Associate Director – Commercial Partnerships

JCDecaux UK Ltd; Greater London; On-site; GBP 90,000 - 130,000; Full time

Job summary

JCDecaux UK Ltd is seeking an Associate Director to drive revenue growth through leadership of the Media Specialist team. You will manage strategic partnerships, champion JCDecaux values, and act as an ambassador for the brand while developing specialist-driven opportunities across agencies and clients.

The role requires strong sales leadership, deep market knowledge, and the ability to influence strategy and execution across multiple stakeholders.

Qualifications

• Capable sales professional with proven track record in media or advertising.
• Strong negotiation and closing skills with a strategic mindset.
• Excellent knowledge of media landscape, clients’ marketing objectives and industry trends.
• Experience leading multi-stakeholder relationships and cross-functional teams.

Responsibilities

• Build relationships with media agencies, clients and specialists to grow JCDecaux revenue.
• Understand client business, marketing and objectives, and identify opportunities.
• Devise development strategies, sales reporting and revenue forecasting to hit targets.
• Lead diversification of customer base across multiple specialists and organisations.
• Spend time with agencies to support Specialist performance when required.
• Own relationships with specific Specialist accounts and drive proactive pitching.

Skills

Sales expertise

Negotiation

Market knowledge

Stakeholder mgmt

Job description

This role is expected to evolve as the digital out of home advances. You will be expected to adopt a change mind-set that leads, encourages and supports this business growth and evolution

Purpose

As an Associate Director you are accountable for the performance of Media Specialist-driven business, you are responsible for, managing and delivering strategic specialist partnerships, creating professional and profitable relationships with Partners generating maximum revenue for the Company. You will act as an expert in your field. In partnership with the Head of Sales and the Director of Activation Implementation you will contribute to and execute the strategy and activity of the Media Specialist team and the achievement of key objectives. Key to the role is to operate as an ambassador for JCDecaux and as such, there is an expectation that behaviour which expresses our corporate values every day and celebrate others who do the same.

What you’ll be doing

• Commercial Build relationships with Media Agencies, Clients and Specialists to grow revenue for JCDecaux.
• Show awareness of strengths and weaknesses of other media and a detailed understanding of clients’ business, marketing and media objectives.
• Devise Specialist development strategies, sales reporting, and revenue forecasts to hit pre-determined revenue targets.
• Lead the diversification of the customer base across multiple Specialist and organisations
• Focus efforts and time on the development and performance of the Specialist business.
• May be required to spend a minority of time with other organisations (e.g. Agency) to support and enable Specialist performance.
• Own relationships with specific Specialist accounts with a sound knowledge of JCDecaux's portfolio to influence activity and planning decisions towards OOH market and to JCD specifically, and to ensure proactive pitching to Specialists is effective.
• Team Management and Motivation Manage recruitment, development, motivation, and management of team members
• Support the Head of Specialist and represent the team in their absence
• Influence strategy and goals in own area based on business needs and priorities in the medium to long term and translates these strategies into deliverable objectives and actions.
• Lead and advocate the wider adoption of the established business and commercial policies, and enabling processes and governance, in place to achieve our business strategy.
• Future Sales Leader A visionary who can inspire colleagues and clients to bring new revenues in from other media.
• Ability to engage, lead and influence others to drive business growth and JCDecaux’s position in the marketplace.
• Lead the diversification of the customer base across multiple agencies and organisations, sharing best practise.
• Maintain expert up to date market knowledge and a thorough understanding of your clients’ business marketing strategies and media objectives to ensure that JCDecaux is their first-choice partner in OOH advertising.
• To build and maintain effective internal working relationships with key stakeholders to act as the two-way conduit for marketplace insight between agencies and specialist teams and manage a smooth transition from; responding to a brief, booking the campaign, right through to excellent after sales service.
• To identify new business opportunities by actively networking by attending industry events and conferences.
• Actively building your agency network by attending industry events and conferences.

A little bit about you

Capabilities

Sales Expertise: Internally and externally recognised as a best practice sales expert within your area and experienced providing input to the selling strategy.

Expert negotiation and sales closing skills.

To be aware and keep up to date with the market and competitor media landscape (across media channels) to challenge the status quo and drive market leading innovation and JCDecaux revenue growth.

Proactive Approach

Manages own time and that of others on key objectives

Develops effective medium to long term project plans for own area.

Challenges the status quo and looks for and removes (or reduce) constraints on getting things done effectively.

Promotes an agile approach and reduces ineffectiveness or inefficiency so that aims are achieved in the most successful way.

Proactively works to improve the performance of the department and business.

Addresses complex issues or problems within the team in a timely manner.

Anticipates skills, knowledge and behaviours required of role and continuously seeks to learn and develop these.

Follows up on delegated work and collaborates across departments to ensure delivery on commitments.

Communication and interpersonal skills

Acts as a facilitator and mentor, encouraging dialogue between team members so that they understand the links between their ideas.

Gets to the root of what the team think or feel about an issue or plan and encourages others to work effectively with people with diverse styles and backgrounds.

A key technical contributor and leader

Creates formal networks internally and externally, i.e. part of a formal industry network.

Explains/ presents complex ideas clearly and with passion.

Anticipates potential objections and prepares accordingly; presenting ideas in a tactful and convincing manner.

Builds support for ideas through persuasion and consensus-building and intervenes in difficult situations to resolves disagreements and conflict with others constructively.

Negotiates effectively to achieve the desired outcome in complex situations.

Thinking and Problem Solving

Develops and refines innovative solutions to complex problems.

Develops and shares innovative approaches; considering the wider impact and implications for the business.

Makes timely and sound decisions regarding complex issues.

Ensures others understand the long‑term implications of decisions.

Supports and leads implementation of large scale change.

Qualifications and Experience

Highly experienced in media (and preferably digital and OOH media) trading and management.

Proven in-depth sales generation, negotiation and account management skills and experiences, preferably within the digital and OOH media marketplace.

Demonstrable experience managing (leading) and motivating large teams to deliver to time, quality and budget under operational pressure and to tight deadlines.

Leads customer service and commercially‑focused teams, including recruitment and performance management.

Has extensive understanding of business, financials, products/services, the market or the needs/challenges of assigned accounts.

Demonstrable capability/experience: Develop colleagues' and customers' understanding.

Act as an expert in the management and delivery of customer campaigns from objective translation into booking and through to implementation.

Success working with complex or high‑profile sales or account management processes as manager.

A little bit more about us

We believe in building a diverse and inclusive culture and positive employee experience. We are One Team, more than just ourselves. We are customer first, we understand, and help solve our customers’ problems. We Test & Learn, we are empowered to learn and grow, unafraid of change. We choose to care, we are committed to doing the right thing, the right way. It’s really important to us that we give as much to our colleagues as they give to us. Our latest Belonging Survey showed that our colleagues feel valued and listened to as we continue to build an environment where everyone can thrive, grow, belong and be their authentic selves. We believe that diversity of thought, experience and background provides the platform for great creativity, We are committed to equal employment opportunities regardless of race, colour, ancestry, religion, national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital status, disability or gender identity. Many of our Colleagues work flexibly in many different ways. Please talk to us at interview about the flexibility you need. We can’t promise to give you exactly what you want, but we do promise not to judge you for asking.

We’re JCDecaux, the world’s largest Digital Out-of-Home media business. You’ll have used or seen our products, services and communication channels, even if you didn’t realise it was us, because they’re at the heart of communities on high streets and major roads and in transport hubs, shopping malls and supermarkets across the country in more than 80 countries worldwide. Our communication channels help businesses grow and thrive, and help non-commercial organisations reach the widest possible audience for their important messages. Our talented team make all this happen, working in a wide variety of roles to connect brands and communities. We’re really proud that 50p in every £1 of revenue is reinvested into the communities we serve, so we can provide innovative, environmentally-responsible infrastructure and services designed to make cities better for everyone. This principle has been at the heart of our business from the beginning. If you join us, you will make a real difference.