When Natalie Graeme co-founded Uncommon Creative Studio in London in 2017, it was one of the U.K.’s only majority female-founded creative studios. Since then, Graeme has led the agency to work with notable clients including British Airways, Nike Jordan and EA Sports; opened flagship offices in New York and Stockholm; and sold a majority stake (51%) to French holding company Havas in 2023.

At the same time, Graeme has made it her mission to uplift more founders. Four years ago, she helped develop an Uncommon accelerator program for startups named Unrest.

The program focuses on identifying impact-driven start-ups and helping to bridge the funding gap that diverse founders face—all-female founders receive less than 1% of available venture capital funding in the U.K. To date, the initiative has helped develop more than 47 brands. More than half of those startups have been female-founded businesses and one-third founded by people of color. This year, Graeme plans to launch Unrest in the United States.

Graeme has also brought continued success and new clients to the agency through edgy, impactful work. Last year, Uncommon's debut work for Nike Jordan, which charted a young girl’s discovery of basketball and her rise to stardom, won numerous accolades at the Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity. Similarly, “A British Original” for British Airways helped the airline win big at industry awards shows and rebound from the pandemic.

So far in 2024, Uncommon is having its strongest year yet. The agency says its revenue has grown by 78% with more than 25 new clients in the past year.

What advice would you give to your younger self?

Have half a plan. It’s very easy to assume that you can't start that thing, and you can't leap off a cliff or that you can't do things differently unless you've got it all sorted. It's so important to just start somewhere. And sometimes you need to do that with a gang like I have with my co-founders at Uncommon. And sometimes you just need to trust that the right steps will open once you just get started. So have half a plan and get started.

What’s the biggest risk you’ve ever taken?

Starting Uncommon; leaping off a cliff and leaving seemingly comfortable jobs but ultimately knowing we wanted to try something new. It felt very risky at the time, because you don't know what's on the other side. But ultimately, I think it's the best risk I've ever taken.

If you weren’t doing your current job, what would you be doing and why?

I would want to be a non-exec director to startups, much like I've had the opportunity to do with our Unrest accelerator program. I really enjoy being able to help other founders start. And it's always easier to fix someone else's hard work. But I like helping from the outside and hopefully, I think I'm quite good at it.

What should the industry do to encourage more women and people of color into its ranks?

Back us. Invest in us. It’s shocking when you look at the stats of how much finance talks and the lack of investment in majority female-founded companies. The stats are woeful. Money Talks. It says that you believe in someone, and I think the results also tell themselves that a lot of female-founded companies tend to do exceptionally well.

How will AI impact your job in the future?

It’s going to be a hugely important tool. I think it's going to help us get to places faster and hopefully with depth of insight. But from a creative point of view, I'm excited about the fact that it will raise the boats for everyone. My hope would be that it will mean that the benchmark will be higher. Therefore human creativity is going to be the thing that makes the difference. If everyone can reach for a tool and come to an answer, then you must be so much more inventive and so much more creative to be able to cut through. It will provide, strategically, the tools that will give us greater insights, but also the freedom to excel.