Leo Burnett always seemed to get it right and this letter is no exception. It doesn’t get more poignant than this. At Fierce, we have adopted this as our personal manifesto and we heed its caution. May we strive for excellence every day—and for those hot, unreachable stars.
Leo Burnett – 1967:
Let me tell you when I might demand that you take my name off the door:
That will be the day when you spend more time trying to make money and less time making advertising – our kind of advertising.
When you forget that the sheer fun of ad-making and the lift you get out of it – the creative climate of the place – should be as important as money to the very special breed of writers and artists and business professionals who compose this company of ours – and make it tick.
When you lose that restless feeling that nothing you do is ever quite good enough.
When you lose your itch to do the job well for its own sake – regardless of the client, or the money, or the effort it takes.
When you lose your passion for thoroughness…your hatred of loose ends.
When you stop reaching for the manner, the overtones, the marriage of words and pictures that produces the fresh, the memorable, and the believable effect.
When you stop rededicating yourselves every day to the idea that better advertising is what the Leo Burnett Company is all about.
When you are no longer what Thoreau called “a corporation with a conscience” – which means to me, a corporation of conscientious men and women.
When you begin to compromise your integrity – which has always been the heart’s blood – the very guts of this agency.
When you stoop to convenient expediency and rationalize yourselves into acts of opportunism – for the sake of a fast buck.
When you show the slightest sign of crudeness, inappropriateness or smart-aleckness – and you lose that subtle sense of the fitness of things.
When your main interest becomes a matter of size just to be big – rather than good, hard, wonderful work.
When your outlook narrows down to the number of windows – from zero to five – in the walls of your office.
When you lose your humility and become big-shot weisenheimers…a little too big for your boots.
When the apples come down to being just apples for eating (or for polishing) – no longer a part of our tone – our personality.
When you disapprove of something, and start tearing the hell out of the man who did it rather than the work itself.
When you stop building on strong and vital ideas, and start a routine production line.
When you start believing that, in the interest of efficiency, a creative spirit and the urge to create can be delegated and administered, and forget that they can only be nurtured, stimulated, and inspired.
When you start giving lip service to this being a “creative agency” and stop really being one.
Finally, when you lose your respect for the lonely man – the man at his typewriter or his drawing board or behind his camera or just scribbling notes with one of our big black pencils – or working all night on a media plan. When you forget that the lonely man – and thank God for him – has made the agency we now have – possible. When you forget he’s the man who, because he is reaching harder, sometimes actually gets hold of – for a moment – one of those hot, unreachable stars.
And before I de-materialize again, I will paint out that star-reaching symbol, too. And burn all the stationery. And tear up a few ads in passing. And throw every GD apple down the elevator shafts. You just won’t know the place, the next morning. You’ll have to find another name.
Rock on. Read the entire article here: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/what-would-leo-do-george-evans?trk=hp-feed-article-title-like
