Synopsis
With over 25 years of diverse experience leading global brands, founding and scaling my own FMCG startup, and holding senior leadership roles in brand and marketing, I believe my unique combination of strategic leadership, creativity, and hands-on operational experience can contribute to your success.
Throughout my career, I’ve consistently demonstrated an ability to build brands and organisations from the ground up by focusing on strategic problem-solving. My background in business school has ingrained core principles of diagnosing business challenges, setting clear strategic visions, and executing with precision. This methodology has been the key to my success in driving impactful outcomes for every business and brand I've worked with.
As a leader, I see my role as that of a high-performance coach. I don’t just set the vision - I build and nurture the right teams to bring that vision to life. I’m passionate about empowering individuals, helping them unlock their potential, and guiding them to achieve exceptional results. My leadership style is hands-on, and I take great pride in fostering environments where creativity, collaboration, and excellence thrive. Over the years, this approach has led to recognition in creative and business-building awards, including Cannes, D&AD, Webby, One Show, and Effies.
I firmly believe in the power of creativity to drive business results at every stage of the marketing funnel. I’ve led bold, ambitious campaigns for high-profile brands, across large portfolios, ensuring that every consumer interaction reinforces the brand’s core platform. From analytics to channel planning, budget management, and portfolio oversight, I bring a comprehensive skill set that contributes to organisational growth.
What I do best is use creativity to move brands forward, whether leading agencies and organisations to elevate their brands, help turn Tiger Beer into a billion-dollar brand, making Google feel like an Aussie, getting a startup off the ground, or helping an engineering company accelerate its success against a Goliath of competition.
An excellent communicator and public speaker and adept at stakeholder management enabling teams to make decisions and drive them forward. A rare talent that mixes strategy, leadership, creativity, marketing savvy, big ideas, and operations in one brain.
Sincerely,
Ryan Bernal
Advisory - Infrastructure & Built Environment
Consultant & Head of Marketing
Nov 2023 - Present
Delivering a mix of management consulting and marketing leadership to organisations within infrastructure and the built environment where the need for differentiation and creativity is critical, especially in legacy environments. Bringing my experience in strategy and communications across a multitude of sectors, I worked with founders and executive teams to reshape how they approached the market.
Key Achievements
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On my second contract with Atlas Engineering and their new owner, Sequana Group, I’m helping craft a new corporate narrative and brand story across the organisation after a series of acquisitions to unify the brands and drive their ambitious growth goals.
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I previously drove the repositioning for Atlas Engineering, pre-acquisition, across vision, Vision, Mission, EVP, Values, brand identity and marketing/tender collateral contributing to their 20% YOY growth.
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Advisory roles on business planning, relationship planning, new service offerings, client reporting, process mapping and corporate strategy.
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Created a Master Tender Template and case repository to cut tender workload and differentiate through design.
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For 7C, a holding company in the built environment (placemaking, architecture, sustainability and interior design), I developed a unified marketing ambition, plan and marketing dashboard aligned to business growth objectives across the earned, owned and paid B2B ecosystem. This included a social overhaul delivering +53% Engagement and +37% followers vs. six months prior for their architecture arm, Woods Bagot.
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Adept and stakeholder management and board reporting.
72andSunny Sydney
General Manager, Head of Brand
Nov 2021-Nov 2023
Key Achievements
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Stepping back into Agency, I've consulted a first-time CEO on agency operations, process, team structure and finance to get the agency on the right trajectory.
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I’ve consulted on the agency model and financial challenges leading to a significant improvement in profitability while pitching and winning 7 of 9 accounts including BCF, MLC, Taco Bell, Edith Cowan University and 4 Pines Brewery.
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Helped the agency win Campaign Brief's Agency of the Year 2022 for the first time in their history.
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Led multiple accounts and teams for their biggest clients including Google (+20% Brand Advocacy); delivering the first 6 weeks of consecutive sales growth for Taco Bell; launching Who Gives A Crap's first global campaign (UK, USA & AUS); delivering an entirely new brand platform, campaign and design system for Edith Cowan University (their best performing campaign of all time) and creating the theme and keynote videos for the annual APAC Google Marketing Live conference (B2B).
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Structured, mentored and supported the account team.
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With the agency on the right track, it was time for the CEO to fully take the reins.
Marcel Sydney
Managing Director & Head of Strategy
Apr 2013-Sept 2020
Key Achievements
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When I first arrived at this agency, it was called Publicis Mojo before we went through a restructure and name change in 2016 to Marcel Sydney. A signal that we re-shaped the agency with a renewed focus on creativity that would be recognised at the global level. Since then, Marcel Sydney has been ranked every year as a 'hot' shop in the Campaign Brief Agency Ranking, we've won over 50 awards locally and internationally and has been the Agency Of Record for global and local brands.
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Relaunched the Cerebral Palsy Alliance's key fundraising event, STEPtember with a total brand overhaul and a $8m fundraising goal, +12.5% VYA. We achieved 150% of our goal by campaign’s end.
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Launched Rio Tinto's first ever brand campaign resulting in double digit gains in trust, favourability and familiarity for only 1/4 of the spend of their largest competitor, BHP.
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I led the global Tiger Beer account (Singapore based client) resulting in over 140% growth globally over 3 years helping it become a 1B dollar brand. During that time, Tiger beer experienced its fastest growth (volume & value) and its most creatively awarded work in its history.
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As Head of Strategy, I also ensured our roster of brands delivered distinctive positioning, human insight and breakthrough communications across all aspects of their brand, internal and external. I also helped brand leaders craft their marketing plans and ensured the brand idea flowed through all touch points from media to internal comms.
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I fostered an agency culture that believed its product should not be limited to Australia, but had the ability to exported across the globe. This resulted in Marcel Australia having more global clients and projects than any other Australian agency.
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Throughout my tenure at Marcel, I've helped secure global new business wins including Tiger Beer, Tinder, [yellow tail] wine, Cerebral Palsy Alliance and OPSM, AirAsia, Powershop and Huawei locally to name a few.
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Successful management of full P&L responsibilities.
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A trusted partner for our clients.
Certificates & Proficiencies
Certificates: SEO I Certificate, SEO II Certificate, Digital Marketing Certificate, Content Marketing Certificate, Technical SEO and AI Search Essentials Certificate.
Proficiencies: Google Docs & programs, Microsoft 365, Keynote, Canva, Klaviyo, Cin 7
Education
Ivey School of Business, The University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario
Degree of Bachelor of Arts, Honours Business Administration
Dean’s Honour List, 1996
CEGEP John Abbott, Montreal Quebec
D.E.C. Commerce
Dean’s Honour List, 1995
Hobbies
Surfing, fitness, travel
