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Published on January 23, 2008

For most companies, one leader is enough. But for a newly established advertising agency called Monday, it has to be two. They are ad-industry veterans: copywriter Passapol "Lek" Limpisirisan and art director Wiboon "Min" Leepakpreeda.

The duo are better known as Lek-Min, or Min-Lek, and they have worked together for so long that people in the ad industry expect they will never be separated.

Even the Bangkok Art Directors' Association accepted them as co-presidents last year - the first time two people had taken the top job. Now the inseparable pair have won the trust of one of the world's leaders in marketing communications: the WPP Group. WPP has given full financial support to the establishment of Monday and has named the new agency as an affiliate.

Passapol and Wiboon met 20 years ago as juniors at Bangkok University.

"Min had to lead a project to enter a company's competition, and he needed one more person to work with, and he had his friend ask me whether I could do that, and I said okay," Passapol recalls.

There were about 10 people in the group of students, so the two did not really become close collaborators. However, working together had an effect on both of them.

"We thought it might be difficult to work with others, because we were already familiar with each other," Wiboon says. "We did not want to be a burden to others."

After graduating in 1992, they both found jobs in the same ad agency: TBWA. They worked separately for a while, because Passapol was a copywriter, and Wiboon was an art director, plus they were obliged to pair with different people. It was while they were paired with others that they discovered their real value to one another.

"One of our pairs was a graduate from the field of painting, sculpture and graphic-arts, so the way that person thought was too abstract to understand. So we secretly brought our respective projects to work on them together, and eventually those works were used. Since then, we've continued working together openly," Passapol says.

From there, they both moved to Lintas in the same year of 1992, to Prakit & FCB (now known as Draftfcb) in 1993, DY&R (now known as Y&R Thailand) in 1994, Flagship in 2000, Euro RSCG Flagship in 2003 and finally to Monday last year.

Their career paths are almost identical. They both climbed from low- to senior-level staff positions, then to executive level in the same companies and in the same years before becoming co-chief creative officers at Monday. The only difference is Passapol climbed through the ranks as a copywriter, while Wiboon rose as an art director.

In their work together, they have created eight renowned advertisements for six advertisers and received 13 awards, including Gold and Silver Lions at Cannes, a London International Award and awards from the New York Festival and Ad Festival, as well as being among 10 finalists at Cannes.

"People started to know us from the 'Kill Bill', 'Titanic' and 'XXX' ads that we created for Soken DVD players. Those gave us a wide domestic and international reputation," Passapol says.

The three ads featured technical problems that consumers usually experience when using DVD players. They used real people. The ads won local awards and reached global centre stage at the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival. Passapol recalls meeting a foreign advertising executive who showered praise on the ads - a moment he says encouraged both him and Wiboon.

They say they have the same way of thinking and that is what makes them work together so well. Passapol says that many times, they have shared the same way of looking at advertising works. It is like they look from different angles but reach the same conclusion.

However, that does not mean they always agree. On many occasions, they have been unable to find agreement, their discussion has become heated and eventually one of them has walked out.

"We're very direct," Passapol explains. "If one of us shows disagreement, it means we really don't agree. But that's good. We want our job to look best. That's why we don't want to compromise."

But like the professionals they are, disagreement is never allowed to damage their close friendship, and an hour after a walkout, they still get together for lunch or dinner as of nothing has happened. Conflicts are left behind in the workplace.

Passapol and Wiboon are so close that people in the ad industry expect they will never work separately. At a press conference to launch the Monday agency, Y&R chief executive Sohn Chongsrichan said if there had been only one of them leading the agency, he would not have accepted it.

"They are great when they're working together," he said.

"People keep calling us Lek-Min or Min-Lek, even though we're not together at the time. It's symbolic of this duo," Passapol says.

Being a duo also has another advantage: it's unusual. As co-chief creative officers at Monday, they use it as a selling point, saying corporate clients can get "double the creative ideas that can really sell products or services" from only one agency.

However, leading an agency brings with it heavy responsibilities.

"Financial issues are a big concern, because every company must have revenue. It's not like before, when we were only a copywriter and an art director, and all we had to think about was creating something great," Passapol says.

Friends and colleagues have counselled them to maintain their creative work like before, without allowing the agency's financial concerns to have much influence on their thinking, and they keep this in mind.

To ensure that the people who work for Monday follow the same directions as their leading pair, Passapol says they will only recruit new graduates and talk to them before accepting them. This ensures that they share similar attitudes.

The co-executives are also concerned about staff happiness. They are already thinking of arranging special activities that staff members can enjoy together without worrying about their work, such as cooking classes, drawing and other workshops.

Now that they are in the top posts, it is a matter not only of how the veteran duo can continue to create great advertising works, but also of how they can drive their new agency to the top of Thailand's ad industry and perhaps to the forefront internationally. This is the new challenge for the inseparable Lek-Min, or Min-Lek.

Nitida Asawanipont

The Nation