When I joined Nomads in Dubai in September 2015, I walked into an office of four people. It became the start of an entrepreneurial creative journey like no other - without any investors or sugar daddies but with the exceptional talent of people like Alex Paquin and Adam Fierman.
Two and a half years later, it's fair to say we struck a chord. In the last few months of 2017 alone we saw a succession of business wins and 11 new talents join Nomads. They're the people in the group picture: Ahmed from Egypt, Ann from the Philippines, Michel from Canada, Leila from Algeria, Casey from the UK, Natalie from Jordan, Patricia from Brazil, Nadine from Lebanon, Dominic from the UK, Brence from India and Braden from Canada. And then in the first month of 2018, Head of Art Ryan from South Africa and Creative Directors Nayaab from India and Joy from Lebanon joined the ranks too.
When I started this Nomads thing in 2015, I had no expectations of the journey ahead. The office I walked into had serviced the global Emirates Airlines account but now it had empty seats and, weirdly enough, smelled like cat pee. It might have looked depressing to most people but to me it felt like a blank canvas. I made it my ambition to become an agency where great people develop great work and have heaps of fun while at it.
It's been incredible to see that staying close to what you believe in can be so successful. Hardly ever does it feel like we're compromising on our principles, yet multinationals have forged long-lasting relationships with us. And seeing great talents switch big network agencies to join us, has been an even greater reward. Growing from a situation in which we had to do everything ourselves to having a Content Producer, a Head of Design, a Traffic Manager, a Finance Director, a Managing Director, a Digital Strategist and an Office Manager made me realize that starting with little to nothing actually makes you discover what you're really capable of. And it's something that doesn't just apply to me. Every new talent we're able to hire is the result of the efforts that every single one of us puts in every day.
There's a lot that can still be improved or achieved, but when I walk into the office each morning and see people working on beautiful ideas, hear laughter and music, see dogs running around, a baby being breastfed, the mood charged with ambition, I realize that we're also creating our own favorite place to work.
I'm excited to see where the journey will take us next.

