Industry pays tribute to 'irrefutable giant' Annette King

Friends, colleagues and leading industry figures have paid tribute to Dame Annette King DBE, the former Accenture Song, Publicis and Ogilvy leader, who has passed away at the age of 57, just over a year after stepping back from her 35-year executive career.

One of the industry’s most highly respected bosses, at the time King said she felt “extraordinarily lucky to have been embraced by the sector and the many people who make it the wild and wonderful place that it is”.

King joined Accenture Song in October 2023 from her role as chief executive of Publicis Groupe UK, where she was responsible for the group’s UK businesses including Publicis, Sapient, Zenith, and Saatchi & Saatchi.

She started her career at Wunderman in the early 1990s, before switching to the agency’s New York office in 1996, and joined OgilvyOne in 2000 to run the integrated American Express business.

She then went through a series of promotions, including client service director, head of new business, and deputy managing director before being appointed managing director of OgilvyOne in 2007 and chief executive a year later. King was handed the EMEA role in 2012, and was then promoted to CEO of Ogilvy Group in 2014.

Ogilvy released a statement which reads: “Annette was a fierce, passionate visionary, famously pairing a steely competitive edge with a legendary capacity for kindness, infectious enthusiasm, a wicked sense of humour, and sheer fun. She led and lived with absolute humanity and a boundless verve for life. Annette profoundly loved people – whether clients, colleagues, peers, or even competitors – approaching everyone with genuine curiosity and unparalleled generosity with her time.

“Her strategic genius built Ogilvy One into an absolute powerhouse, achieving unprecedented record-breaking heights before she took the helm of Ogilvy UK Group as CEO.

“Annette’s impact extended far beyond pitches won and agencies transformed. She was a transformative leader whose insights were sought at the highest echelons, cultivating a culture of creativity, confidence, and distinction, and mentoring countless colleagues. Perhaps most inspiring was her radical approach to talent: she was famously promoted twice while on maternity leave – a powerful act that established a progressive standard and profoundly paved the way for countless women to thrive in the industry.”

“The industry has lost an irrefutable giant.”

Ogilvy global chief creative officer Liz Taylor added: “Annette was all heart. Love and care were her default setting, and the source of the extraordinary force she was for everyone around her. What lit her up most was people – her clients, her teams, her peers – and she had that rare gift of making each of us feel seen, supported, and capable of more than we thought possible.

“For our industry, in all its experiments and ambitions, Annette brought bravery, laughter and deep humanity. She made everything she touched better — shaping, crafting and elevating the work with an instinct and clarity that was uniquely hers. But perhaps her greatest talent was bringing that same greatness out in others, lifting us all a little higher.

“We will miss her dearly, and we will carry her spirit – her warmth, her courage, her belief in people – with us always.”

Meanwhile, Ogilvy Consulting EMEA chief executive Ann Higgins, WPP global client lead Sophie Hoffstetter, and Ogilvy global CEO of advertising Fiona Gordon released a joint statement. They said: “It has been an honour and a privilege to work alongside Annette, to learn from Annette and to call her a dear friend. We’ll aim to carry forward her laughter, her verve for life and her love of people every day.”

Ogilvy UK vice chairman Rory Sutherland added: “Dame Annette embodied exactly the kind of glorious mass of contradictions which made her a rare natural fit for our industry. Bizarrely, she had a wonderfully abrasive personality, and yet almost everyone liked and revered her – except perhaps the poor unfortunates who had to compete with her.

“She was as fun to socialise as she was enjoyable to work for; she inspired immense loyalty, and deserved every bit. She was part New Yorker (she worked in New York for many years) but never wholly left Swindon – and was at home almost everywhere.

“She also combined a razor-sharp mind, dry-humour, sharp-elbows and gritty determination with immense intuition and kindness. You would go to see Annette whether you wanted someone assassinated (she would make it look like an accident) or if you needed to take a day off to attend your daughter’s Nativity play in the middle of a pitch.

“I have never met anyone, inside the business or outside, who came to display such a mix of complementary talents and carried them all so well. We shall not see her like again, and I shall miss her more than I can say.”