Rewarding Work in an AI Age Needs a Harder Question
Industry awards in India are quietly facing an existential audit. If AI can produce the output, what exactly are we honouring — the idea, the execution, or the outcome?
The ET Trendies results are out and the winners look credible. But the more interesting conversation is the one Brand Equity itself is running alongside it: in an AI world, what are we rewarding, really?
It's not a rhetorical question. Award culture in Indian marketing has always measured a peculiar blend of craft, strategy, and visibility — with jury intuition filling the gaps. That worked when human effort was the assumed input. Now the input is murky and the output is often indistinguishable from what a well-briefed AI could produce in an afternoon.
This matters for studios and agencies more than it might seem. If the metric for excellence shifts from *how it was made* to *what it changed in the market*, then the whole evaluation framework needs rebuilding. Outcome-based awards — did the work move sales, shift perception, grow a category — are harder to game and harder to judge. But they're probably the right direction.
IPO communications work winning awards is a useful stress-test here. A well-crafted IPO narrative can move a valuation multiple. That's a measurable, commercial outcome — not just aesthetic achievement. If Indian creative awards started weighting for that kind of proof, the winner's podium would look different.
The industry isn't ready for that conversation yet. It should start having it anyway.