Strategy Needs to Breathe Like Culture

​Trinh Nguyen Khanh may be known as a strategic planner on paper, but to her team at Happiness Saigon, she is better known as the ‘creative cop’. “Probably because I’m often the one in the room asking questions, pointing out what feels off, and suggesting where an idea could go further,” she says.

Her questioning nature is what led her to the field. She studied international business economics, but was drawn in by by the study of human behaviour. “Not in theory,” she says, “but in the messy, everyday sense. I was also curious about why brands behave the way they do – why they position themselves a certain way, why people care about some and ignore others.”

With strategy giving her access to one of the earliest points of thinking in the creative process – “the place where direction is shaped” – Trinh was drawn to working at a creative agency. “It meant I could explore different categories, brands, and people, and for someone still figuring themselves out, that kind of exposure felt right.

“I’ve always seen work as more than just a way to make a living but also a way to explore who I am and what I value. I didn’t choose strategy because I knew the answer – I chose it because I had too many questions. And I still do.”

Fuelled by an endless curiosity, Trinh sees her questioning as a way to help an idea land in the most original way possible through focusing on two key points:

1. Is it truly on brief? “Not just from a client approval standpoint,” she notes, “but based on the strategic intention we set out with. Did we communicate the core message we were meant to? Have we covered what’s non–negotiable?”

2. Can it go further? “At Happiness, we are against negativities and impossibilities. We believe the first idea is just the starting point so I try to offer inputs that help push it to the next level. That might come from a strategic angle, or simply from a local insight that sharpens the cultural fit.”

Above all, Trinh follows a piece of advice that has stayed with her throughout her career: strategy is about making choices – not finding the one right answer.

“That line shifted how I think. It reminded me that strategy isn’t about chasing the perfect solution. It’s about choosing a direction with clear reasoning, committing to it, then staying aware enough to adapt,” she says. “Even if you’ve mapped out all the risks, the real clarity only comes from doing, and from seeing how the choice plays out in reality.”

This mindset has helped her not just with work, but in how she navigates everything in her life. “It takes the pressure off needing to be ‘right’, and instead puts the focus on whether you’re learning and moving forward,” she says, noting a particularly important approach when working in a market as diverse as Asia. “There’s no such thing as one-size-fits-all or universal strategy across cultures. What works in Vietnam might fall flat in Singapore. What moves people in Thailand may feel irrelevant elsewhere. Every market has its own cultural rhythms, sensitivities, and ways of seeing brands.”

That’s why, when working on Popeyes’ Lunar New Year campaign in Singapore, Trinh and her team started by listening. They spoke to Singaporeans in their network to understand how they celebrate the season and what gifting means to them. “We were developing a Lunar New Year campaign in Singapore, a culture we didn’t live in, and the risk of misreading that moment was high,” Trinh says. “So our conversations with Singaporeans shaped not just the execution, but the strategic entry point.”

That said, there is one essential thing that has to remain consistent: brand distinctiveness. “Every brand has a core, a reason that makes it stand out, and that shouldn’t change across borders,” she says. “How it’s expressed might shift, but what makes it recognisable should stay.” She cites Hygiene, a Thai fabric care brand known for its natural and long-lasting scent, as an example. “That same DNA exists when it enters Vietnam, but the way scent is perceived or desired can be totally different here. Strategy is the bridge between brand truth and local resonance.”

Trinh credits her strategy director, Nemo Nguyen, as having played a defining role in her growth – not just professionally, but personally too. “She was the one who gave me a strong foundation, and just as importantly, the clarity to navigate what kind of strategist I wanted to become.

“On the professional side, she helped me sharpen both my hard and soft skills, from writing better briefs, to framing strategic approaches more clearly and knowing how to present with intention. She didn’t just teach me how to do strategy: she taught me how to think like a strategist, and how to approach problems with both logic and perspective.”

On a more personal level, she encouraged Trinh to expand her experience outside of work: to read more, live more, and explore perspectives beyond the advertising bubble. “What I learned from her is that professional growth doesn’t happen in isolation. It comes from how you live, how you reflect, and how much of yourself you bring into the work. Working with her reminded me that professional growth and personal growth don’t have to be separate – they feed each other.”

As long as she is growing every day, Trinh is fulfilled, which she feels is enough reason to stay present and engaged. “When that answer becomes less clear, I take time to reflect – not with the intention of quitting, but to understand what needs to shift so I can keep moving forward.”

With the future full of new and exciting challenges, Trinh has plenty to keep her growing. “The way young people connect with brands is getting more fragmented with different subcultures, different platforms, different expectations. So strategy can’t just follow one fixed structure or template anymore. It can’t stay stuck in static brand ladders. It needs to breathe like culture does. It has to be more flexible, more responsive, and more aware of how fast things shift. Less framework, more fieldwork.”

But it’s not just audiences that are diverse and evolving. Strategists are too. “I think we often expect creatives to have different styles, but forget that strategy also involves perspective, interpretation, and choice. There’s no one way to ‘do’ strategy.

“One strategist might go deep into culture, another might start with behavioural insight, another might use brand tension as the entry point. And all of those are valid, because strategy isn’t a checklist. It’s a process of making choices based on how you see the problem. So to keep up, strategy doesn’t just need to follow youth culture. It needs to stay open to different ways of thinking, including from the people doing the strategy.”