Leo Burnett Sri Lanka’s Sarah Hassanally and Dilendri Wettewe recently won the Bronze award at the Young Spikes Media Competition, which took place in Singapore.

The contesting teams comprised some of the best young professionals from around the world, who responded to a brief on the challenging topic of combating poverty alleviation. Following an intense competition and a rigorous judging process, Sarah and Dilendri were awarded the Bronze award. They were the only team from Sri Lanka to secure a metal at the young Spikes competition.

Conducted as part of the globally hailed Spikes Asia Festival of Creativity, the Young Spikes Competition offers young talent within the industry a platform to showcase their talent, knowledge, insights and strategic skills. Each country conducted a competition in their respective territories to choose the teams that would represent the country at the Young Spikes competition.

After the briefing session, the teams take on the challenge of developing an innovative media strategy to achieve the objectives of the brief, which is judged by a panel of highly acclaimed jurors from a wide cross section of agencies and specialisations.

This year, the teams in the media category were issued with briefs featuring Asia P3 Hub, a platform for multi-sector collaboration which is hosted by the international NGO World Vision. The hub focuses on bringing together individuals from various sectors, including governments, businesses, start-up enterprises, NGOs and academia to address the effects of poverty. According to the brief, the main challenges faced by the Asia P3 Hub focused on the fact that a ‘multi-sector partnership is a concept that is not easily understood, as well as the fact that private sector organisations, who are often equipped with newer technology, greater operating efficiency and larger investment capacity do not have a strong incentive to partner with other sectors to solve large-scale poverty issues. The contestants had to respond to this brief by formulating a campaign that would raise awareness and draw the private sector towards multi-sector partnerships, by demonstrating how sustainability and poverty alleviation can benefit their businesses in the long term.

Commenting on Sarah’s and Dilendri’s achievement at the Young Spikes Media Competition in Singapore, Leo Burnett Sri Lanka Managing Director Ranil de Silva said: “I am extremely proud that two of our very own young professionals from Leo Burnett Sri Lanka have secured the Bronze award at the Young Spikes Media Competition. I would like to congratulate Sarah and Dilendri on their outstanding performance at this prestigious competition. I strongly believe their enthusiasm and passion is what brought them this success. The Spikes Asia Festival is the region’s oldest and most prestigious event of its kind, which not only recognises the best work in the region, but also brings together Asia Pacific’s leading creative thinkers and brightest young minds. The exposure they gained from this competition as well as from the festival will I am sure empowers them to enjoy progress in this industry. The team at Leo Burnett in Sri Lanka joins me to congratulate our two talented young professionals on this significant achievement. I am confident they will continue to excel and to reach even greater heights in their careers.”

Over the years, Leo Burnett has built many powerful brands and meaningful partnerships with its clients, whilst delivering gratifying results for its clients while gaining peer recognition in the industry. This year the agency celebrated its 18th anniversary in Sri Lanka whilst the global company commemorated its 82nd anniversary. As Leo Burnett looks ahead to the future, the agency remains dedicated to developing new ideas inspired by HumanKind – Leo Burnett’s philosophy which is rooted in the belief that creativity has the power to transform human behaviour.