POSITION: Account Director

DEPARTMENT: Account Management

REPORTS TO: Group Account Director

CLIENT MANAGEMENT TEAM:

The Client Management team functions as our clients' strategic advisors and partners. They represent our clients' needs and build efficient cross-functional teams to deliver on all work flowing through the Agency to deliver against those needs. They are responsible for ensuring all the work aligns with the clients' brand, objectives and budgets. They will work with all departments to ensure that client's expectations are met and that the agency operates at profitable levels.

They are responsible for maintaining and growing the client relationship. They are responsible for identifying new opportunities for the agency to pursue that will help drive growth. Ultimately, the function accountable for all aspects of the client experience throughout the entire project cycle. Accountable for delivering the in-year fiscal plan.

POSITION SUMMARY:

The Account Director will own and lead the overarching client relationship on a defined portion of business, potentially with multiple clients across multiple categories/industries. They will be directly responsible for the 'delivery' of the active projects as well as be more forward planning focused initiatives. Through having a rich understanding of the client's business and brand they are responsible for identifying opportunities to drive growth for the client and thus the agency.

IDEAL PROFILE:

You are by nature a collaborative, savvy integrated marketer who thrives on tackling business and brand challenges from a holistic perspective. You thrive on and have experience in full funnel marketing and potentially even have client slide experience to leverage. You have experience leading top brands towards getting the most value out of their marketing investment across all marketing channels. You have proven strength in analytical and strategic thinking. You understand the consumer brand journey across multiple touchpoints and how to best facilitate discussions internally and with clients so that sound marketing decisions can be made. Married with this is your ability to recognize strategically sound creative ideas with potential to deliver on your client's objectives. You are able to build cross-functional teams to solve unique challenges and you are a proven leader capable of mentoring and growing the careers of your direct reports. Most importantly, you have a passion for building brands, big ideas and of course, creativity!

DETAILED RESPONSIBILITIES:

Client Relationship Management

• Develop a trusted advisor relationship with clients and key stakeholders
• Demonstrate confidence and industry expertise as the day-to-day voice of the Agency
• Anticipate potential relationship or expectation issues, advising upper management in time to act proactively
• Work with the GAD in the development of an annual Client Development Plan and produce monthly client forecasts

Project Orchestration and Execution

• Ownership and accountability over program budgets and profitability
• Lead the development of all client-facing presentations
• Lead and/or support internal meetings with department heads to identify the right resources to address all client asks.
• Lead and/or support developing project SOWs, budgets, WBS, Trackers, and Reports & Reconciliation
• Ongoing organizing and setting clear expectations in regard to tasks and deliverables
• Timely development of key client contact reports

Strategic Account Planning

• Be an expert in your client's business - key issues, opportunities, strategies
• Working alongside your partners in strategy, facilitate the deconstruction of client brand and business challenges in order to develop actionable strategies that are then translated into actionable creative briefs.
• Work closely with the Strategy and Creative teams to ensure strategically sound and powerful creative output.
• Able to provide a range of alternatives for client and agency decision-making
• Display marketing curiosity and willingness to push your own thinking and the agency's work in new directions
• Identify and support the organic development of incremental business with existing clients
• Proactively elevates risks and works collaboratively with senior management to build solutions.
• Lead, mentor and develop direct reports including providing clear on-going performance feedback (when role includes direct report)

QUALIFICATIONS:

Must-have:

• Minimum of 10 years of marketing experience.
• At least 3-5 years in a client-facing services role in an agency environment
• Minimum 3 years of people management experience
• Experience working on large consumer-facing brands
• Expert at storytelling and building impactful and influential strategy and creative concept presentations.
• Strong understanding of strategic marketing and business principles
• Strong understanding of the current media landscape and understand how to apply that understanding to holistic and integrated solutions for brands.
• Extensive hands-on experience in the ever-changing digital landscape
• Proven success leading team-based projects
• Self-motivated with quantifiable success in marketing and/or retaining and growing brand and/or client portfolios.
• Strong planning and organizational skills: time-management, working to critical paths, budgeting, delegating, facilitating meetings, multi-tasking, attention to detail, follow up, etc.
• Love building relationships and getting to know clients

Nice-to-have:

• Client-side experience an asset, particularly Tier 1 CPG
• Planning experience a significant asset