Dayton Ogden
Succession Advisory Services
Dayton Ogden is the global leader of Spencer Stuart’s CEO Succession advisory services and a member of the Board and Industrial practices. His search consulting work focuses on senior executive and board recruiting for a broad range of international clients.
History of search and leadership excellence.
Three years after Dayton joined Spencer Stuart, he became manager of the firm’s New York and Stamford offices. In 1987, he was elected chief executive of the firm and in 1993, became the first CEO in the firm’s history to be re-elected to a third term. He served as chairman of the firm from 2003 to 2006, having served as joint chairman for the previous four years.
He is a frequent commentator on key trends and issues affecting CEOs and boards, both in the United States and internationally. In 2000, Oxford University Press published a book, titled CEO Succession, which Dayton co-authored.
Dayton draws from direct board experience for client work, currently serving on the board of the American Business Conference, an organization that includes the CEOs of emerging growth companies. He also serves on the international board of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation and chairs the Talent & Compensation Committee. After 20 years, he recently stepped down as a director of Project HOPE and received a lifetime achievement award. Project HOPE is a leading healthcare foundation based in Washington, D.C. He previously served seven years on the board of Advanced Tissue Sciences, a NASDAQ biotech company.
Before joining Spencer Stuart, Dayton was a principal of an executive search firm located in Washington, D.C. Additionally, his military career included two years as gunnery officer on a U.S. Navy destroyer followed by a tour in Vietnam, where he served with distinction as officer in charge of a swift boat in the Mekong Delta.
Dayton is a graduate of Yale University.
Curt Hamilton, Founder and President
Here’s the Design Design story and history. And my story, really.
In the winter of 1980, I left the world of the paycheck kingdom and, with a partner and against parental advice, rented a small office on Main Street in Evanston and named my new business Stripes Visual Communications. We took our life savings, plopped down a month’s rent, bought a couple of drawing boards and a stat camera, and opened our doors in January of 1981 with (almost) no clients. Alas, after about a year, we still had (almost) no clients. Things changes shortly after that (whew!), and things took off. This small taste of success led to striking out on my own, sans partner, and renaming the firm Design Design Communications in 1984. I moved into a warehouse on Chicago’s near west side on N. Sangamon St. because it was near a photographer I knew and I had gone to a punk rock party there before. Very analytical choice.
Working primarily for PR firms and Rockwell International, we again moved when the building went condo in 1987. This time, to another eerily big loft space with strange art (mine), green walls and no individual offices, except a couple of half walls for myself and the “computer room”.
We enjoyed ten years at 311 North Des Plaines before moving to the big time in a real office, complete with a custom build-out and room for about a dozen employees at 1333 North Kingsbury St. — still pretty much River West, and never too far from the Matchbox Tavern at the corner of Milwaukee and Chicago Avenues.
In 2004, we opened an office in the shadows of Wrigley Field, with our logo on the awning of a vintage brownstone,
Realizing a long developing vision, we are now a virtual office with employees and team members, partners and associates scattered throughout the city (and the country). But wait, I once again starved for personal interaction and a water cooler so, in 2016, we opened a satellite office on Paulina Street in Chicago's West Loop.
There has always been great clients, great employees, tough deadlines and hard work. But there has always been fun and passion, also. So, here I am, 30+ years later, still doing what I was meant to do with enthusiasm and pride. Thank you.
