Miles Young was educated at Bedford School and New College, Oxford. His career in advertising has spanned Lintas, Allen Brady & Marsh and Ogilvy & Mather, which he joined in 1983.

Miles was appointed to the Board of Ogilvy & Mather Advertising in London in 1986 and Client Services Director in 1988. In February 1990, he became Managing Director of Ogilvy & Mather Direct in London. He was a Regional Director of Ogilvy & Mather Direct Europe from 1990 to 1995.

From 1994 to 1995, he had the additional responsibility of setting up and running the IBM account in Europe which had previously been held by some 40 separate agencies. This included setting up a dedicated service hub in Paris for both advertising and direct marketing; and Miles has lectured and written widely on the subject of integrated marketing, a special interest.

In September 1995, he moved to Hong Kong to take up the position of Chairman of Ogilvy & Mather Asia Pacific, and served on the Board and Executive Committee of Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide. During this period, Ogilvy & Mather grew significantly in size and market share, and was repeatedly acknowledged as “Agency of the Year” by Media magazine.

He represented WPP’s corporate interests in Asia, in addition to his O&M responsibilities.

Miles is cofounder of the Ogilvy-Tsinghua Program for Public Branding, a joint venture with Tsinghua University, Beijing, and a member of the Advisory Board of the Tsinghua School of Journalism. He is also an Economic Consultant to the Jiangsu, China Provincial Government and a visiting Professor at Xiamen University. Miles is Chairman of the US Pakistan Business Council in Washington, D.C. and a member of the Prime Minister of Turkey's Investment Advisory Council. He is a member of the Board of the Museum of Arts and Design in New York. In addition, he is the Chairman of the American Friends of the Hermione.

He assumed the position of CEO of Ogilvy & Mather in January 2009 and Chairman in July 2012. He is based in New York.