Dan Wieden Honored With CLIO Lifetime Achievement Award in 2009

At 64 years of age, Dan Wieden stepped up to the podium in 2009 during the 50^th Annual CLIO Awards hosted at Las Vegas’ Hard Rock Hotel & Casino. The Wieden & Kennedy co-founder and CEO was presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award to which he humbly asked, “Isn’t this a little premature?”

Although Wieden was being honored with the event’s most prestigious award, he made certain to acknowledge the people and experiences that got him there. With agency partners in attendance, including co-founder David Kennedy, Wieden opened his speech with “It’s a great honor.” Following the opening statement, Wieden quickly dove into a plethora of comments in which he cited Kennedy as being the one who got it all started for him. “These kinds of awards are nice to receive but quite honestly a lot of what happens to you in life depends on whose canoe you jump in and I jumped into the canoe of a crazy Irishman named David Kennedy.”

Wieden recalls that all he had to lean on upon during the agency’s 1982 launch was Kennedy, a book called ‘How to Start an Advertising Agency,’ and an advertising-hating client in a young Nike company. Originally aspiring to be a writer, Wieden eventually joined McCann-Erickson, where he and Kennedy were first introduced. Kennedy’s background boasted a more extensive experience in the industry due to previous stints with other established agencies, though Wieden insists that neither of the two really knew much of anything about starting their own. Never afraid to use profanity, Wieden stated that “Kennedy was the only one who knew s*** about this industry. That ignorance is really what helped us and propelled us forward. We didn't know what the rules were. No one in their right mind would start an international agency in Portland, Ore.”

Wieden at the 2009 CLIO Awards

It was this insight that would eventually define the agency’s philosophy of forgetting the rules and having no formula for creativity. In true Wieden fashion, the advertising icon quickly turned his attention to crediting his employees for his continued success as he had done on countless occasions throughout his career. Jim Riswold, Wieden’s first copywriter, was singled out for his work on some of the company’s first Nike campaigns which were largely responsible for the agency’s successful launch. Wieden’s employees have always been featured by the ad giant as the true driving force responsible for the first-rate status, and the love received back is no less admirable.

Over the years many have been quick to comment on Wieden’s loving, laid back, anything goes nature. Former employee John Boiler recalls a certain speech given at the agency’s 10-year anniversary party addressing the CEO’s freedom giving management style in which Wieden said, “I think you people just needed somebody to get the f*** out of your way.” Randall Rothenberg, a former news reporter, wrote a book about the agency stating that, “What Dan Wieden reminded me of, more than anything was my and your most favorite high-school teacher. Your favorite high-school teacher knew how to push your buttons to get the best stuff out of you. That is Dan.” Wieden even owns his own camp for at-risk youth, called Caldera, where the kids call him “Papa Bear.”

The awards event was kicked off by Rick Williams, President of The American Indian College Fund and long running agency client. He expressed his feelings about Wieden by dubbing him a “remarkable man,” and adding that, “When you think about Dan Wieden, you think about respect. Everything about him, he does it in a respectful way. He treats people respectfully; he treats the world with respect."

Wieden closed the end of a heartfelt speech by alluding to the agency’s creative slogan, “Fail Harder.” He went on to ad “I love failing… What I love about this moment in time in this industry is that no one knows what the right thing to do is right now. You've got to experiment. I'm going to let you guys figure out the end of this story.” This reminds me of my favorite quote from the advertising legend, “You’re not of any use to me until you f*** up three times. Just don’t f*** up four.” Any man with a philosophy like that is okay in my book.

Mesh, A. (2009, December 2). Here's The Pitch. In Willamette Week. Retrieved March 17, 2011, from <http://www.wweek.com/portland/article-11379-hererss_the_pitch.html>

Parpis, E. (2009, May 14). CLIO Honors Dan Wieden . In AdWeek. Retrieved March 19, 2011, from <http://www.adweek.com/aw/content_display/esearch/e3i667520d694e3e8a2ab5306c41f920618>