Senior Manager, Business Strategy

Job Description:

Merkle is a leading data-driven, technology-enabled, global performance marketing agency that specializes in the delivery of unique, personalized customer experiences across platforms and devices. For more than 30 years, Fortune 1000 companies and leading nonprofit organizations have partnered with Merkle to maximize the value of their customer portfolios. The agency’s heritage in data, technology, and analytics forms the foundation for its unmatched skills in understanding consumer insights that drive people-based marketing strategies. Its combined strengths in performance media, customer experience, customer relationship management, loyalty, and enterprise marketing technology drive improved marketing results and competitive advantage. With 16,000+ employees, Merkle is headquartered in Columbia, Maryland, with additional offices in the US, Europe, and Asia. In 2016, the agency joined the Dentsu Aegis Network.

The Senior Manager operates as a key member of our Transformation & Consulting team helping to ensure that the recommendations we deliver are based on our deep understanding of our client’s business and strategic objectives.  You must also show the ability to build strong relationships in order to become a trusted advisor to the client and Merkle team.  This role requires you to be analytical as well as creative in your thought process and have the ability to be nimble in your thinking about client problems.  As a key contributor inside of a team you must also demonstrate the capability to get others to believe in the ideas that you present and follow that belief through to execution.

The ideal candidate for this position must have a strong passion for problem solving and a deep understanding of how businesses, brands and customers interact, with an advanced understanding of the rapidly evolving role that data and technology play in this relationship. Candidates must possess the ability to support business growth opportunities and develop strategic recommendations to support the growth of client relationships.

Key Responsibilities

• Partner with Consulting delivery leads to drive individual consulting workstreams and deliverables related to organizational strategy and operating model design, often in coordination with concurrent Merkle data, technology, and experience delivery teams.
• Plan and facilitate client discovery through techniques such as client interviews, document review, surveys / questionnaires, or marketing data analysis
• Help clients assess organizational readiness for omnichannel personalization or other marketing transformation initiatives
• Support ideation, planning, and delivery of organizational strategy consulting engagements with our clients, which may include marketing process assessment and design, evaluation and redesign of marketing (or other related) functions, competencies, roles and responsibilities, recommendations around decision-making and governance, etc. based on assessment of client gaps against our maturity models
• Support delivery of change management strategy, planning, and implementation efforts, including empathy maps, change roadmaps, skills assessment, training plans, test and learn plans, playbooks, KPI alignment, ways of working feedback & monitoring
• Facilitate and drive client meetings and discussions, define consulting project objectives and engagement approach
• Facilitate discovery sessions, client workshops, deliverable reviews, and manage overall day to day delivery efforts for consulting engagements
• Support operating model and organizational change thought leadership and practice development efforts
• Support overall delivery and success of Merkle’s transformation consulting engagements which may include:
  • Support discovery, visioning, prioritization, roadmap or recommendation alignment workshops
  • Support development of customer use cases (B2B, B2C, B2B2C)
  • Support market and competitive research to uncover trends, benchmarks, and best practices to inform recommendations
• Support executive-level presentations, synthesizing discovery findings into common themes that drive client recommendations and decision-making
• Create multi-year roadmaps to guide client implementation, in consultation with data and technology teams, to identify key dependencies and sequencing of recommendations
• Ensure meaningful client value is delivered through a mix of best-practice solutions, skills, capabilities, and original thinking.
• Identify key data points and measurements to show the impact of our approach and strategy on the client’s business.
• Support business development activities including identification, proposal development, and other pursuit activities.
• Collaborate and develop relationships with internal Merkle teams (account management, technology, B2B, analytics etc.) to understand the feasibility of cross-channel recommendations/plans.

• Bachelor’s Degree required.
• 7+ years of cross industry consulting experience in digital transformation roles or integrated marketing strategy.
• 5+ years working in a top tier consulting firm and/or digital marketing agency.
• Demonstrated understanding of end-to-end consulting approach to solve client problems - from design/develop to execution of strategy.
• Prior experience assessing and recommending optimal team structures or process structures to facilitate integrated marketing program execution
• Familiarity with the application of agile methodology to marketing
• Hands on delivery experience with organizational strategy, design, and implementation, business process design, change management consulting (highly preferred).
• Experience in leading and delivering complex projects by providing actionable solutions for clients.
• Hands-on skills using data and research to drive decisions. Some knowledge of data and analytics strategy.
• Strong writing, presentation and client facing communication skills.
• Experience translating data analysis into actionable marketing recommendations and presentations – proficiency in PowerPoint required.
• Self-starter with high intellectual curiosity, drive, determination, and persuasion skills.
• Problem-solving mindset; thrives in ambiguous and fast-moving environments, as well as in informal, loosely structured, and creative work environments.
• Comfort and experience working within a highly matrixed organization in roles with a wide degree of latitude.
• Average 20%-30% travel (contingent on comfort level of client)

Benefits and Perks

• Work remotely from home or from one of our many offices within the continental US
• Flexible Vacation Policy
• Generous Medical, Dental and Vision Coverage
• 401k with company match
• 19 paid holidays
• Career development and learning opportunities
• Inclusive work culture and focus on DEI

The anticipated salary range for this position is $94,000 - $152,375. Salary is based on a variety of factors including relevant experience, knowledge, skills and other factors permitted by law. A range of medical, dental, vision, 401(k) matching, paid time off, and other benefits also are available. For more information about dentsu benefits, please visitwww.dentsubenefitsplus.com.

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