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Nominations and Awards Do they really matter?

noellamenon@gmail.com (Noella Menon) — Sat, 15 Nov 2025 10:14:05 GMT

My son was in his school soccer team and their team competed in an inter school tournament. The previous year they had brought home the trophy and each of them were given a medal. It was a sweet victory and the whole school applauded them during their assembly as they received their medals. My son felt elated. It was such a thrill. The following year however, they decided they wanted it to be a ‘friendly’ series and decided to move away from competition mode. I guess the organizer could save on medal and trophy costs. The boys were really disappointed to say the least. Ok! So now that I had my chance to rant as the typical “soccer mom” on how that medal-less year was a major de-motivator for the whole soccer team, I can move on to the point of why awards, medals, plaques and trophies really matter.

As an artist or a company, applying to prestigious awards that have built up a brand and credibility of their own through the years, have been holding the award ceremonies for more than a decade preferably or at least a couple of years and have come to be recognized by industry veterans as “legit”, is definitely worth it!

Here are the top 5 reasons why….

#1 It makes you, your team strive for excellence – It’s a great motivator and incentive to put in their best for each and every project or job where that driving ambition will lead to career progression and self-development.

#2 It validates you, your team and their most creative work. Creative work is so subjective and it’s often difficult to be the judge of your own work. It is a 3^rd party endorsement with a fresh objective perspective and one that is received from the best of the best in that particular field since the judges will always be selected based on their own stellar work and achievements.

#3 It allows you or your team to reflect on your best performing work in terms of market results where customers or viewers have appreciated the work and the numbers and stats speak for themselves. This should be a good criteria to enter a piece of work when thinking about which work to submit for an award.

#4 It builds visibility and puts your best work in front of people that matter within your industry. Judges, Organisers, Viewers, Fellow Artists and the whole network of eyeballs who will eventually see your work and register your name or your brand. It is bound to make a favourable impression.

#5 It’s a fabulous marketing tool – An award-winning artist or company builds credibility. It’s a brand statement which puts you in a league of your own and gives customers, clients or viewers the feeling that they are in the best of hands. It’s a reassurance that they will get their money’s worth for sure.

Putting your name forward for an award takes courage and conviction on your part. No matter whether you win or lose, you’re placing your bets on YOU! That means you already believe in yourself, you consider your work to be praise worthy and award winning material and regardless of the outcome you’re a winner in your mind. That’s HUGE!

The past year 2020 was the year of COVID-19 and a lot of us were under forced lockdowns. It gave us the opportunity to reflect, to self-evaluate and to consider different and alternate ways to work, to market and to self-improve. Improvisation, re-invention and coming out of our comfort zones was all part of the learning experiences we went through last year.

As part of those efforts, besides taking online courses, upgrading my skillsets and working on a brand new Skills Future Credit Eligible course module, I decided to apply to a couple of Voice Over and Voice Acting awards and since they were all being held online, virtually, I thought why not give it a shot from the comfort of my home! I figured I had built up a decent body of work over the years in various genres of voice over – commercials, interstitials, trailers, IVRs, VR vids, animated films and TV serials, radio spots, e-learning, museum walkthroughs, corporate films, explainers, e-learning, jingles, theme songs for soundtracks, intros-outros, documentaries – the works! So instead of hedging my bets and entering multiple categories, I decided to enter only one category – ‘Outstanding Body of Work, International’ at the prestigious ‘Voice Arts Awards’ (SOVAS) held in New York, USA. It’s being touted as the ‘Oscars’ for the Voice Industry and rightly so! It was such a slick and well-organized show with presenters like Tom Kenny (Iconic voice of Sponge Bob Square Pants) and George Lucas (Star Wars) and awardees like Mark Hamill (Luke Skywalker, Star Wars).

My category was selected among 5 out of 90 categories to be live-streamed and when the award was announced, us top 5 nominees, got to go live! I was tuned in on a Zoom call, miles away in Singapore and due to the time difference, it was early morning for me. Given that we VOs are used to being all drab, sometimes working in our PJs, that’s the earliest I’ve ever had rush to get all togged up. I had to make sure my audio, video and lighting were all on-point! The organizer made sure we had a test run prior to the show. It was an exhilarating, nail biting experience and though I didn’t win it was an experience of a lifetime being nominated and among such stellar and highly accomplished voice talent – the best of the best globally!

I felt like a winner irrespective and my well-wishers and community of voice artists, friends and family really made me feel elated with their outpouring of encouraging compliments.

I had also entered some of my work to the ‘India Voice Fest 2020’ and was thrilled when I received a call one evening, early December 2020, to let me know that I had won ‘Best Voice Over - Corporate Film English Female’ for Barclays Japan’s 50^th Anniversary video. I got to prepare and deliver a speech and was nominated from among 500 entries overall in various categories. To win was truly the stuff made of dreams! The India Voice Fest was well curated with stalwarts of the Indian Voice Industry joining in as presenters, panelists, speakers and awardees. There were edutaining live events streamed over a week that benefitted the whole community and the live performances on the award night itself made it quite a fantastic show. I particularly enjoyed the ‘Dubbing Voice Talent Hunt’ which brought a spot-light on aspiring voice talent.

All-in-all it was a wonderful opportunity to see the winning work of the best international voice talent at these events and to see where the bar is set at and to evaluate my own work based on that benchmark. It was insightful to say the least!

I was able to get my work evaluated and in front of the best names in voice over and made some great new connections on social media.

I am a believer in immersing myself in new experiences, pushing myself out of my comfort zone occasionally and to diving into good opportunities that come my way head-first even though sometimes I might feel insecure, inadequate and perhaps not quite ready. I say this because we tend to be our own worst critics, always second guessing ourselves and thinking of the worst-case scenario. It’s like a self-created yoke around our necks that we’ll be free from if we but choose to unlock it and throw that heavy burden into the ocean to sink forever….never to surface again! Ok! I’m being dramatic but seriously I share this from a myriad experiences, that have turned out pretty amazing in hindsight. I tell you with a certain amount of confidence that you’ll do great and whether you win, succeed or even FAIL, you will be richer for it! The life-learning is immense and your memory bank and portfolio of relevant experiences are bound to hold you in good stead in the future.

You’ve figured by now that I am all for awards and trophies and good old healthy competition. It keeps you ticking, relevant and eager to improve, striving for excellence and it raises the bar higher and higher.

My India voice fest plaque arrived by courier, all wrapped in red ribbon, sent all the way from Mumbai India across the miles to me in Singapore. It has taken its pride of place on my desktop right next to my microphone and cans in my Home Studio. I eagerly await my plaque from the Voice Arts Awards as well. I look forward to running out of display space in the future! ;-)

So, wanna see your name engraved on a plaque one day?,

Can’t wait to thank your parents, your mentors, voice coaches and the good Lord above in your acceptance speech?

or strut your designer wear on that red carpet (after all this social distancing madness has finally ended for good)?

Then you’re all set to come out from behind the scenes, emerge from the dark recesses of your mole-like studio and take a well-deserved bow in the spot-light!

For more information about the Voice Arts Awards click here

For more information about the India Voice Fest click here

For more information about the Asian Academy Creative Awards Click here.

For more information about Noella and to see her award-winning Voice Over work click here or do follow her on her social media pages IG @Wonders_of_the_voice FB @voice4ads Linkedin & Twitter @noellamenon

For more information on her Skills Future Credit Eligible / PA affiliated five star rated voice acting and voice over course ‘Wonders of the Voice’ Click Here

AI Doom or Gloom?

noellamenon@gmail.com (Noella Menon) — Tue, 11 Nov 2025 09:43:58 GMT

Let's face it AI is more than just a "Distruptor" - It's come in with a BANG! Pulled the carpet from under our feet and made us go, "DANG!".... but is it really "Kaput!" or can it be a possible "Ka-Ching!"? Is it Doom? or can we Boom? This is a nail biting question on every creative's mind.

Let's examine what happened here....

Some Possible Positives...

The way we create has changed overnight!
The IoT is truly at our fingertips....at our command or in this case our nuanced query - Heck! Open AI has taken "Ask and you shall receive" to a whole new level! If you've tried it out you'll feel like you have your own personal Genie in a bottle.
Those who stay open to ride this new wave can learn fast, work smart and stay relevant
The learning curve for most things will be greatly reduced.... things that were known to experts will be available freely for newbies to absorb at the rate of knots!
AI is Levelling up the playing field here like never before
The Productivity Potential is enormous!

Some Perceived Negatives

Creatives are feeling destabilised and with uncertainty comes a feeling of being lost
Jobs and designations as we know it have changed or will possibly become redundant
Income slices of those delicious pie charts have virtually been eaten up by AI
With cloning and replication tools we are questioning the ethics and best practices in most industries with the advent of AI - more so in the creative space.
Privacy, Intellectual Property and Brand Uniqueness are being violated, Content identity theft and plagiarism is becoming child's play - What's the way forward and how can we put ground rules and governing laws in place so our individual and collective rights are safeguarded in cyberspace?

With the gusty winds of change often comes a storm of displacement and chaos. But as in nature, the storm passes and calm is always restored....blue skies and sunny weather where the birds chirp and the bees hum. This too shall pass.

Like in the past, many new and innovative things were invented by the sheer genius of the human mind... the telephone that connected people across the world, iron and steel ships that floated on water without sinking, that miracle of an airplane that defied gravity and now transports millions around the globe in hours if not minutes.... all this using not even 10% of our human intellectual and creative capacity. Machine learning algorithms are being refined as we speak....getting fed with intelligent human data voluntarily. But at the end of the day it is just that.... a machine with lifeless data.

We are the ones who infuse it with so called "life" - It will continue to lack soul and life's uniqueness that only Humans are capable of experiencing.

Sure! Graphics are being produced in seconds but they all have that "AI look and feel" - it is the creative artists that can truly make "original art" - There is and will always be value in exclusivity and originality.

Absolutely! Voice overs are being produced with a click of a button now.... modulated, inflected and articulated with accents thrown in to the milieu but they too sound more or less the same with that easy to identify "AI Sound" lacking emotional depth and nuance that only a human heart that lives and breathes can bring to life.

MNC clients have already started insisting that I sign an agreement that ensures I do not use any AI voice....protections for cloning my voice are also in place in clauses that safeguard the interest of Artistes.

Yes! Clients and agencies I work with have started using AI. Why wouldn't they? They get a good idea how long their video is with an AI voice and while some have started using it for straightforward tutorials or educational content... as soon as there is a proper noun; a name of a person or place or a tricky medical or technical term with abbreviations - they seek out a real Human Voice to handle those projects.

I would imagine really low budget projects that VO talent should not be taking up anyway can be handled by AI freeing up time to handle the really creative and enjoyable projects. I don't see those projects being replaced by AI. Leading Brands and MNCs will know better than to associate their entities with a cheap, run of the mill AI voice. They'll want to continue to stand out from the crowd and differentiate their Brand Voice with a REAL human voice - a thinking, feeling, emotive one that understands the human heart and connects to other humans through that shared experience....authenticity and relatability will continue to come at a premium and there will always be a experienced voice talent that offers that premium conversational voice.

Surprisingly! AI cloning hasn't spared singing too. Justin Beiber, JLo and Drake soundalikes and lookalikes are releasing music videos and tributes to the Pope that are going viral. Ugh!! Cyberspace is a bit of a mess at the moment. 😅

The way I see it - It's a new toy to play with. Open AI has changed the way we work, we play and we create just like the way the internet and later social media changed the way we worked, we played and we created about a couple of decades or more ago. We have adapted, adopted, learnt and regulated. I have no doubt we will do it again.

It's an experimental phase.... the launch, the tinkering around, the adoption and our intrinsic adaptability will show us the way forward. Best practices will come into place eventually and we will minimise the risks while proliferating with the all the benefits.

Communication is here to stay.... It's the way we Humans connect with each other. The way we communicate may change but the need to communicate is going nowhere!

And NO!! Video DID NOT KILL the Radio star!

I certainly hope that AI will not kill the Human spirit. That is what will always differentiate us. The living, breathing and actually experiencing human spirit - filled with joy and oodles of charm, depths of sorrow and endless creativity and imagination - the same intellectual and imaginative visionary that brought AI to life.

I am one of those billions of humans - I was born with an intrinsic sense of hope, enthusiasm and a spirit of adventure - I choose to use AI as a tool to springboard from and enjoy the joy ride! I'm excited to see how much I can do and how fast I can achieve with this brand new personal assistant.

There will always be the good, the bad and the ugly. This is just the way of the world; a realm of co-existence so we can be challenged to push our boundaries and seek to learn and grow while we're here for short blip in time. I ask... can the created destroy the creator? Nah!I'd like to believe not! Not in a long, long time to come anyway ..... 🤞🏼

It's all a matter of perspective - your POV - So are you a skeptic who prefers to wallow in the gloom and doom or will you choose to adopt the growth mindset?

I'd love to know what you think. Any comments?

ps: This is a 100% original article. I did not consult google nor put it through chatGPT. Just saying.