Let’s be honest – in this industry, sometimes we complicate things that should be simple. Here is the bottom line: we want YOU to join us if you are truly passionate about guiding marketers on how to best connect their brands with people. It doesn’t get much simpler than that.

At Spark Foundry, we have a unique approach and provide the support to help you do this. In fact, our approach is built on creating the space for ideas that lead to smart work, and Spark Foundry is built to celebrate and develop YOUR ideas.

The Associate Director, Strategy will work with the team to harness business, brand, competitive, audience, and marketplace insights to craft strategic idea-led, multi-platform campaigns to deliver on objectives for a Retail brand. The ideal candidate for this position is a strategic thinker, proactive, likes numbers, and is a team player. This person will work closely with strategy counterparts, investment teams, agency partners, marketplace community, and client leads to ensure flawless executions.

RESPONSIBILITIES

•    Build a strong and successful client relationship. You’ll interact with the client on a regular basis to understand their needs and help them grow their business.
•    Manage a team of direct reports that includes supervisors and associates. You’ll maintain the workload of your team, delegating tasks and responsibilities to ensure the most productive and effective use of each person’s skills, while motivating their interests.
•    Develop innovative go-to-market strategic plans to drive product awareness, consideration, and traffic to Retail cafes. 
•    Develop and oversee test market campaigns throughout the year and build actionable learning plans that can be rolled out at a national level.
•    Manage all internal and client facing financial operations across the entire portfolio, including Retail & CPG brands, working with strategy and investment teams to ensure accuracy. 
•    Lead client communication and deliverables developing efficiencies where possible.
•    Possess strong knowledge of the media landscape and greatest opportunities for the client to drive their business forward. Advocate how media channels work together to change consumer behavior and address business challenges.
•    Possess strong project management skills. We are looking for someone who'll be able to manage up and down, funnel workload and project timelines; fast-twitch ability to develop plan from beginning to end (brief to strategy to negotiation to activation).

•    Bachelor’s Degree
•    6+ years in media planning/buying, with ideally 1-2 years in an Associate Director role.
•    Ability to explain complex and technical approaches in simple language that is relevant and meaningful to general marketers.
•    Hunger and curiosity to drive innovation and uptake of emerging platforms and new ideas.
•    You think strategically. You take into account the bigger picture. You analyze everything and think critically when solving problems to come up with unconventional solutions.
•    You’ve lead a team before. You know what it takes to manage a group, even when a lot of moving parts are involved. You’ve managed large budgets and are able to stay close to the numbers.
•    You are constantly on the lookout for the latest industry news, keeping up with new media/technology and marketing opportunities, as well as category information.
•    Retail experience is a bonus.  

All your information will be kept confidential according to EEO guidelines.