The role
We’re looking for an ambitious, entrepreneurial and commercially minded Client Lead with a passion for purpose and sustainability to lead on exciting, purpose-driven accounts.
You’ll be an integral strategic partner for your clients, and will own and manage the delivery of exceptional programmes of work across strategic thinking, brand innovation and storytelling. Our output is varied - and so you could have the opportunity to work across a range of projects, from purpose positioning to corporate communications and engagement; from sustainability strategies to behaviour change campaigns.
You’ll work alongside the in-house consultancy and creative teams as the client’s representative in the agency, responsible for account development and nurturing relationships, as well as project delivery. You’ll also actively seek out and contribute to new business.
You’ll report into an Associate Director of the Client Team who will support you with career development and opportunities. You will lead 2-3 bigger accounts (£200k+), along with a selection of smaller projects, to deliver outcomes that genuinely have real-world positive impact with amazing brands. On some accounts you will be supported by a Client Manager, but on others you will work solo.
Day-to-day responsibilities
Developing strong, strategic and commercially successful client relationships
Establishing strong account relationships, understanding your client’s business and their challenges in order to support and challenge them to develop effective, impactful work together
Leading business development across your key accounts, identifying opportunities, preparing proposals, managing a pipeline and converting income
Contributing to new business meetings and pitches, authoring and delivery key sections and proposals
Taking responsibility for account level finances – ensuring accurate forecasting and managing profitability
Being the first point of contact for your client, flagging any issues and acting as a point of escalation
Planning and leading delivery
Planning purpose programmes, proposing the activities, workstreams and tasks needed to meet objectives
Running client projects, working collaboratively with both strategic and creative teams to deliver high impact projects
Ensuring that work is delivered to brief, on time and within budget, delegating effectively where required. This includes:
Writing scope documents and budget breakdowns
Creating timing plans and managing project resources
Representing the voice of the client in the agency
Authoring briefs and briefing wider teams
Delivery of flawless work to clients in the most appropriate medium
About you
We’re looking for someone who would describe themselves as a confident, entrepreneurial, approachable, solutions-focused, organised and happy to get stuck into delivery. You will be happy working with different disciplines (ideally including purpose strategy, sustainability, planning, conceptual creative and design). You'll feel confident managing multiple accounts and priorities and have great organisation/project management skills. Most importantly, you feel motivated to help deliver a real positive impact through the work that we do.
We would like you to have prior experience as a hands-on Account or client facing Programme Director.
A key focus of the role is account development, so you will have an entrepreneurial outlook and a track record of proactively identifying and converting new opportunities. You will also have experience building client partnerships and managing programmes of work.
Recruitment process
Our first step will be a 30 minute phone call to understand a bit more about you and why you’ve applied. Next, we’ll invite candidates to a first round interview to get into more detail about you and the role, as well as taking a look at your experience together. The final stage will involve answering a short brief that will take no longer than a day of your time to prep. We’ll ask you to come into our office (if you’re comfortable doing that) to present your thinking.
About us
Given is the agency for purpose-driven brands. Everything that we do is about making brands a force for good, helping create positive change for people, communities and the world. Working with ambitious clients on the creation and execution of purpose, sustainable business strategies, innovation and creative campaigning and storytelling we are seeing the demand for the support that we can offer grow exponentially.
We offer great benefits, a collaborative and creative environment, impactful and meaningful work, brilliant career opportunities, and the chance to work with some of the biggest and best brands in the world. Our work has helped national and international brands like IKEA, John Lewis & Partners, Nespresso and Bupa, define and execute on their brand purpose. We fundamentally believe it takes both insightful strategy and imaginative creativity to change things for good, so we have both under the same East London roof.
