amongst senior management, decide on a lunch venue.

2:15pm Finish three-Martini lunch without any Martinis.

3:00pm Call teams to review new ideas. They ask for a half hour.

4:30pm Teams ready with ideas. I ask for a half hour.

7:30pm Call gym to cancel the 6:30pm appointment.

8:00pm Leave for home.

8:45pm Read bedtime story.

9:00pm Dinner.

10:45pm Search for a pen to write scripts.

10:46pm Find remote control.

10:47pm Find interesting stuff on tv.

2:00am Search for a pen to write scripts.

Can you suggest a question for our next Q&A candidate?

Money or idea?

What is the most exciting thing you see on the horizon for our industry? (Question supplied by Leo Burnett’s Andy DiLallo)

The most exciting thing on the horizon for our industry is the next season of Mad Men.

In other news, I believe that not only will more indies, creative shops open in India, more and more clients will invite them for their perspective on brand building in an interactive age. That’s going to be very exciting for many creative people with entrepreneurial energies.