During his acceptance speech as the Advertising Agencies Association of India (AAAI) honoured him with the Lifetime Achievement Award, Prasoon Joshi, chairperson - APAC, McCann Worldgroup, CEO and CCO, McCann India, (to be chairperson, Omnicom Advertising India), remembered the advertising legends that passed away this year, and stated how he deeply missed them.

"I want to remember the people we lost this year and deeply miss Piyush Pandey, Ram Sehgal and Neil French," he said.

After calling himself a stone that has his origins in Uttarakhand, Joshi stated how his role in advertising made his parents proud.

"My father was an education officer and my mother was a pure artist. I had loving parents and when one has that one cannot be rebellious. So I couldn’t take my guitar out to prove them wrong. So I had to manifest both of them," he added.

Talking about his early days in advertising, Joshi said, "We are all drifters in this profession who find our way by searching. We are fundamentally very vulnerable people. When a creative person tells you a story, be patient, be kind, because that person is exposing something very personal. That person has taken something from his own life and had the courage to bring it out as a short story form in front of you. Vulnerability is the strength of our profession. If we become well-rounded as a profession, clients will stop coming to us because they are well-rounded and we are vulnerable - that's how it works. Vulnerability is what makes you connect. That’s the crux of our profession."

Joshi, who started his career as an intern at Trikaya Grey, moved to Ogilvy because of the opportunities it offered to a bilingual person.

"I joined Ogilvy because there was a bilingual person. Sanjeev Lamba hired me. Suresh Malik and Piyush Pandey were there. I owe Suresh a lot. He used to seek me out and took special interest in teaching me. He taught me how to use something that one already has. Piyush told me I wrote well but I wrote a lot. He taught me the economics of writing. He said people don’t have time and make it concise. He told me 'tum zada likhte ho, kam likho!' (You write a lot, write less). Kam shabdon mein apni baat bolo, logo ke pass time nahi hai (Say your thing in few words, people don't have time)," said Joshi.

While Pandey taught him the economics of writing, French's advice was quite the opposite - 'long copy isn’t dead and keep writing it.'

Joshi stated that he also met his life partner, Aparna, while at Ogilvy.

McCann

Joshi joined McCann because he had the opportunity to turn around the agency.

"Tension creates music. Over tension breaks the string. The right amount of it will make it a song," he stated, indicating what he needed to do at McCann."Confusion is the liminal space where ideas reside. Finality kills creativity. Confusion gives us potential and we have to stay with it. That’s where the ideas are. The real test of an agency is in the time of crisis," he said, before stating how he dealt with the Coca-Cola (pesticide) issue, along with Maggi (banned due to lead and MSG), and now approaches Air India.

"The Coca-Cola pesticide and Maggi controversies taught me a lot. My simple solution was that one needs to communicate. For Maggi, we stated how Nestle is a 100-year old company and spoke to mothers who felt they were cheated. Real partnerships come from trust. Same with Air India and the campaign we are now working on," said Joshi.

He added, "One can ride or create culture. India is a continuous civilisation. People have experienced all kinds of thoughts in this country. They have lied latent but they exist. What would I like to be born as - as a creation and not a creator. I want to be a song that reaches the lips of people."

The future

Talking about the future and the role AI will play in it, Joshi said, "I look forward to my new role (at Omnicom after the merger). It’s in collaboration between humans and humans, and humans and tech. Ai is an ally. Ideas have died because they haven’t presented out well. AI will help. A few points to be careful - AI defines a big mass. There’s a lowest common denominator and AI can take you there."