Vanderbilt University

When an outside agency's brand equity concepts didn't land with leadership, the internal team stepped in to pitch their own. I led the concepting — developing three distinct campaign directions, each with its own name, core message, emotional appeal, and brand rationale. The work was collaborative: brainstorming with copy, design, PR, and brand, then writing solo, workshopping the messaging as a team, and watching the design team bring it to life across mockups showing how the language would translate IRL — coffee cups, wheat paste posters, billboards, bus stops, pop-up carts, print collateral, and social.

The brief: make Vanderbilt stick in the mind of a new kind of leader — skip the legacy and prestige. Focus on warmth and authenticity, and speak to a generation redefining what leadership actually means.

The campaign territory that emerged — Leadership, Redefined — was designed to travel across OOH, digital, and experiential activations in Vanderbilt's satellite markets.