McCann China hires Ng Tian It for CCO role

McCann Worldgroup China has hired Ng Tian It out of DDB to fill the vacant Chief Creative Officer position. It is a return to the network for Tian It, who in the early 2000’s was the ECD of McCann Singapore.

Tian It leaves DDB China where he has been for nearly a year after joining from Saatchi & Saatchi Shanghai. He moved to China with BBDO/Proximity Beijing where he was Executive Creative Director. Previously he was with Lowe & Partners as the Global Creative Director on Unilever’s Clear haircare brand and Chief Creative Officer of Lowe Singapore.

Previously in 2007, he was the Executive Creative Director of Lowe China, taking charge of the creative for the region.

Commenting on this appointment Lin said, “Tian It is among the best creative leaders in the ad industry. This is a significant step for MWG China to further boost our creative performance since we’ve been continuously evolving in this highly competitive marketplace. You can see his passion for people and creativity in every piece of work that he does. With Ng’s creative leadership, we’re confident to raise the bar even higher for delivering better work and attracting more top talents to join us.”

This will be Tian It’s second stint with McCann and his first tenure was 13 years ago when he was Executive Creative Director of the Singapore office. During the four-year period, Tian It had led its transformation into a creative powerhouse with notable business and creative wins, notching every international/regional/local award ranging from Cannes, D&AD, One Show, Clio to Spikes and Adfest, etc, year in and year out.

“There are 3 things that have drawn me to McCann: Being “home”; being in Shanghai and being with the right team. Their phenomenal turnaround is no fluke as it merely attests to the fact that anything is possible with the right people. I have a niggling feeling that the latest Campaign Asia Agency of the Year accolade is only the beginning.” said Tian It.

A graduate with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Illustration from Otis/Parsons School of Design in Los Angeles, Tian It’s early commercial commissions can be found in the non-swimsuit editions of Sports Illustrated. Returning to Singapore in 1993, he exchanged the heady fumes of colored magic markers for the terrifying starkness of the blank layout pad as a self-taught art director.

The leap paid off. What followed was a productive period when he quietly honed his love for advertising by building blue chip brands in some of Singapore’s top ad agencies. In a short spell, Tian It rose from junior art director in a small local shop to become Executive Creative Director of some of Singapore’s best known international agencies and served many global brands such as McDonalds, Unilever, Singapore Airlines, IKEA, Citibank, Singapore Tourism Board and MasterCard.

With more than 300 international awards to his name, Tian It has built a reputation for helming creative departments where talented people want to join and creating work clients such as Qualcomm, Volkswagen and Mars Foods believe in.

Among the many reasons for his return to MWG is his romantic notion of sharing a name card with his TV idol – Don Draper (main character from Mad Men). “In this world where life imitates art and art becomes life”, said Tian It. “anything’s possible.” And that’s not the fume of the magic markers talking.

Meanwhile, Stephen Mui has resigned for family reasons and left the agency at the end of November 2015.  Jesse Lin said, “In the past two years, Stephen Mui has been a wonderful colleague and worked hard to build and strengthen our creative capability across all disciplines. I sincerely thank Stephen for his great contribution and best wishes to him and his family.”