What makes the client relationship work

An editorial interpretation of the conversation, distinguishing the guest’s arguments from verified business outcomes.

A CEO’s balance sheet of trust

Kunal Jeswani describes agency leadership through relationships, people and financial discipline. Reflecting on his move from India to Singapore and Malaysia, he distinguishes familiar business mechanics from the harder work of earning trust in a new environment. In India, established colleagues and mentors provided a strong support system; moving markets meant building relationships again and working with a more culturally varied team. His ambition across ASEAN is to connect specialist capabilities while recognising the distinct teams and conditions in each market.

Unfinished ideas and honest client relationships

For Jeswani, a CEO should remove obstacles that prevent teams from serving clients well. Good relationships allow direct, honest conversations about both problems and successes. He recalls learning from Piyush’s habit of sharing ideas with clients as they occurred, without waiting for a finished presentation: the gesture showed continuing attention to the client’s business. His account of repairing a difficult Tata Motors relationship adds a qualification: trust requires commitment from both sides, sustained listening and shared goals that can be reviewed over time. It cannot be restored by an agency’s promise alone.

How creative pride becomes operational

Creative ambition also needs room to operate. In Singapore, Jeswani says tightly allocated client time had squeezed proactive work. He and his creative partner set an ambition for work people would feel proud to share personally, with awards treated as one possible outcome. Commercially, he criticises unpaid pitching and negotiating fees after substantial creative effort has already been invested. He then qualifies his criticism of process: people do manage new-business pipelines, but he believes the industry should manage them better. On existing accounts, he separates extra time spent on unchanged deliverables from poorly defined scope, and explains why estimates must account for each client’s approval hierarchy and working processes.

Using AI to improve the work

Jeswani’s AI argument centres on improving quality. He describes using an assistant to challenge a problem definition, explore alternative solutions and sharpen execution, while people evaluate the results at every stage. He allows that some research tasks may become easier, but warns that removing strategists, creatives or account managers to cut costs risks weaker work. He also points to social platforms, commerce and influencers as connected shifts in client demand. For newcomers, his advice is to master changing tools while preserving the independent thought and creative judgment that give those tools a useful purpose.