ADGEEK
MANJA’s 16-person model: pricing expertise, protecting attention
Arvind Krishnan explains how MANJA’s lean, senior-led structure shapes its pricing, client choices and approach to growth. For agency founders, creative leaders and marketers, the conversation examines a difficult bargain: how to sell expertise and direct attention while building a business that can sustain both.
The conversation
Senior attention is finite. For Arvind Krishnan, Founder & CEO, MANJA, that fact shapes the economics of an independent creative agency as much as its creative output. In Episode 36 of The Indian AdGeek, he discusses with Vishal Mehra how a 16-person team, as described at the time of recording, works with limited management layers while keeping experienced practitioners close to clients and ideas.
His account of BBH London supplies a useful starting point: disciplines aligned around work that moves a product, supported by a willingness to listen. At MANJA, that focus carries into conversations about what the agency should take on, what it can deliver and how much attention each relationship deserves. Growth, he argues, should amplify the agency’s voice without diluting the involvement clients value.
The commercial choices are equally deliberate. Krishnan distinguishes value-based project pricing from retained relationships that commit defined portions of people’s time. Expertise accumulated over years cannot be adequately valued by counting the hours required to produce an answer. Yet procurement remains a negotiation, and competing agencies do not necessarily price the same work alike. He puts MANJA’s revenue mix at approximately 55–60% retainers and 40–45% projects, and argues that longer-term commitments provide a sounder basis for hiring than a temporary project win.
The discussion also corrects an easy caricature of independence. Declining work can reflect insufficient capacity, a capability mismatch or cultural fit; tactical assignments are not automatically unwelcome. Defining the real problem with clients matters more than devising a hard sell for a disruptive idea.
AI already helps MANJA gather and organise information and visualise early ideas, Krishnan says, while people must interpret and judge the results. Its potential to extend smaller teams’ delivery capabilities remains a possibility. His longer view of agency equity rests on culturally resonant work and the people an organisation develops: value that he believes can accumulate beyond an individual assignment.
Key Takeaways
- A flat agency still needs operational strength — MANJA’s limited layers depend on capable practitioners, a relatively large creative contingent and leaders who do the work themselves. Krishnan acknowledges the need for an operational layer; flatness does not remove the responsibility to organise and deliver.
- Price the expertise behind the answer — Krishnan prices projects around the value of the work, including the experience required to produce it, while accepting that procurement will negotiate. Retainers carry a different obligation: if an agency sells a defined share of someone’s time, it must actually reserve that capacity.
- A project win is a weak foundation for permanent hiring — Krishnan argues for expanding the team on the back of longer-term commitments, which can then create capacity for more projects. His approximate 55–60% retainer and 40–45% project revenue split describes MANJA at the time of the conversation, rather than a benchmark for other agencies.
- Senior access creates a ceiling on what an agency can accept — Krishnan describes declining projects when the leadership team could not give them sufficient attention. Adding partners could extend that capacity, he suggests, but only if they can sustain the same internal standard; headcount alone cannot fulfil the promise of senior involvement.
- Saying no is often a question of fit — Krishnan challenges the idea that MANJA refuses tactical work, pointing to sales campaigns as legitimate creative opportunities. Cultural incompatibility, a mismatch in capabilities and insufficient capacity are more precise reasons to decline than a blanket preference for supposedly higher-value briefs.
- AI can enrich the inputs without owning the judgment — Krishnan describes using AI to gather, organise and present information and to visualise early creative possibilities. People still have to interpret that material and decide what works; his hope that AI could extend small teams’ global delivery capabilities is a possibility, not an established outcome.
- Agency equity includes the work remembered and the people developed — Krishnan sees cultural impact as something that can compound into an agency’s reputation alongside its alumni’s achievements. He also acknowledges that this is difficult to measure and that MANJA is too young to claim that legacy yet.
Editorial analysis
An editorial interpretation of the conversation, distinguishing the guest’s arguments from verified business outcomes.
An agency built around finite senior time
The scarce resource in Arvind Krishnan’s account of MANJA is senior attention. A small agency can promise direct access to experienced practitioners, but every additional assignment draws on the same finite supply. He describes declining projects when the leadership team could not give them sufficient involvement. His possible route beyond that ceiling resembles a partnership: more leaders cultivating relationships, provided they can sustain a shared standard. Expansion should amplify the agency’s voice; simply adding people risks diluting what clients came to buy.
The two promises in projects and retainers
That makes the commercial model a practical expression of the creative promise. Krishnan distinguishes projects priced for the value of an answer from retained relationships that reserve people’s capacity. Experience accumulated over years cannot sensibly be valued only by the time spent producing a particular solution. Yet value-based pricing still involves negotiation, and rival agencies may price the same assignment very differently. Retainers carry their own discipline: selling a share of someone’s time means actually keeping that capacity available. His approximate revenue mix describes MANJA at the time, rather than a universal prescription.
Growing without a bureaucratic hierarchy
Growth follows the same logic. A temporary project win is an insecure basis for permanent hiring; longer commitments can support a team that subsequently takes on additional projects. Flatness, meanwhile, does not abolish operational responsibility. Krishnan describes experienced people remaining close to delivery and a relatively large creative contingent, while acknowledging the need for an operational layer. Nor does independence require rejecting tactical briefs. Sales campaigns can offer worthwhile creative problems; cultural incompatibility, inadequate capacity and a mismatch in capabilities are more useful reasons to decline work.
Find the problem before finding the idea
The interview’s creative argument is similarly grounded: spend time establishing the problem before rushing to answers. Krishnan recalls Amazon Music as a fulfilling collaborative process and credits receptive clients when discussing disruptive work. AI already helps his team gather and organise information and visualise possibilities, he says; people must still interpret the material and exercise judgment. His hope that technology could extend smaller teams’ global delivery remains a forecast. The longer-term ambition is harder to measure: culturally resonant work and people developed within the organisation might accumulate into agency equity. He recognises that MANJA is too young to claim that legacy.
Questions & answers
What constrains a small agency promising senior attention?
A promise of senior involvement creates a capacity ceiling. Krishnan sees selective acceptance and, eventually, partners held to a common standard as more credible responses than headcount growth alone.
How does a retainer differ economically from a project fee?
Project pricing and retainers sell different commitments. One values an answer and the expertise behind it; the other requires an honest reservation of people’s time, even while both remain subject to commercial negotiation.
When does an agency have enough certainty to hire?
Longer commitments can justify hiring that a short project cannot. Krishnan describes a reciprocal model in which stable relationships support a team and that team creates room for additional assignments.
What does flat structure still require?
Flatness needs capable operators. MANJA’s small team relies on experienced people doing the work and relatively few management layers, while Krishnan explicitly acknowledges the need for operational capacity.
Why should problem definition come before creative execution?
Problem definition is part of the creative work. The Amazon Music discussion emphasises finding a distinctive problem and voice through conversation before settling on an answer.
Sources & attribution
Original publisher audio (archived enclosure): Original publisher audio (archived enclosure).
Podcast episode on Spotify: Podcast episode on Spotify.
Podcast video on YouTube: Podcast video on YouTube.
Original publication: The Indian AdGeek, Episode 36, featuring Arvind Krishnan; original publisher date: 2026-10-12.
Method and attribution: This analysis and the five Q&As are editorial syntheses, not verbatim statements or substitutes for listening to the original conversation. Guest judgments, examples, forecasts and reported business metrics should not be confused with independently audited findings. Research timestamps do not represent podcast chapter timings.