Hamish McLennan to leave Y&R and return to Australia
Hamish McLennan is leaving one of the most senior global roles in advertising held by an Australian with his exit as Y&R Advertising’s CEO.
McLennan will remain as chairman until the end of the year ahead of a move back to Australia.
According to AdAge: “The news comes amidst a rough patch for WPP-owned Y&R, which has seen the defection of several longtime clients and is also battling in a review for the Sears account and a chunk of tech titan Dell’s creative business.”
Describing the US operation as troubled, AdAge adds: “While in many respects the work at Y&R has improved in the U.S., the clients haven’t stuck around to benefit.”
However, Y&R’s difficulties began long before McLennan took the global role.
McLennan began his career with George Patterson Bates, and came into the Y&R stable when the agency was acquired, becoming GPY&R.
9.10am update: In an annoucement from Y&R the company says:
Young & Rubicam Brands announced today that David Sable is to succeed Hamish McLennan as Global CEO of Y&R Advertising, part of the world’s third largest agency group. This follows the decision by Hamish McLennan, who has led the agency for the past five years, to return to his native Australia for family reasons. Hamish will continue as Chairman of Y&R Advertising until the end of the year when David Sable will take on this additional role too. Sable remains head of Team Microsoft which co-ordinates the Microsoft account across WPP. These changes are effective immediately.
Commenting on his decision to return to Australia, McLennan said: “This hasn’t been an easy decision for me and my family to make but in the end it became so. I’m very pleased that I shall be continuing to contribute to Y&R worldwide – a company I’ve spent nine years with – and I can think of no more qualified candidate to take over as CEO than David, a close friend and colleague for whom I have the highest regard, both personally and professionally.”
Sable is one of Y&R Brands’ and WPP’s stellar performers. For the past five years he has been Vice Chairman and Chief Operating Officer of Y&R’s sister company, Wunderman. With Chairman/CEO Daniel Morel, with whom he has worked closely for the last 10 years, he has overseen the agency’s expansion and growth. Since 2001, when he joined the company, Wunderman has almost doubled in size to a one-billion-dollar revenue business, acknowledged as global digital leader in its field.
Sable, a New York resident, has a reputation as one of the industry’s most innovative and progressive new media strategists and is respected as a world class authority in digital marketing, advisor to many digital start-ups and noted public speaker on the discipline. For Sable, the move marks a return to the agency where he began his career. Subsequent roles followed at Wells Rich Greene, award-winning Israeli agency Mimsar-Arielly (which he co-founded), and at global PR consultancies, Burson-Marsteller and Cohn & Wolfe, both Y&R Brands companies. An early digital entrepreneur, he also co-founded Genesis Direct, an innovative, web-based direct-to-fan sports retail business.
Peter Stringham, CEO of Young & Rubicam Brands said: “We are very indebted to Hamish for all he has done to set the agency on a strong course of growth, with a record performance in 2008 and its second-best performance ever in 2010. On his watch, Y&R won such clients as Goldman Sachs and LG, added global Danone Waters and consolidated others like Bacardi and Vi Atlantic. And the agency’s creative performance improved dramatically — at Cannes, Y&R New York was named #1 agency in the US and # 2 worldwide, and the global network #3. We are also grateful that he has agreed to stay on as Chairman until the end of the year, to ease the transition.
“David Sable is perfectly equipped to lead Y&R, having spent two thirds of his career at Young & Rubicam Brands companies. Most importantly, his experience across our group has helped him understand more than anyone how to deliver integrated solutions across advertising, public relations, direct and relationship marketing and, critically, how the evolution of digital channels affects all of those. He is the ideal leader to take Y&R to the next level.”
Before moving to New York with his family to take the helm at Y&R, Sydney-born McLennan had served as Chairman/CEO of Young & Rubicam Brands Australia/New Zealand, managing over a dozen companies in the region.
Tim Burrowes founded Mumbrella in 2008. He worked on Mumbrella until 2021. At various points he was editor, content director and editor-at-large.
Linkedin
Oh nooo! What to do with his hugely successful facebook fan page??
http://www.facebook.com/pages/.....0842322821
User ID not verified.
and he’d done so much for the culture of the agency too
User ID not verified.
Oh no, the people at YR New York must be devastated to lose him..
User ID not verified.