Merkle is a people-first, customer-obsessed and tech-enabled customer experience company and believes strongly in organisations taking a data-informed approach to decision making, utilising insight to develop strategies focused around connecting, creating & curating intelligent customer experiences that empower individuals, build brands and transform businesses

Merkle’s heritage in data, technology and analytics is the foundation for our understanding of consumer insights that drives our people-based approach to CXM. With our expertise, we can offer our clients content-driven, contextual and compelling customer journeys and experiences that drive business growth.

The Role

The Strategy & Transformation Director role will join a team of talented and experienced CXM strategy & transformation professionals & marketers that focus on helping Merkle clients achieve their business goals through transforming strategy & ways of working and developing best in class organisational design that enables each client to deliver people-first CXM, grow customer & commercial value, and achieve their success.

The Strategy & Transformation Director is a key lead role in defining, developing & driving engagements with clients to assess their CX capabilities, strategy & ways of working and help them to advance their CXM maturity, effectiveness & efficiency. You will be responsible for leading on the development of transformation & strategy propositions and thought leadership, and the diagnosis & definition of transformation & strategy solutions to CXM client needs, including acting as solution lead for Transformation projects with clients, to deliver successful outcomes. This will involve thought and best practice leadership, client needs diagnosis & solution definition, and include facilitating workshops (face to face and virtually) around people, process and culture, working collaboratively with clients to lead the co-creation and embedding of the right customer-obsessed, people first mindset and new (agile) ways of working practices; as well as to take advantage of new data & tech capabilities to create new value exchanges, and to focus their business around increasingly personal customer strategies & experiences. 

This role requires you to be a strong, people-focused & influential leader, who is analytical as well as creative in your thought process and having the ability to be nimble in your thinking about client problems.  As a key leader of or within a Proposition Chapter, as well as working at the heart of collaborative, cross-functional client mission and client project teams, you will also need the capability & confidence to bring thought leadership and a point of view, and to be able to influence others to believe in the ideas that you present and follow that belief through to execution – turning possibilities into probabilities into reality and sustainable value.

Merkle is a people-first, customer-obsessed and tech-enabled customer experience company and believes strongly in organisations taking a data-informed approach to decision making, utilising insight to develop strategies focused around connecting, creating & curating intelligent customer experiences that empower individuals, build brands and transform businesses. Our Strategy & Transformation consultants must believe in this philosophy and have demonstrably strong capabilities within the customer experience, data-informed marketing or ecommerce, CVM or loyalty, and/or insights fields. The candidate must demonstrate the ability to collaborate knowledgeably with clients when it comes to media planning, commerce and marketing programmes & campaigns, and have the ability to work across multiple of our core vertical markets (Insurance, Financial Services, Non-Profit, Retail, Automotive, Travel, Media and Entertainment, B2B, High Tech).

The ideal candidate for this position must be a confident leader with a strong passion for people & problem solving, and a deep understanding of how businesses & their people, brands and consumers interact – helping businesses know their customers of today, and of tomorrow – with deep interest in the rapidly evolving role that data and technology play in this relationship, and in empowering teams & individuals. Candidates must possess the ability to identify, develop and lead the delivery of business growth opportunities – for both clients and Merkle – and to develop strategic recommendations and solutions to support the growth of client relationships.

Life as a Strategy & Transformation Director at Merkle

• Lead development of transformation & strategy propositions and thought leadership, and the diagnosis & definition of transformation & strategy solutions to CXM client needs, including acting as solution lead for Transformation projects with clients, to deliver successful and value-adding outcomes
• Leading, and working within, client project teams to understand clients’ current strategies, organisations, capabilities and ways of working, and help map progression to more mature CXM capabilities and effective & efficient strategies & ways of working.
• Drive the transformation of clients to more collaborative, agile, data-informed & insight-led, and customer-obsessed ways of working.
• Lead teams to build and deliver client outcome focused CXM strategy & transformation propositions, including target operating models and strategy and measurement frameworks.
• Lead and/or mentor Strategy & Transformation consultants, focusing on the continuous development of industry-leading strategic thinkers & practitioners in digital & CXM transformation, with the right agile, adaptive client partnering, co-creation & influencing skills
• Act as a subject matter expert, particularly in the areas of organisation design & (agile) ways of working, digital marketing & commerce, CRM/CVM and CXM.
• Continually monitor current CX & marketing trends, agile ways of working, new technology solutions, and competitive strategies – and then translate them into new marketing & CXM ideas & solutions for clients.
• Show an understanding of differences in marketing & CXM to customers & clients in different verticals, environments, maturity stages and need states.
• Develop trusted, long-term relationships with key client stakeholders and V-suite & C-suite.

Collaborate and develop strong, trusted relationships with internal Merkle & dentsu teams, including Strategy & Transformation in particular, as well as Sales & Client Services, Media, Experience & Commerce, MarTech, Decisioning & Data Solutions, and Analytics & Measurement practice areas, and Operations & Finance, and partner agencies to understand the feasibility of omni-channel, multi-disciplinary recommendations & plans

What we are looking for in you

• Demonstrably strong capabilities within the customer experience strategy & design, transformation, operating model design, data-informed marketing or ecommerce, CVM or loyalty, and/or analytics & insights fields.
• Passion for putting people first
• Leadership (of people, strategic thinking & projects) experience and strong influencing skills
• Agency experience expected, and client-side experience strongly preferred.
• Demonstrable ability to collaborate knowledgeably with clients when it comes to CXM, media planning, commerce and CRM/CVM programmes & campaigns, and have the ability to work across multiple of our core vertical markets
• Knowledge and direct experience of agile ways of working and previous experience in transformation/change management roles expected, and agile practitioner certification beneficial
• Self-starter with high intellectual curiosity & aptitude for problem solving, drive, determination, and influencing skills.
• Understanding of how businesses & their people, brands and consumers interact, with deep interest in the rapidly evolving role that data and technology play in this relationship, and in empowering individuals
• Lead by example in collaborative ways of working – both internally, and with clients and other external agencies and partners
• Exemplary listening skills to understand clients visible and invisible needs, and influencing skills to effectively articulate recommended solutions to priority needs
• Proven experience in developing solutions to support the sale of new services to clients.
• Strong writing, presentation and client-facing communication and influencing skills.
• Experience translating data, organisational and ways of working analysis into actionable CXM recommendations and presentations – with proficiency in PowerPoint expected.
• Attention to detail and the ability to incorporate internal and external feedback on an iterative basis.
• Ability to leverage business experience / acumen to identify new business and marketing opportunities.
• Must have superior networking, time management and inter-personal skills.
• Comfort and experience working within a highly matrixed organization in roles with a wide degree of latitude.
• Experience of different marketing technology platforms, and/or running assessments on technology assessments would be beneficial, but not essential.

A few of the benefits

Whether it’s the joy of working with people at the top of their game or the Merkle social calendar, people love working here – and we hope you will too

• Company Pension, life insurance and other corporate benefits
• 25 days annual leave, plus 3 Wellness Days a day off for your birthday (and 3 days additional leave between Christmas & New Year?)
• Career development through dentsu Merkle University and other tools; with access to courses, textbooks and mentorship
• Free breakfast, fruit and most importantly, biscuits – in the office!
• A selection of other industry standard benefits

Merkle does not discriminate against job applicants on the basis of age, disability, gender reassignment, marital or civil partner status, pregnancy or maternity, race, colour, nationality, ethnic or national origin, religion or belief, sex or sexual orientation. Experience stipulated in this job description serves as a guide only and all applications will be considered on their merits, irrespective of experience.

As part of our Diversity and Inclusion agenda, and as an Equal Opportunities employer, if you require reasonable adjustments during the selection process please engage directly with your Recruiter.