Dynamic Duos: The Hallway’s Jules Hall and Simon Lee
In this week's Dynamic Duos, Mumbrella sat down with The Hallway's CEO Jules Hall and chief creative officer Simon Lee who tell the story of how they went from 'frenemies' to 'work wives', working in partnership to steer The Hallway for the past 12 years.
In Dynamic Duos, Mumbrella each week asks two members of the same organisation with a professional and personal affiliation to share with readers the importance of workplace relationships in an increasingly hybridised world of work.
Jules Hall:
Simon and I first met as frenemies. We were working for different agencies collaborating on the Westpac account. At the time Simon was creative director at Lavender, and I was general manager at NetX.
I still remember the first meeting Simon was in. Lavender presented work that was far more integrated and digitally savvy than anything we had seen from them previously. I remember thinking we needed to watch out for this bloke Lee. That would have been 2005.
At that stage NetX was Australia’s biggest and most admired digital agency. So it wasn’t surprising that it got acquired in 2007, becoming part of Clemenger Group. Which also coincided with Jameson Irish Whiskey, who’d been sponsoring my sailing for five years, giving me the opportunity to start my own agency.
I was young, blindly optimistic, and in hindsight, remarkably naïve. So I tore into it. Best thing I ever did!
The first couple of years I did what a lot of start ups do – I lent on freelancers and external creative teams. In late 2009 I read that Simon had resigned from Lavender. Whilst I was busy getting The Hallway up and running Lavender had snaffled the digital business off Clemenger/NetX. And they’d won ATL responsibilities for Westpac Business Bank from The Campaign Palace. That bloke Lee must have been doing something right – so I got on the phone and tracked down his number.
We met at Ivy for a drink in early December. It was a hot sunny day and Simon told me about the imminent arrival of his second child. And the fact he was simultaneously flying off to Chile to film the Dakar Rally as part of a feature documentary he was making.
On his return Simon started freelancing to The Hallway. It was immediately obvious that we shared a very similar view on the type of work that works. And the incumbent responsibility on agencies to always be creating work that grows their clients’ businesses. Something that was sorely lacking in the industry at that time.
By this stage I’d worked out that I needed to bring creative in-house. I’d also learned that I work best in partnership – being an extrovert, I problem solve by discussing issues. Simon had already started his own agency. We decided we’d be better together. That was late August 2010.
We’ve had incredible adventures together over the past twelve years. My life wife, Tanya, calls Simon my work wife. I’m not sure he appreciates that moniker. But that’s how business partnerships work – when you give them the same attention you put into a successful marriage. Simon and I have completely different skill sets. And often very different perspectives. Over the years we’ve learned how to communicate with each other incredibly effectively. Today our partnership is one of the greatest assets of our business.
Simon Lee:
One of my earliest memories of Jules was a lunch that my boss at the time – Will Lavender and I had with him on the Woolloomooloo finger wharf, way back sometime around 2005. At the time, Lavender was in the process of heavily ramping up their digital capability and Will and I were “joking” with Jules about how – if NetX weren’t careful – Westpac’s digital business would soon be coming our way. I have a hazy half-memory that, as we polished off another bottle of wine, Will may even have suggested Jules might want to come and work for us. Jules, unamused, politely declined, but the wheels of fate had been oiled and a hint of a Lee & Hall collaboration put out into the universe.
It was four years later that I got a call out of the blue from Jules. I was about to leave Lavender, my wife had just given birth to our second child, and I was preparing to head off to Argentina and Chile to shoot my documentary feature film – Dream Racer. I’d heard that Jules had started his own agency and had already done some nice work, so I agreed to meet him for a drink. Then, a couple of months later, when I returned back from the Atacama Desert to a family that needed feeding, I started doing some work with Jules through my consultancy – UNLTD Creative.
It didn’t take us long to realise that formalising our partnership was the right path to take. Within months of starting working together, we’d won pitches against long established agencies, were making bold Affective work, and most importantly were having a lot of fun. So we shook hands on a deal over a curry and a beer on Cleveland Street and set about building The Hallway. In hindsight, there’s a lot we didn’t know back then, but we didn’t let that stop us – we were wonderfully naively optimistic and fearless, and they were exhilarating times that set the tone for our adventures in advertising.
Jules and I are both very different in many ways, to the extent that you could call us the Yin and Yan of The Hallway and that’s probably why the partnership is successful. But two opposites don’t come together and miraculously just work smoothly together; it takes conscious focus. It means learning to really listen to a different point of view, to take the time to understand and empathise with where the other person is at, and to drop any façade and be vulnerable. The personal growth that comes from this is a benefit of my partnership with Jules that I would never have anticipated. It’s one of many that I’m very grateful for.
Jules and Simon on a shipping buoy, for Campaign UK in 2012
Jules on Simon:
Most memorable moment with Simon:
Like most suits, I’ve always secretly harboured creative ambitions. In 2012 we learned we had been identified by Campaign UK as one of the world’s leading independent agencies. And they needed a photograph to go with the article. That weekend I was in my second home – sailing on Sydney Harbour. I was looking at the ship mooring buoys and came up with a cracking idea for the shot. I pitched the concept to Simon first thing Monday and he agreed it was pretty good. All we needed to do was execute.
We pulled a favour from photographer Brock Elbank. Borrowed a boat. And headed out to sea. It was the middle of winter, and the harbour was the calmest it has ever been. Yet the minute we left the dock poor old Brock started feeling seasick. Uh oh! Simon was going to be doing yoga on the shipping buoy. And I was going to be floating in a dinghy next to it. When we got there, we discovered you could be arrested for climbing on them. OK. And when we blew up the dinghy it had a large sign saying max weight 45kg. Bugger.
So we applied all of our entrepreneurial instincts.
It was early morning, so the only traffic was commuter ferries. We didn’t want them to report us, so we had the boat captain, Joppie, choose a gap between ferries to drop us off. We got into position. Simon on the buoy, me precariously balanced on the smallest rubber dinghy you’ve ever seen, smoking a pipe. And Brock lay down to take the shot. Only to start violently throwing up!
We sat there waiting. The Manly ferry rapidly approaching. Finally, Brock was able to grab his camera and shoot. He nailed it.
We hopped back on the boat, turned for shore and never got busted!
Describe Simon in one word:
Wannabehippybutactuallyacapitalistalbeititaconscientiousone
Simon’s most annoying habit or endearing behaviour:
Always coming back from holiday a day later than his diary says!
Simon on Jules:
Most memorable moment with Jules:
In the twelve years that Jules and I have been partners in the great game they call advertising there have been many many memorable moments, but I wanted to share a recent non-work related one that I think gives a good sense of the kind of guy Jules is and the character traits that have helped drive our agency’s success.
My story – just like Jules’ tale about me – takes place on a boat, but most definitely not on a flat day in comfortable Sydney Harbour. You see Jules isn’t just a world class adman, he’s also a world class sailor. In late 2021 he made history, skippering his wonderfully named Disko Trooper sailboat to victory in the inaugural two-handed category of the Sydney to Hobart race, then in July this year, backed this up by winning the prestigious Sydney to Gold Coast race. And the Gold Coast is where my story begins, dressed in full wet weather gear, motoring out of Southport Yacht Club in the dead of night with Jules and two other crew members to deliver Disko Trooper 384 nautical miles back to Sydney.
Our Creative Services Director told me she’d pictured Jules and I dressed in white linen, sipping G&Ts as we casually cruised down the coast. Her mind picture couldn’t have been further from the truth. Jules has stripped Disko Trooper of any weight that could possibly slow her down – which means there’s nothing on the boat that isn’t 100% necessary.
Forget the mini bar and cocktail glasses, there’s barely even a toilet onboard. And this was certainly no casual cruise: for the first thirty odd hours, we sailed into a headwind that was pushing against the prevailing current making for a very bumpy ride. I remember being at the helm in horizontal rain, staring ahead, unable to identify a stable horizon as waves, current and wind turned our whole world into grey and white streaked turmoil. Then when the wind finally turned, somewhere offshore from Port Macquarie, we were propelled down the coast like a runaway train. At one point I lay in my berth, experiencing what I imagine being inside a surfboard would feel like. I could hear the rush of water, mere centimetres from my head as we picked up speed on the wind swells, the boat relentlessly driven forward as we all hung on for the ride.
It was an exhilarating rush of a trip, but exhausting. For three nights and two and half days at sea, we each slept no more than two to three hours at time, and when on deck, dealt with everything from the whims of mother nature to rogue drifting coal tankers appearing out of the dark. I love these sorts of adventures, but by the time the sun was setting for our third night at sea, I was very tired and quietly looking forward to getting home. And looking at the faces of the other two crew members, I’m pretty sure I wasn’t the only one. It was at this point that Jules appeared from the cabin, rugged up in his sailing gear, beanie and head torch on his head and a smile on his face. “This is when it starts to feel good” he said “when you get into the rhythm of it all. Feels like you never want to stop”. We were all ready to wind down, and given half a chance would happily have pulled into a marina somewhere for a schnitty, a beer and a long sleep. But not Jules, oh no; the skipper was just getting going.
Describe Jules in one word:
Winner
Jule’s most annoying habit or endearing behaviour:
Jules’ manners are almost too impeccable: it takes him a very long time to get out of a crowded lift.
If you and a colleague would like to submit your story to Dynamic duos, please email kwelch@mumbrella.com.au.
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