Ogilvy North America appoints Steve Hayden as chief creative officer

NEW YORK - Ogilvy & Mather North America has appointed Steve Hayden as chief creative officer in its latest management shake-up, which comes as the 10-year anniversary of David Ogilvy's death approaches.

Hayden will retain his title as vice-chairman of Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide in addition to his membership seat on the board. On a day-to-day basis he will focus on improving North America and New York.

Hayden has been tasked with evaluating Ogilvy's current creative structure and identifying key areas where the agency can improve its performance.

Chris Wall, who previously led creative work in New York as vice-chairman of creative, will now lead a group of creatives on clients including IBM and Ford. He will report to Hayden.

Other management changes include the retirement of David Apicella, vice-chairman creative for North America. He will not be replaced.

Jan Leth, Ogilvy's head of creative, will move into a part-time role consulting with the company. His duties will be taken over by Lars Bastholm, who joined Ogilvy North America in March as chief digital creative officer.

The changes come just two months before the 10th anniversary of the death of founder David Ogilvy, often described as "the father of advertising".

Ogilvy founded the agency that is now known as Ogilvy & Mather in New York in 1948. One of his greatest successes was the "Only Dove is one-quarter moisturizing cream" campaign, which helped Dove to become the top-selling soap in the US.

Hayden joined Ogilvy in 1994 in the newly created role of brand steward for the IBM global account. He also played a key role with other Ogilvy clients including American Express, Kodak, Motorola and Dove.

Earlier in his career Hayden worked for Chiat-Day, where he was responsible, along with Lee Clow, for the breakthrough '1984' Orwellian take-off campaign for Apple. He later became chairman/CEO of West Coast operations at BBDO.

Ogilvy slashed 10% of its North American staff at the beginning of the year and there have been rumours of another large round of layoffs.

John Seifert, Ogilvy North America chairman, told US trade journal AdAge the rumours were "categorically untrue".

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