Sir John Hegarty is the British Adman extraordinaire, and the industry’s favourite contrarian. He’s the founder of BBH, one of London’s best established and most successful ad agencies, and the brains behind decade-defining campaigns for Levis, Audi, British Airways and Johnny Walker.

This is an episode from the Gentleman’s Journal archive — we recorded it back in the summer of 2018, but it’s only just seen the light of day. Thankfully, Hegarty’s advice, Oracle-like insight and counterintuitive outlook are pretty timeless.

In this episode, we spoke about how humour can always save you; about the birth of Flat Eric; how, actually, you don’t learn much from your failures; and how storytelling gave birth to the modern human race.