Meet the Whippets: Grace Fox, Account Director

Grace Fox joined Whippet after spending her entire career client-side, bringing with her a unique perspective on what clients really want, what creative teams need to do their best work, and how to bridge the gap between the two. Whether she's navigating competing priorities, challenging a brief (constructively, of course), or helping brands stay true to themselves, Grace believes the best work starts with asking better questions.

We caught up with Grace to talk agency life, great client service, creative collaboration and why the strongest brands rarely chase the crowd.

Q: You spent your entire career client-side before joining Whippet. What was the biggest misconception you had about agency life before making the move?

A: The pace. Client-side, you're immersed in one brand's world. In agencies, you're thinking about multiple brands, multiple projects and multiple deadlines all at once. It's a constant juggling act.

Our weekly resource meetings are probably the best example of that. Seeing everything happening across the studio in a single week is pretty mind-blowing. It's fast-paced, sometimes chaotic, but in the best way.

What surprised me most, though, was the culture. We're a busy agency and there's always plenty happening, but people genuinely make time for each other. If a project needs extra input, people don't hesitate to jump in and help.

I also love how passionate everyone is about the work. People here will argue for the right creative solution, not simply the safest one, and I think that's a really special thing.

Q: Now that you've experienced both sides of the table, what's something agencies wish clients understood, and vice versa?

A: It all comes back to the brief.

A rushed brief almost always leads to rushed work, so taking the time to properly understand the challenge at the start is invaluable. A conversation is always better than an email because it gives you the chance to ask questions, uncover the small details and really understand what problem you're trying to solve.

On the flip side, I know how complicated approval processes can be. While agencies are often pushing for feedback to keep projects moving, clients might be juggling multiple stakeholders, legal teams and senior decision-makers behind the scenes. There's often far more happening than we can see.

The best briefs don't just tell you what needs doing - they explain why. They're also honest about what hasn't worked. That kind of openness gives the creative team a much stronger foundation and removes a lot of the guesswork.

Q: Having worked in brand marketing before moving into account management, how has your understanding of great client service changed over the years?

A: Great client service isn't about saying yes to everything.

It's about building enough trust that you can challenge a client's thinking when you genuinely believe there's a better way forward. Sometimes the most valuable thing you can say is, ‘I don't think that's the right approach, and here's why.’

Having spent years in clients’ shoes also means I naturally find myself anticipating the conversations happening behind closed doors. I'll often be in a creative review thinking: ‘legal is never going to approve that headline.’

That perspective helps us think ahead, avoid unnecessary surprises and make recommendations that work creatively and commercially. At the end of the day, the goal is always the same: helping clients achieve the best possible outcome.

Q: You've worked across a variety of brands throughout your career. What do the strongest brands always seem to have in common?

A: They know exactly who they are.

There is often temptation to try and appeal to everyone, but the strongest brands resist that. They have a clear point of view, they're distinctive, and they stick to what they know.

Consistency isn't the most glamorous part of marketing, but it's probably one of the most important. It's what helps people recognise and remember your brand over time.

That's become even more important in recent years because consumers are incredibly switched on. They'll spot inauthenticity instantly, and social media means brands are held accountable faster than ever before.

It's no longer enough to simply say the right things. Brands have to genuinely live their values and follow through on what they promise.

Q: You moved from Australia to the UK. Has working in different markets changed your perspective?

A: Definitely.

I loved working in Australia, but one of the reasons I moved was the opportunity to work on larger, globally recognised brands.

Being involved with businesses like Marks & Spencer has given me exposure to projects on a completely different scale, which has been hugely rewarding.

The M&S Money rebrand has been the highlight so far. Watching the whole journey from strategy through to concept development and then seeing everything come to life in-store was incredibly rewarding.

It was a long project with countless iterations, but seeing it finally launch made every stage of the process worthwhile.

As for cultural differences... I had to learn what Percy Pigs and Colin the Caterpillar were pretty quickly!

Q: What have creative teams taught you about approaching problems differently?

A: To sit with the problem for a little longer.

As an account director, your instinct is often to find the quickest solution so projects stay on schedule. But working with creatives has taught me that sometimes it's worth resisting that urge.

Rather than jumping to the first answer, they'll ask, ‘What if we looked at this another way?’ More often than not, that extra thinking leads to a much stronger solution.

People think account management is all meetings and emails, but there's a huge amount of planning, prioritising and expectation management happening behind the scenes. Sometimes it feels like a giant game of Tetris, making sure the right people are working on the right things at exactly the right time.

At the end of the day, that's really what good account management is: creating the space for great creative work to happen. When everyone feels heard, everyone knows where they're heading, and the team has what it needs to do its best work, that's when the strongest ideas come to life.