Our Team

James founded NCA in 2020 with David Golding, becoming one of the fastest-growing agencies in the UK in 2023. Since its inception, NCA has worked with local and global clients including Sainsbury’s, MoneySuperMarket, Vodafone, Nando’s, Paramount+, Alzheimer’s Society and Cityfibre.

Murphy and Golding previously founded Adam&Eve in 2008 and built it into one of the most influential agencies to launch in the UK, with success on the international stage. NCA employs approximately 90 people and is currently based in Fitzrovia in London and Merchant City in Glasgow, in partnership with the Glasgow School of Art.

Both Ogilvy UK and NCA will come under the leadership of James Murphy as CEO Ogilvy Group UK. This marks a return to Ogilvy for Murphy who began his career as a graduate trainee with the agency.

Laura specialises in the creative sector, with two decades of experience leading HR functions across big brands, top creative agencies, global networks and independent start-ups. She is a passionate champion of Ogilvy UK’s ‘people first’ strategy. Overseeing employee experience and agency culture, she delivers on her passion for learning and development by implementing tangible strategies across the agency.  

Laura works alongside the wider leadership team, including CPO EMEA Elaine Grell and Ogilvy UK's head of DEI, Matt Foster, to champion a safer place to work for all colleagues. 

Jules Chalkley is the Chief Executive Creative Director of Ogilvy UK. He has worked as a creative leader within the advertising and communications industry for more than 20 years, having built a unique and highly multidisciplinary skillset. He fundamentally believes in the power of borderless creativity, in all its forms, to transform and grow business and solve societal challenges.   

He has created ground-breaking campaigns for the Mayor of London, Relate, Sipsmith, British Airways, IKEA, M&S, and Land Rover; winning in excess of 200 awards globally, ranging from D&AD, Cannes, Clio and One Show.  

Whilst he is one of the UK’s most awarded creatives, he is also proud to have overseen the creative for the BBC’s coverage of the London 2012 Olympic Games which saw an audience of 200 million worldwide and earned the Grand Jury Prize at the Royal Television Society. Elements of the creative work were integrated into the opening ceremony.  

Whilst he has a passion for British and Global brands, he has also worked closely with the UK Government to create highly integrated behaviour change campaigns. He was responsible for a ground-breaking and highly effective creative platform for the NHS Blood Donation programme called ‘Missing Type’. It was considered Campaign of The Decade by the British media.  

Jules has contributed articles to leading industry platforms, written for the Guardian and spoken on BBC Radio London, is the Executive Sponsor and a champion of Neurodivergent thinking and sit on the Diversity and Inclusion Board of Ogilvy London. 

Laura Vipond is Ogilvy’s Chief Growth Officer.

In her role, she will oversee Ogilvy’s new business teams across all five areas of business, including advertising, experience, PR, consulting and health. She will be responsible for the agency’s growth strategy, focusing on new and existing markets and key network client opportunities.

Vipond has previously worked as head of new business at Elvis and was co-chair of the IPA new business and marketing group. In addition, she is also a Wacl Future Leaders Award-winner and a founder of Futures, a network for the award’s alumni in partnership with Wacl and Nabs. 

Elaine Grell is the Chief People Officer for Ogilvy EMEA.

Prior to joining Ogilvy UK in 2022, Elaine built an impressive legacy of leading people teams, working in the UK and US at a range of companies including The Collective, IHG and IAG.

In addition to her wide experience, Elaine has an MBA and a CIPD Fellowship.

Passionate about creating an enriching employee experience, Elaine also supports others in her role as a Trustee for the Springboard Charity, who help and mentor emerging talent, young people, and those from disadvantaged groups get into the hospitality industry.

Karla Smith is the Chief Financial Officer of Ogilvy UK.

A commercially minded chartered accountant, Karla has over 20 years experience in the industry. Karla leads the UK’s commercial and finance communities across all areas of the business driving strong client relationships which enable our creativity to drive impact for our clients.

Karla is an advocate for workplace well being, driving multiple DE&I and anti-racism initiatives across the business. Karla is the honorary treasurer for the industry charity NABS and a member of the IPA Council and the IPA Finance Committee.

With over 25 years of brand communications experience across agency and in-house, Nicola has been a Managing Partner and part of the Ogilvy PR leadership team since 2019, leading new business, overseeing operations and corporate and consumer work for clients including Nestlé, Johnson & Johnson, UNESCO and Aldi.

Prior to Ogilvy, Nicola was Deputy Managing Director of Karmarama PR agency, Kaper.

Nicola has a broad spectrum of experience across commercial, not-for-profit and government and has worked with leading organisations including Barclays, IKEA, Unilever, Virgin Trains, London Underground and Dyson. She appears in the 2021 PR Week Power Book.

Clare is CEO of Ogilvy One EMEA, and also leads Ogilvy UK’s Experience business, which is focused on delivering strategies that drive growth and long term customer value for brands. With over 20 years experience in the direct to consumer space, Clare has lead consumer and business brands in telco, finance, hospitality, CPG, and entertainment.

Prior to this role, Clare was the Chief Customer Officer of Ogilvy UK, and prior to that the Managing Director of the original OgilvyOne. She is a data geek at heart and has a passion for all things precision and performance. 

Alongside her current role, Clare is an active member of WPP’s mentor programme and mentors three up and coming women, along with being a sponsor of Ogilvy Equals. Ogilvy’s equality network - not to be confused as a women’s only network, champions the need for equality in the workplace. She is also Chair of the IPA 44 Club.

Out of work, she is an avid sports fan, and saves that passion for performance for standing on the side-lines of her eldest son’s football training and matches that somehow consume the whole weekend! 

Caroline Howe is the CEO of Ogilvy Health and also leads the UK’s health business.

Along the journey to becoming CEO, she has been a practice lead for advertising and digital and a client lead for medical education and PR. This has allowed her to build a wealth of experience in integrated health communications across numerous campaigns and brand launches.

Working across both promotional and educational disciplines, she has created communication strategies for many clients in the healthcare industry (pharmaceutical companies, professional societies, health innovators and NGOs) across a variety of therapeutic areas including infectious disease, mental health, women’s health, vaccines, respiratory disease, cardiology, immunology, dermatology and oncology.

She works in partnership with her teams and clients, driving agency transformational change and guiding clients through their ever changing business needs.

She sits on the EMEA Exec Committee and UK Board and is a member the health council for EACA (European Association of Communications Agencies).

As CEO, Ogilvy Consulting EMEA and Chief Consulting Officer, Ogilvy UK, Ann leads the strategic consulting team in the UK and across Europe, based in London. Ogilvy Consulting is the strategy and innovation arm of Ogilvy, helping clients find new paths to growth as they navigate an increasingly complex environment. 

With her team, Ann delivers Growth & Innovation, Brand & Customer Experience and Digital Transformation solutions and also oversees our specialist practices in Corporate & Sustainability and Behavioural Science.  With over 20 years in WPP in strategy and client leadership roles spanning New York, Paris and London, Ann has been instrumental in developing our IP in modern marketing and applying it with clients across a wide range of industries – from Financial Services and Technology, to FMCG, Retail with brands including American Express, British Airways, Unilever, Mondelez, Nestlé, IBM, Cisco, SAP and Louis Vuitton.

Prior to joining Ogilvy, Ann worked for what is now Kantar Consulting, developing and using qualitative and quantitative consumer research to inform long-term marketing and brand strategy scenarios for clients including Lloyds TSB. Following this she worked in brand and advertising planning for what is now Wunderman Thompson and in Digital Media at Mindshare. Ann is a BIMA 100 member and is a graduate of University College Dublin and Université Pierre Mendès-France.

Rory is the Vice Chairman of Ogilvy, an attractively vague job title which has allowed him to co-found a behavioral science practice within the agency. ​

He works with a consulting practice of psychology graduates who look for ‘unseen opportunities’ in consumer behaviour - these are the very small contextual changes which can have enormous effects on the decisions people make - for instance tripling the sales rate of a call centre by adding just a few sentences to the script. Put another way, lots of agencies will talk about "bought, owned and earned" media: we also look for "invented media" and "discovered media": seeking out those unexpected (and inexpensive) contextual tweaks that transform the way that people think and act. ​

It is a hugely valuable activity - but, alas, not particularly lucrative. This is because clients generally do not have budgets for solving problems they have not noticed. ​

Before founding Ogilvy Change, Rory was a copywriter and creative director at Ogilvy for over 20 years, having joined as a graduate trainee in 1988. He has variously been President of the IPA, Chair of the Judges for the Direct Jury at Cannes, and has spoken at TED Global. He writes regular columns for the Spectator, Market Leader and Impact, and also occasional pieces for Wired. He is the author of two books: The Wiki Man, available on Amazon at prices between £1.96 and £2,345.54, depending on whether the algorithm is having a bad day, and Alchemy, The surprising Power of Ideas which don't make Sense, to be published in the UK and US in March 2019.  ​

Rory is married to a vicar and has twin daughters of 17. He lives in the former home of Napoleon III - unfortunately in the attic. He is a trustee of the Benjamin Franklin House in London and of Rochester Cathedral. ​ ​