JKR's electrifying advice for creatives gave me actual tingles

Tosh Hall, Global Chief Creative Officer at JKR just shared the agency's 10 principles for success in a genuinely electrifying keynote at OFFF Barcelona 2026. The showreels interspersed into the advice were indicative of the agency's huge success working with iconic brands (they didn't win last year's BIA best of show as a fluke y'know!). Seeing so many stellar projects fused together invoked genuine tingles - especially the Olympic sonic design made out of heartbeats. Also included was that groundbreaking Burger King rebrand as well as work for Budweiser, Paramount, Blood Cancer United, Dunkin', Yahoo and more.

While we got a full explanation of all 10 principles in the room, Tosh ended the presentation by recommending we just pick three (and if not three, then just try one). So that's what I'll do here – pick three. JKR itself picks one a year to swear by, FYI – last year it was 'Celebrate Wins', and this year it's 'Demand More'. There is also Question Everything, Tell Better Stories, It's All About the Idea and Find the Joy to pick from.

01. Hunt the opportunity

Some briefs are terrible, Tosh tells us. You have to search for the opportunity to make something amazing out of a functional client brief.

"We got a terrible brief once," Tosh said. "They said, hey we want to make a summer camp with Budweiser. There were a lot of weird things in there. We were like, maybe we should completely change the entire brand rather than just make it for summer.

"We got a crazy brief for a donut company. We were like, we're going to make it about coffee. So we need a new logo about coffee – we want it to be a coffee cup. And we were like, you've already got it. So maybe you should just drop the donuts!"

02. Look Back to Look Forward

JKR is known for its creative strategy of looking back through a brand's design history to inform the next design path, with a reel of projects including the Burger King and Yahoo rebrands, and the Jack Daniels redesign that changed nothing (remember "Don't worry we haven't touched the whiskey"?). Tosh encouraged the room to look back again and again until you find something - "because there's always something," he said.

"Sometimes you look back, and there's one amazing thing. Let's pull it from the past and you find a new, old, cool logo. You're like, sweet, what else shall we do? Well then you've got to go forward and make all kinds of new things. Not everything's in the past.

"Sometimes you go back and there's nothing. Poof. We're f*cked. It's black. What are we going to do? Turns out there's always something. Even if it's new. It could be the founders, it could be what makes us different. What are values are. Things we love. How we see the world."

03. Trust Your Gut

"It's easy, right? We all have guts," Tosh joked. Though it may be one of the hardest things to do – have conviction in your ideas – as a creative you'll have an instinctive reaction about whether or not you believe in an idea. And you should trust that.

"Sometimes you know right away. Sometimes you know when you have your second idea. Sometimes you get lost in the wilderness and you have no ideas. That's when you need your gut."

Tosh uses the New York Philharmonic rebrand as an example with the showreel proclaiming: "Is it about the conductor? The orchestra? The building? The culture? The donors? The music? For us it was only one thing. New York Motherfucker. Most orchestras speak to patrons and donors, their identities made for designers, insiders. This orchestra belongs to New York."

For more advice from OFFF 2026, see Uncommon co-founder Nils Leonard's tips for creative success. And look out for our webinar series on How to win at Branding, coming soon.