Rory Sutherland (advertising)

Rory Sutherland (born 1965, Usk, Monmouthshire, Wales) is a British advertising executive. He is the current Executive Creative Director of OgilvyOne. He was vice-chairman of Ogilvy Group UK and co-founder of the Behavioural Sciences Practice, part of the Ogilvy & Mather group of companies. He wrote The Wiki Man.

Career history

Sutherland read Classics at Christ's College, Cambridge, upon graduation he joined Ogilvy & Mather Direct in 1988 as a planner before then becoming a copywriter working on the Microsoft account in its pre Windows days. He was notoriously called the 'worst graduate trainee that Ogilvy & Mather had ever hired'.

In 1995 he was made Head of Copy at OgilvyOne and then became Creative Director in 1997 before becoming Executive Creative Director in 2002. In April 2009 Sutherland was elected President of the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising, making him the first creative and direct marketer to hold the post. In 2012 he was awarded an honorary doctorate (D.Litt) by Brunel University London.

Talks and speaking engagements

Rory Sutherland has delivered a number of well received and popular conference talks for organizations, including:

• Life lessons from an Ad Man for TED talks
• Sweat the small stuff for TED talks
• Perspective is everything for TED talks
• The next revolution will be psychological not technological for the Institute of Communication Agencies

• Rory Sutherland's 'Life lessons from an Ad Man TED talk
• Rory Sutherland's Sweat the small stuff TED talk
• Rory Sutherland's Perspective is everything TED talk
• Rory Sutherland's 'The Next Revolution Will Be Psychological Not Technological talk

The Wiki Man

Sutherland writes a fortnightly column for The Spectator, called "The Wiki Man", the article covers his thoughts on technology and the internet. He has also authored a book entitled The Wiki Man, a collection of his blog posts, tweets, interviews and reference materials.

Personal life

Sutherland is married with twin daughters.