Fennell told The Marketing Society’s annual conference today (29 November), that in order to produce great marketing, "you have to be tolerant of people making mistakes and put your hand up quickly when things do go wrong".
He argued that business leaders should not allow British ambition to be stifled by the growing economic gloom, which had been exacerbated by today's Autumn Statement by Chancellor George Osborne.
Fennell said: "It's human nature that when times are tough, people become more cautious. What we need to do as business leaders is change this. The place where we need most creativity is Western Europe, where we need to defy gravity, compared to other places where they have a tail wind."
When questioned whether Diageo tolerated mistakes, he cited the time he was in charge of the launch of the failed Quinn's alcoholic fruit drink.
The drink was described as an "unmitigated disaster" after Diageo spent £6m in the first six weeks marketing the aborted product. Fennell said the experience taught him "the money lost won’t break us, but the experience we gain might make us".
He said that as a Brit, the recent poor performance of domestic companies in the Gunn Report "pisses me off [because] we've got great people here on client and agency side".
He concluded: "You only cause great things when you are setting out to achieve great things."
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