Spikes Asia 2026: Meet the Design & Industry Craft jury president

Anticipation is building for Spikes Asia, Asia-Pacific's most prestigious and sought-after awards for creativity and marketing effectiveness, which is returning for 2026. 

This year's awards are once again breaking new ground, with new categories and a highly esteemed panel of jury presidents that is more diverse and representative of the industry across APAC than ever before. 

Atiya Zaidi, CEO and chief creative officer at BBDO Pakistan, is among the 2026 jury presidents heading up the Design and Industry Craft category.  She is also the first Spikes jury president to hail from Pakistan and is the first from her country to win a Glass: The Lion for Change at Cannes Lions 2023. Zaidi was selected for the Cannes Lions See It Be It in 2017 and later returned to the programme, which is designed to accelerate the careers of women and non-binary talent, for the 2025 cohort.

In this interview with Campaign, Zaidi explains the innate ability of Pakistani creatives to thrive under constraint, how younger female creatives are applying new confidence and how AI tools are shaping the work. She also sets the bar for what she wants to see in the Design and Industry Craft submissions from across APAC. 

As the first Spikes jury president from Pakistan, tell us one attribute of Pakistani creativity that sets it apart from other markets?  To what extent is creative work from Pakistan misunderstood?

One attribute of Pakistani creativity that truly sets us apart is our ability to turn constraint into originality. We do not create in perfect conditions. We create despite imperfect conditions. Limited resources and budgets, cultural complexity, social tension, political, religious, and cultural censorship are a few of our challenges. These do not dilute our ideas, they sharpen them. We have built a creative instinct that is resourceful, emotionally intelligent, and deeply rooted in insights rather than excess. 

Is our work misunderstood?  Yes, definitely. Pakistan is often seen through a narrow lens of political headlines instead of human stories, stereotypes instead of nuance. Our creativity is judged on the output, not the context behind it. What looks like a “simple” idea is often solving multiple unseen problems. As the first Spikes jury president from Pakistan, I carry that responsibility proudly and humbly to not just celebrate the work, but to widen the frame through which the world sees Pakistan. 

You’re also a See It Be It participant who won Pakistan’s first Glass Lion for Change. How would you assess the level of change we’ve seen since Covid when it comes to ensuring women in Asia are given real opportunity to produce the best creative work for clients they can?

Covid didn’t just change working habits; it exposed the myth that women needed to “fit in” to succeed. Suddenly, performance mattered more than presence, ideas mattered more than office politics. And women thrived. But let us be honest, the progress is still patchy. Too many women are trusted with the workload but not the authority. Flexibility is different from opportunity and empathy. In Pakistan, the roles attributed to women are complex and nuanced. The culture has long taught them that thriving at work does not get you any extra points at home. You could the hot shot creative at work but at home you are still judged for being a good home maker and playing the roles attributed to you.  

The real change I see is in mindset. The younger generations are not asking for permission or a token seat; they are taking space, leading teams, and owning outcomes. When this confidence meets real institutional support, Asia’s creative work will evolve fast, and it will be unstoppable.  

AI tools are revolutionising the fields of design and industry craft, a field where the best work has been driven by human vision and passionate executions. How big a role does technology and the process by which the work came from factor into how we evaluate the finished results?

AI is changing the tools, but craft is still about the intent. Great work has always come from a human vision that technology helps scale or shape. So yes, the process matters but not as a technical audit. It matters in terms of "did the team use the tool to unlock a new idea, a new aesthetic, a new emotional moment we couldn’t reach before?" 

We should not penalize work for being made with AI, and we shouldn’t praise it just because it is made with AI. The question is simple: Is the final piece powerful, original, and culturally effective? If the answer is yes, then the craft human or augmented has done its job. 

In the end, technology is not the creativity. It is the amplifier. The vision still must come from a human. Insight, courage, craft. AI can execute passion beautifully, but it can’t replace it yet.  

What trends are you noticing emerging in the work from this category across APAC?

I am seeing a rise in cultural specificity. Work is no longer trying to look “global.” It is proudly local in visual languages, typography, folklore, and insights being reimagined with modern craft. That confidence is powerful. 

What are you looking for inside the jury room this year?

In the Jury room, I am looking for work that is impossible to ignore. Ideas expressed through craft that amplify emotion and not used as decoration.