Carlos Menezes Small to mid-sized company MD & digital lead.

Starting as an intern, within 7 years I became appointed the European MD of Africa's largest digital agency. What followed were some the toughest and most rewarding years of my life, being part of a company that grew from 20 to 300 people and got acquired by WPP. During this time I had to learn to lead cross-functional teams (from creative designers to developers to business consultants) across multiple regions, handle a multitude of clients in complex fields (ranging from some of the world's largest brands - such as Netflix and SABMiller - to some of its hottest startups), navigate the political structures of the world's largest advertising group and build and execute HR, commercial and thought leadership strategies that translated into sustainable growth for my company. I hope to share with you some of my own experience, some tips that I have learned, approaches that have worked, many of the failures that I experienced and also my own thinking and advice on your own situation.

There's a lot that you can do in digital, but what should you do? What are the things that don't sound impressive but are crucial for driving your growth and / or efficiencies? Having driven digital strategies for the likes of Netflix, notonthehighstreet, moo.com and many other large and small brands, I can offer pragmatic advice across both digital strategies and the tactics that can make all the difference.

I have trained over a thousand people in digital marketing during 12 years, including running a WPP agency focused on digital training (and my feedback wasn't half bad). My time has been divided between training graduates, MBA students (at Oxford Saïd Business School) and clients at some of the world's largest businesses (SABMiller, Warner Bros., Hiscox, Bayer and others). Whether it be SEO, social media, paid media, analytics, web development or just digital in general, I have spent a lot of humanising these topics to both demystify them, and to offer practical advice that can be implemented.

Are you trying to run a remote team, or even one in a different country? I have spent over twelve years building and leading remote and offshore teams of over a hundred people, and want to share some of my experiences in overcoming the challenges and in making these teams into a core of my business' success.