Ep 207: Mark Read of WPP - "The Pragmatic Leader"

How much do you know about what’s happening at your company? 

Mark Read is the CEO of WPP. At last month’s Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, WPP was named the most Creative Company of the Year.

Mark took over the role in 2018 from WPP’s founder, Sir Martin Sorrell. It was one of the most publicized and dramatic changes in leadership that the advertising and marketing industries have ever seen. 

Taking the company from those turbulent times, to one of relative stability and success, has required a realistic, pragmatic approach.

Leadership of any creative business is a balancing act. Between dreams and reality. Belief and skepticism. The known and the unknown. 

Where you are on each of those scales depends on circumstances that can change by the day and sometimes faster than that.

Which means sometimes you have to make decisions based on instinct.

That’s fine, to a point. But as flawed human beings, even the best leaders among us are sometimes let down by their instincts. 

When you’re looking for a place from which to start the process of deciding what happens next, I have found that the best leaders prefer to begin with the truth. In fact, they seek it out.

As Mark says, when you’re in charge, that’s often difficult to find. 

But if you’re going to build scalable, sustainable success, finding out what’s really happening is a critical starting point. 

That might be difficult and sometimes painful in the short run. And a lot of leaders by-pass seeking out the truth because it makes life more complicated for a while. 

But starting with the truth pays for itself in big and small ways. Including in your ability to look yourself in the mirror.