Last night, 17th November, at The Marketing Society Global Dinner, Paul Polman, CEO of Unilever was awarded the Outstanding Leadership Award for his exceptional vision and contribution to business.
On collecting his award Paul said, “At its heart, marketing has always been about creating a brighter future – helping to make lives better tomorrow than they are today. As we face the huge challenges of addressing climate change and rebuilding societies, the power of marketing to stimulate and shape a new, better era of responsible consumption cannot be underestimated.
To achieve this, The Marketing Society continues to be an important driver, challenging brands to use the richness of their insight and the force of their creativity to think and engage differently with consumers. On behalf of everyone at Unilever, I am very grateful for this recognition of the role that our brands are playing towards making sustainable living commonplace.”
Previous winners include McLaren’s Ron Dennis, EasyJet’s Carolyn McCall, producer and film director Richard Curtis CBE and Olympic gold medallist Jessica Ennis-Hill CBE.
At the same event Channel 4 was voted The Marketing Society Brand of the Year in association with Campaign and sponsored by Videology. Channel 4 joins an illustrious line up of Brands of the Year including O2 in 2015, Macmillan Cancer Support in 2014, Sainsbury’s in 2013 and Procter & Gamble in 2012.
Hugh Burkitt, CEO of The Marketing Society said “Paul Polman has demonstrated he is an outstanding leader by a brilliant eight years at Unilever during which the value of the company has doubled. He has set an outstanding example to the rest of the business community on how great marketing can benefit society as well as shareholders. Paul along with our 2016 winners of Brand of the Year, Channel 4, symbolise everything the Society stands for.”