Worked as a copywriter as part of a partnership to take a creative brief and turn it into a pitch for a campaign that changed behavior for a nonprofit. The final campaign featured OOH elements, a TV spot, a podcast sponsorship, and a brand new social network.

1. Lean in
Ella Blott
Rocio Alquati
THE
Agency

2. What is Lean In All
About?
EducationCommunity Circles
Empowering women in the workforce

3. Women in the workforce apologize too much.
Problem

4. Target Audience

5. Ideation
Mentorship Network Social Experiment 30 Day Challenge

6. We need to let women
know what the problem
is, then show them how
to fix it

7. a production

8. Step 1: Awareness
Awareness is the first step to changing a problem. We want to show
people how much they over-apologize, and how this can affect their work.
Enter Sorry!, a documentary about over-apologizing in the workplace, to
show people how often they apologize in a day, compared to how often
they think they do, and who this affects disproportionately.
We want to incorporate a social experiment about the differences between
male and female apologies in the workplace, data from the Sorry Like You
Mean It study, and linguistic and psychological experts discussing how
apologies can become a vocal tic, and what that type of apologizing means.

9. Step 2: Changing Behavior
If we can change the underlying issue, which is a lack of workplace
confidence and support from other women, over-apologizing behavior
will correct itself as a trickle-down result.
Introducing Circles, a professional mentorship social network. The aim
would be to find female mentors for women needing guidance, connect
women to other women within their industries, and give them a platform
to share support, mentorship, workplace issues, and more.
It would feature anonymous forums for discussing sensitive issues, share
digital and in-person events related to women in the workplace, and
highlight the existing Lean In feature of Circles, which builds online and
in-person networks of people.

10. STep 2 Network to action

11. Ad2

13. Podcast Sponsorship
We want to talk to women on the platforms they already turn to for
workplace advice. The Broad Experience is a podcast about “women, the
workplace, and success.” In order to maintain the tone of the show that
people trust, we would produce a podcast sponsored by Lean In and Circles
in which the host would discuss the documentary and then start a
conversation with her listeners about the issue of over-apologizing in the
workplace as a whole.

14. Visual: woman seated at a desk in an office, looking
concerned, on the phone, mid-conversation.
Woman: “…yes, thank you. I’ll let him know
immediately”
Visual: she hangs up the phone, hurries across the office,
knocks on a door, and bursts into the room. There’s a
man working inside, who looks stunned by her
appearance
Woman: “Sor…”
Visual: woman freezes & camera zooms in on her ear,
where a small female angel sits, dressed like the woman
but with the addition of a halo, agitated and yelling, but
only the woman can hear
Angel: “woah, woah, woah! We’ve been over this. Are you
really about to apologize for interrupting him
doing…whatever it is that he’s doing, with news that his
wife just went into labor? Are you really sorry about that?
Didn’t think so”
Visual: zoom back out to see the man looking even more
perplexed. Back to the woman, who’s smiling now.
1/2
TV: Guardian Angel

15. Woman: “Hey Jim. Your phone’s off. Just got a call
from your wife. Looks like you’re about to become a
dad”
Angel: “Finally, we’re getting somewhere”
Visual: woman turns to leave the office, with the man
visibly excited in the background
Man yells: “Thank you!”
Woman walks back to her office, looking less harried
and more confident
Angel turns to speak to the camera
Angel: I can’t be there to catch you every time you
fall into an undeserved apology. But I know someone
who can...
Visual: shots of Circles
Angel(VO): Circles can offer you the support of other
working women to help you with workplace issues &
stop that apology in its tracks. Because you’re really
not sorry about that.
2/2
TV: Guardian Angel

16. We’ve got a big problem in the American workforce. And, odds are, you
haven’t even noticed it. It has crept into our vocabulary and made its
unwelcome presence known in meetings, client calls, water cooler chats, in
nearly every workplace encounter you can imagine. One little word, causing a
big problem. SORRY. That’s right - we’re saying sorry too much.
Ever heard someone apologize for going to the bathroom? Or when asking the
client to clarify an unclear point? Or when they were correcting someone
else’s error? When did all of these unnecessary sorries find their way into the
workplace?
Think back on the last time you heard a coworker apologize for a situation
that didn’t deserve a sorry. And then, think about who that person was. Odds
are, they were a woman. And I, for one, want to find out why this is
happening, and what’s so bad about it? What’s wrong with being too polite?
Well, we’re about to find out in Sorry!

17. Thank You!