Drugi jezik na kojem je dostupan ovaj članak: Bosnian
By: Ekrem Dupanović
The first snow of the season fell today in Sarajevo. It’s been falling all day. First snows somehow always remind me of the interview I did 45 years ago with Rade Šerbedžija in Belgrade, as a young volunteer at Radio Sarajevo. I remember the interview was arranged at breakfast time. Rade came down from his room with quite a hangover and wasn’t really in the mood for chit chat, especially not with a young and inexperienced journalist who begins the dialogue with those classic questions: When did you begin to pursue acting? What do you like most in the theater? And other nonsense. He was slowly becoming nervous, but when I asked him to recite some verses from his favorite song, I thought he was going to throw his plate at me. Sensing that the harassment was nearing its end, Rade quite calmly began to recite the song by Enes Kišević which begins like this: “Last night the drunks fell together with the snow.” I guess that’s why the first snowflakes always bring this interview back to my mind. 45 years ago I had a breakfast with Rade, today I had breakfast with Zvezdana Žujo, CEO of Communis, and Belma Hadžiomerović, head of marketing corporate communications and sustainability management for Raiffeisen Bank in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Again the story revolved around snow, as we commented on the snowfall outside, and again the story about a beginning. I’ve known Belma for 15 years, since she was employed in the marketing of Raiffeisen Bank, but only today she shared with me a detail from the beginning of her very successful career.
Belma came to the marketing of RZB right out of college, and she immediately took the position of Chief Marketing Officer. She did not know what exactly her job was, so she asked for a meeting with the Director of the Bank Edin Muftić. He referred her to Abid Jusić, head of general affairs, who told her: “I don’t know exactly what you should do, but here’s the marketing plan which was done for us last year by Ekrem Dupanović, so use that as your basis.” I remember that right around that time I had launched the Media Marketing magazine and that in one of the first issues I did interviews with several young people who almost simultaneously took the lead marketing positions in several banks in Bosnia. So I also did an interview with Belma. Today, I told her that after 15 years the time has come for a new interview in which, unlike the beginner’s steps, she will talk about the latest trends in banking marketing. There will also be some articles about new marketing campaigns that are launching these days, and one in particular. Classic. I’m always told all sorts of news, which all usually end with: “Please keep this information for yourself. Don’t even think about publishing this yet. It’s not the time.” So I continue being a silencetologist. Sorry!
Zvezdana came to Sarajevo 18 years ago to start Communis, and Raiffeisen Bank is a client of the Agency for 15 years now, from the very beginning of Belma’s marketing career. And since in a way I was also there from the very beginning, we had a myriad of things to talk about. I was – to be honest – most pleased with the fact that RZB and Media Marketing will soon establish business cooperation. For us it’s a great news for 2017.
Apart from the fact that Belma and I are both passionate yoga fans, and that we urged Zvezdana to try it, we talked a lot about work and how to use our synergies to make our jobs even better. The phones were ringing non-stop, but we did not pay attention to them. We focused on the most interesting topics, occasionally noting only that the snow was falling more intense. I answered only one call. It was Žarko Sakan, President of New Moment in Belgrade. He told me about how they got to work on another campaign for a client in India, and that he was delighted with the professionalism of the client and the conditions they agreed. We noted that this was a great year for New Moment. In addition to working for a large client from the US, now they have a second campaign in India. This is that Žaki’s idea that Balkan creativity can conquer the world in action. Apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. I hope that Saki is watching down on this from a star far above, smiling. We agreed that we would meet on Thursday in Belgrade and talk about everything.
When Belma and I started talking about the book The Best of Creative Directors, which should soon hit the presses, Zvezdana jumped in: “Oh no you won’t, not before you finish your first book Hotel Yugoslavia. I mean what are you thinking? You remember what you promised me?” As I drove to the restaurant where we agreed to meet for breakfast, I thought about what I would tell her if she asks this. If I try to excuse myself with two months of lying in bed and recuperating from injury, she would say: “That means you had just the chance to finish it.” I had to come up with a better excuse, but I had no idea what. All the time I was trying to give her no reason to ask me that, and then, with the book about creative directors, I slipped on a banana peel. I got away with it relatively cheap, with a firm promise, for the second time, that writing the few pages I still have left in the book will be my top priority.
On parting, we agreed to see each other in the evening, at the promotion of the Porsche Panamera, organized by Communis.
Two nights ago I had dinner with Vlatko Dimovski, regional director of McCann’s advertising agencies, and with Vesna Vlašić Jusupović, CEO of the agency McCann Sarajevo. Every conversation I have with Vlatko for me is like a cherry on top of a cake. His experience is immense, and his ability to identify trends and his vision about the direction in which the industry will continue to develop are huge. It would be unfair not to say that many interesting details of the conversation at the dinner table were tied to communication with Vesna, but wherever Vlatko is at the table, everyone knows whose word carries the most weight :) We are constantly trying to catch one another. When he’s in Sarajevo, we always meet. When I’m in Belgrade or Zagreb (where he now mostly resides), I always get in touch so we could meet. It relaxes me. With Vlatko, two plus two is always four. I must stop now because I’ll start talking about something that I know nothing about, and for which I was told is not for the public.
I ended the working part of the day with a long telephone call with Marija Vićić, head of corporate communications at I&F McCann Grupa. We will soon sign a contract with I&F McCann on strategic cooperation for the next year. I&F McCann is our strategic partner for three years now. We discussed the agenda for our meeting in Belgrade next Thursday. I really look forward to it.
The night slowly comes over Sarajevo together with the snow. It’s time to get ready and go to Panamera’s promotion.
Thursday, 3 November 2016.