Heat welcomed six senior hires to the New York office it launched back in May of 2016.
Group creative directors Jeff Leaf and Robert Balog, head of business leadership Leyland Streiff, head of public relations Emily Hodkins, global business director Sara Daino and head of team design Christine Cifra joined the agency.
“Thriving at the intersection of business strategy, technology and creative, our agency has spurred great interest in the market—attracting today’s top experts across disciplines,” Heat New York general manager and principal Katie Klumper said in a statement. “We’re not trying to be for everyone. But for those who have the creative craft and growing desire to have a greater impact on business—Heat is the place to be.”
In an interview with Adweek, Klumper also explained that, while Heat’s San Francisco office continues to operate as a standalone creative shop (more or less), the New York team often collaborates with Deloitte Digital to work on a per-project basis for the consultancy’s existing clients.
Leaf and Balog arrive from Ogilvy & Mather New York, where they served as group creative leads on such accounts as Nestlé waters and Dupont and will work alongside Heat New York head of creative Evan Slater who joined the agency as an executive creative director early last year.
Streiff also arrives from Ogilvy, where he most recently served as global managing director on the BlackRock and iShares accounts. Before joining Ogilvy & Mather as a marketing manager in 2010, he served as an account supervisor with DDB.
Hodkins arrives at Heat from Anomaly, where she also served as head of public relations. Prior to joining Anomaly in that role in 2015, she served as director of communications for Droga5.
Daino joins the agency from BBDO New York, where she spent the past year and a half as account director on Lowe’s, American Family Insurance and Operation Hope and three years in the role at Translation before that, working on Jeep, DSW and State Farm Insurance.
Cifra arrives at Heat from KBS, where she was director of resource management. She was previously head of creative talent at 360i.