Kat McCord: Give Away Your Ideas
Creative Director of Thackway McCord
by Elizabeth Lavis
|09 May 2025
The top advice that Kat McCord, Creative Director of Thackway McCord, has for aspiring designers is that sharing ideas is the way to go. “Give away your ideas,” she says. “Don’t hoard them. Idea generating uses a muscle, and working it out makes it stronger.”
McCord's life and career span a broad geographical area. She grew up in Vancouver, worked for over a decade in London, and currently lives and works in New York. “Working in three different cities and three different countries has given me a broader point of view,” she says. McCord describes her design style as “pretty rooted in modernism with a smattering of humor and big idea advertising,” and says that it varies in shades by what the client needs, or the campaign calls for.
Establishing trust and rapport with a client is a crucial part of the process. “I listen, ask smart questions, and show them that I care,” McCord says. “I go the extra mile when they’re in a pinch. I know it sounds corny, but I always say to love your client. If you don’t love them, they can tell. If you don’t love them, you shouldn’t be working together. It’s usually mutual.”
McCord has fired clients when their values didn’t align, but she also notes that there can be disagreements on the project direction, and that’s ok. “The client isn’t always right,” she says. “Also, I am not always right. When you listen to your client, believe in them and what they are aiming to achieve. Also, if you’ve proven yourself, it’s easier for a client to take your advice even if that advice is ‘no’. But then, I would say come up with a solution that answers the problem they were trying to solve.”
"Q4 rebrand", Thackway McCord
Ultimately, there are two essential aspects of a design for McCord. “The most important ones are the idea, and whether I would wear it or put it on my coffee table. If not, it’s no good,” she says. Her average design campaign takes three to nine months, and she holds regular team meetings with her geographically diverse staff to keep everyone on the same page. “We are fully remote, and across several time zones, so we have to work hard to have a unified team,” McCord says. “We have a team meeting every day, where we talk about work. We also share stories, movies, personal challenges, and celebrations. We work in Teams and have channels for Inspo and Music, and we do a team poem every year for National Poetry Month. When working on projects, we get everyone’s point of view. While ultimately it’s my responsibility to make creative decisions on what we present to the client, the whole team actually debates, sometimes heatedly, and votes on work.”
McCord’s healthy team dynamic helps her deal with burnout. “I am getting burned out,” she says. “But teamwork helps. When you’re all in it together, you can back each other up, take the load for someone for a bit, then it’s your turn.” If she needs a creative boost, McCord turns off the computer. “I go for a walk,” she says. “Or I’ll get in a CitiBike.”
McCord sees herself designing political action posters from a warehouse with a half pipe and a neighborhood coffee bar in it in five years. On a personal note, she plans to grow by saying ‘yes’ to more things, and continuing her quest for the new, having fun, and enjoying her family, friends, and the beauty of nature.
Submit your work for Indigo Design Award competition
