By Darren Gilbert

Now, if you ever to talk to her about this, you’ll realise that there was actually never any doubt. Napier exudes the quiet confidence of a woman who knows what she wants. It’s an attitude that she attributes to her upbringing. “I had the kind of parents who always said that if you work hard enough and you dream big enough, whatever you want to do, you can do.”

Her initial dream was to work in magazines, which saw her work as a freelance journalist overseas. However, Napier soon found herself missing her family and moved back to Durban. It was a step that proved to be the kickstarter to her career in the ad world as she found work at a small agency.

“I was very lucky because the owner of the agency took me under her wing,” explains Napier, who worked through various departments in the agency before ending up in client service, where she knew she had found her niche. “It is the beautiful combination of creativity and the most academic side of the business. It was the perfect fit for me.” It also led her to fulfil the words that she had had spoken as a teenager, joining Hunt\Lascaris in Johannesburg. And it proved to be everything she had hoped for.

“Hunt\Lascaris was an amazing environment in which to work. But it was also a tough environment,” says Napier. “It’s an environment that is either going to bring the very best out of you or it is going to chew you up and spit you out very quickly.” In other words, if you don’t have the self-belief, you won’t be able to survive in this industry.

Yes, that may sound harsh, but it’s true. Unfortunately, not everyone is cut out for this. Napier agrees. “You have to believe that you can climb mountains because there are days when you are literally doing that,” she says. Fortunately, for Napier, it’s an environment in which she thrived, running major accounts while at the agency. However, the one client that she was interested in working with would only come with a show of bravery on her part.

“I was at a crossroads in my life,” admits Napier. “I thought, ‘Well, I’ve been here for seven years now. What do I do? Do I go back to Durban to be close to my family? Do I pursue a career in advertising overseas?” And then she got a phone call from John Davenport. “I was obviously flattered. I knew who he was but I didn’t think he knew about me.” Davenport had plans to start a new agency with Phil Ireland and he was intent on bringing Napier on board.

It was an opportunity that Napier did not need to think about for too long. However, that didn’t mean that Napier wasn’t scared. After all this was a huge risk. And she certainly knew it. She recounts a story from her first day: “I can remember thinking: ‘What have I done? We are starting an agency. We have no clients. We have no staff. We literally had one computer between the three of us.”

Fortunately, not long after the opened, they came across news that would ultimately catapult the agency onto the main stage: BMW was going out to pitch. Of course, this meant only one thing – Ireland/Davenport had to get on the list. They did just that before pulling off one of the biggest advertising coups in history by winning.

Since then, the agency has gone from strength to strength. Napier believes it’s not hard to explain why. “We always had a very clear idea of what kind of agency we wanted. We didn’t want to do something mediocre. We wanted to build something.” They have done just that, and successfully so. However, for all the success with work, what does it matter if you can’t share it with someone?

Up until now, Napier had ticked all of life’s boxes except for one: finding someone to settle down with. Fortunately, she found him and while it was later on in life – she was 32, he was 35 – it allowed here to fulfil another dream: to have children. “If you ask me what I believe I was put on this earth to do, I would say that it was to be a mom.”

It’s certainly a brave decision. After all, motherhood and the ad industry don’t mix often. And even when they do, it’s always hard. However with Napier, you know that she will take it in her stride. It is a decision that she has never regretted. “Yes, there are sacrifices and I’m not going to say it wasn’t tough. But I was always going to find a way to make it work.”

Napier also believes that it’s not impossible for others to do so long as you find a balance. “If you have a deep passion for what you do, you can find a way to make it balanced.” Of course it will take time to figure it all out – this is not a perfect science that we are talking about here. However, it’s completely possible. At the same time, it’s about how much you really want it. Napier knew she wanted it so she went out and found a way.