Sometimes the greatest obstacle is not the competition, but the belief that a particular opportunity is intended for someone from a larger country, a better-known agency or a more developed creative market. Svetlana Ćopić, Creative Director at Block & Roll and founder of No Agency, went to Cannes with precisely that doubt and returned as the first representative of Serbia and the entire region to take part in the See It Be It program.
The program is held as part of the Cannes Lions festival and has brought together up to 20 women and non-binary people in senior creative positions for more than a decade. Selected participants take part in intensive workshops, one-to-one mentoring sessions and meetings with leading industry figures, while gaining access to parts of the festival and professional circles that usually remain outside the standard program.
More than 1,000 applications were submitted for this year’s cycle by established creative directors, strategists and other female creatives from around the world. Svetlana was among fewer than two percent of the selected candidates.
“I was convinced that the program was intended for some larger and more important countries, agencies and creatives. After all, what were the chances of me being selected among fewer than 2% from more than 1,000 established creative directors, strategists and female creatives who, for lack of a better word, are absolutely killing it around the world? The fact that I am the first person from Serbia and our entire region to go through this program means only one thing to me: now it is my turn to be an example to someone else that it is possible and that it is worth trying. ‘Pass it on,’ as we used to say when playing as children,” Svetlana says.
Her experience in Cannes therefore did not remain at the level of a personal professional achievement. By joining the See It Be It community, she became part of a network comprising around 150 former participants from different parts of the world, while this year’s program also brought her 18 new friendships that she believes will last a lifetime.
She describes the sense of support she encountered as particularly important, having never experienced anything similar in the industry before. This community is one of the program’s central values, created to offer senior female creatives a space for exchanging experiences, mentoring and mutual empowerment.
The need for such initiatives remains visible in the numbers. Globally, women account for only 17 percent of creative directors and just one percent of agency founders. Behind discussions about equality, therefore, remains a very concrete question: who is given the opportunity to lead creative teams, make decisions and build their own agencies?
Svetlana’s selection for the program moves the answer at least one step closer to our region. Her message to female creatives considering applying is not that they must first become sufficiently established, visible or internationally recognized. The message is that they should apply even before they stop doubting their own place among the best.
The new application cycle for See It Be It will open in the autumn. Thanks to the first representative of Serbia and the region, future candidates will no longer have to imagine whether being selected is possible. They now have someone who has already taken that path before them.
