How would you describe what your most recent work involved as a Creative at Google Creative Lab?
The Google Creative Lab is a team of interdisciplinary creatives within Google that shape the company’s storytelling. Or, in their words, “writing the fiction of science”. As one of the world’s biggest tech companies, its products, innovations and experiences centre around technical solutions, but how can the user connect to them? Through storytelling.

As a creative, my role was to support exactly that, creating the narrative, developing the core concept and shaping the creative direction of prototypes, campaigns, films, or products that allow the user to understand and connect to the brand and its products.

Would you say you need any specific training for what you do – in particular, your focus on AI?
The most important skill is being able to make things in whatever shape or form is most natural to you. For me, that is filmmaking and writing. By trying, sketching, writing it out yourself you go through the process of testing the idea and additionally your audience can more easily be invited in when they can already see it and feel it.

The focus on AI didn’t come through using AI tools, even though that can be incredibly helpful – but came much more through learning about and reflecting on its positioning in culture and its impact on how we work, think, learn, and create. With technology, and especially emerging innovations like AI, storytelling becomes the pencil. You can write its context; you can draw how people see it. That creates the bridge to understanding the product.

What’s been your favourite project to work on from the past year, and why?
There have been many great projects I was lucky to have been a part of at Google. From the global Google Pixel 9 campaign to the Google Doodle for Earth Day and its film (above), one that holds a special place in my heart is the launch of Google’s AI Bard [now called Gemini]. It was my first project at the lab and the brief was “make it famous”. We were given the space and time to experiment with how we could do that, and developed hundreds of prototypes across the global team. In the end it was two of us, in my kitchen in London, filming on a phone, within a couple of hours and with the resources we had at hand.

It became one of the most viewed social reels in the company’s history.

Could you tell us more about your multimedia installations that reflect on the influence of technology on society?

A few years ago, I started creating multimedia installations that paved the way for me to get a job as a creative in tech. I wanted to add a perspective on the role technology has in society and its development.

Studying at the Royal College of Art during a global pandemic, all our communications and everything we created in the programme was through a computer. It changed my perspective on ownership, identity and expression in relation to technology, so I visualised that and called it NFMe. It was critically acclaimed and exhibited worldwide.

What was your journey like when you were first starting out?
I always wanted to be a multidisciplinary creative, but that meant a difficult start due to having to explain my skill set and role a lot more, and needing to find or make a space where that can be not only useful, but valuable.

Luckily, the industry is now more interdisciplinary than ever, and you can combine any field of interest whilst having never-before-granted access to all the tools you’re curious about, and opportunities to learn skills.

Was it difficult? Yes. Would I do it again? Absolutely. I've always preferred to nurture the multidisciplinary spark rather than not being challenged in my full potential. In the meantime, you gain resilience, expand your skill set, make uncertainty a friend and be a sponge. Something always comes out of something.

How did you go about landing your first few jobs?
After graduating from university, I used the momentum to submit my work to open calls, platforms and competitions, which was very successful in terms of just getting my name out there.

From there, it’s all about building your network and keeping in touch with companies and agencies, even if they have nothing available at that moment. Having those conversations can be essential to keep you on their radar – even more so when you’re freelancing. And finally, something that I recommend in case you do get a rejection for a job offer is a feedback call, which can be incredibly valuable. Once, it even got me the job. So not every closed door is locked.

What has been your biggest challenge along the way?
Since I’ve gone down the multi-disciplinary route, the biggest challenge has been believing in and standing for it. It’s like the famous saying: “A jack of all trades is a master of none” – until I discovered that the quote continues, “…but oftentimes better than a master of one”. Multi-disciplinarity doesn’t compromise mastery when it comes to work.

In terms of storytelling, it allowed me to focus less on which tool I should specialise on and more on originality and the ability to see and express things. That’s the beauty of creativity: it has neither rules nor limits, and you can make your own. But [discovering] that was a big challenge.

That, and full-on imposter syndrome. However, in my opinion, that is one of the best things to have. It’s a sign that you’re surrounded by people whose talent pushes you out of your comfort zone, which means you’re in the right environment.

How important are social media and self-promotion to your work?
I have a love-hate relationship when it comes to social media.

One the one hand, most people I’ve met in the industry so far look at social media and websites equally when considering potential collaborations or candidates, as do I. These are different sources that help frame you, and I believe in using all [resources] available to give the world the best idea of you and your work. You can share, connect, present, invite, and stand out with just a tap, and build an audience you can create for and with.

On the other hand, it’s essential to not look at social media too much. There is an overload of other people’s work floating in a very saturated digital world, and with every scroll, everything looks bigger, better and challenges your originality. To then be able to come up with never-before-seen ideas gets harder and harder when you’re feeding yourself other people’s ideas. So, as much as you should put your work out there and contribute to the beautiful world of works, sometimes I believe in switching it off and creating your own.

Have there been any courses, programmes, initiatives, access schemes or job boards you’ve found helpful or would recommend to get into your sector?
The Intensives at Parsons [School of Design in New York] are great programmes to dive into a different discipline for a few weeks or months. Other universities most often have these short courses or programmes as well, which I’ve found super interesting. Other than that, conferences! Sounds boring, but they’ve been incredibly inspiring. Especially DLD, Forward Festival, Cannes Lions and D&AD New Blood Festival.

And finally – or should I say obviously – the Google Fiver programme.

What advice would you give to someone looking to get into a similar role?
Don’t look for quick gratification and external validation, but focus on what matters to you and what you’re curious about. Learn the skills to do it, and embrace the journey.

You should also want to [work in] a certain studio, company or role, set your goal to get there, and believe you will achieve it. Then it’s all about talking to people and sharing your work. It does not have to be work you’ve done for previous companies or clients; the ones that resonated with the most people were projects and experiments that I did just because I was curious and passionate about trying them out. This is something that may seem obvious, but is often forgotten.

Those [projects] give you an outstanding “signature” because you invite people into your world; into what you are able to do when you’re free to do it.

Finally, my advice would be to do it! Storytellers are change makers and create connections through creativity. And besides it being a privilege and joy to do, it is very much needed.