YPA FACULTY 2024
Yaa
Boateng
Managing Director and Chief Creative Officer, The Storytellers. Ghana
Juror
About
Yaa
After competing against over 700 applicants worldwide, Yaa was one of 15 women selected globally (the first Ghanaian and only African representative in 2019) to be part of the Cannes Lions See It Be It initiative. The initiative aims to inspire, support, and bridge the gender gap by accelerating the next generation of senior-level women in the creative industry.
She began her career in advertising as a Designer at Landor Associates in the UK and later moved back to Ghana, where she joined the creative team at Ogilvy. Yaa progressed through the ranks, becoming the first and only female Creative Director at Scanad, a J. Walter Thompson Company within WPP Scangroup.
Yaa holds a Bachelor of Arts (Hons) degree in Graphic Design from the Arts Institute of Bournemouth. Additionally, she earned certificates in Leadership, Branding & Marketing, Interactive Media & Digital. Her typographic excellence was recognized by the International Society of Typographic Designers (UK), earning her the title MISTD. She also exhibited her work at London's D&AD New Blood show.
Having served on the jury panel of Cannes Lions See It Be It in 2020, 2022, 2023 & 2024, Yaa was featured in Cannes Lions Classic Reactions with Facebook and served on this year’s jury panel for the Art Directors Club’s 103rd Annual Awards by The One Club for Creativity. In 2023, she was a juror at the 45th Loeries Awards and part of the International Advertising Association planning team for the 6th African Rising Conference.
In 2021, Yaa served as a juror at the Ad Stars Advertising & Creative Festival and was a Panelist at the Gerety Talks 2022. She also participated as a Panelist at the 3rd African Rising Leadership Conference organized by the International Advertising Association (IAA). Yaa has been a keynote speaker at Accra’s Social Media Week for two consecutive years (2018 & 2019) and at the Pitcher Awards for 2020 & 2022. In 2019, she served as a juror at the Lagos Advertising and Ideas Festival awards (LAIF) and the 2019 Young LAIFers programme in Lagos, Nigeria.
Recognized for her outstanding achievements, Yaa was nominated in 2018 for Ghana's prestigious 40 Under 40 Awards in the Advertising, Communications, Sales & Marketing category.
Yaa is an advocate for autism and volunteers at the Autism Awareness Care & Training Centre in Ghana