Sir Martin at 81: The relentless architect of modern advertising

A 1968 Harvard graduate who joined Saatchi & Saatchi to become its CFO. Who would have thought that he would one day own some of the biggest and best ad agencies in the world. Many might have laughed when he first started with Wire and Plastic Products, that modest shell company which was to become the huge monolith called WPP. It takes a certain kind of audacity to buy an empty basket and then go shopping for the finest fruit in the market. Sorrell had that audacity in spades.

Although I grew to admire him through the last few decades, I can’t help saying that I was disappointed when he bought over JWT in 1987. The entire culture of our company changed. We lost some great planners. He tightened the belt so hard that all of us were hurting. But in retrospect, he took over a company without financial discipline and with falling margins. I am not sure I liked what happened to JWT emotionally, but I know that he made it a profitable and far more accountable company. He replaced comfort with performance. Not always popular, but undeniably effective.

I once had the opportunity to present to him more than twenty years ago. As I was setting up my computer and opening my presentation, he told me, “Your neck is next on the chopping block.” I was shaken but not stirred. I had already heard that the other agency managers before me had had a hard time. As it so happened, my presentation went off very well and I emerged victorious. Another Indian manager once asked him how he should address him. Sorrell replied that he could call him anything as long as he kneeled before addressing him. That was British wit at its driest and sharpest ; intimidating, but somehow also disarming.

What set Sorrell apart was not just his appetite for acquisitions but his extraordinary memory and command over numbers. He could walk into any office, anywhere in the world, and know your billings, your margins and probably your client’s billing cycle better than you did. He brought a financial discipline to the creative chaos of advertising. For many of us raised in a more romantic era of advertising, this was uncomfortable. But it also ensured survival and growth in an increasingly corporate world.

I have to say that I became a Sorrell fan about the time he finally left WPP. I could have predicted that WPP would start faltering the day he left. And in many ways, he might well have been the right man to steer the company through its most difficult decade; the digital disruption, consulting invasions and shrinking margins that followed. Founders and empire-builders rarely leave behind successors who carry quite the same fire.

As far as agency holding company CEOs go, I thought he was the most impressive. Although I might be biased because I worked at WPP and had reluctantly begun to like him.

At 81, Sir Martin Sorrell remains what he has always been — sharp, driven and slightly formidable. Advertising has seen many flamboyant leaders, but very few empire-builders. He was, and remains, one of the last of that breed.

Happy 81st, Sir Martin. The industry is still catching its breath from the pace you set.