Operations Director

Publicis Groupe; Johannesburg; On-site; ZAR 1,800,000 - 3,200,000; Full time

Job summary

Publicis Groupe Africa seeks an Operations Director to lead end-to-end production operations across Johannesburg and Cape Town, building a high-performing, data-driven function that delivers work on time and on budget.

You'll own ways-of-working, tooling, capacity planning, commercial hygiene, governance, and continuous improvement to unlock growth and margin while elevating client experience across brands and markets.

Qualifications

• 8–12+ years in production/studio operations or delivery management within an agency/production environment.
• Bachelor’s degree in Operations/Business/Production or equivalent experience; certifications (Agile/Scrum, Lean) advantageous.
• Demonstrated success instituting standardized WoW/SOPs and data-driven continuous improvement.
• Strong commercial acumen: utilization, recovery, and margin protection.

Responsibilities

• Own the production operations roadmap and drive improvements to processes, tools, and governance.
• Standardize SOPs from brief to delivery, ensuring consistent adoption by all teams.
• Maintain RACI clarity between Client/Brand Leads, Project/Delivery Management, and Resource/Traffic.
• Lead tool enablement, dashboards, and operational telemetry for throughput and cycle time.
• Run capacity planning rhythms and manage freelancer/supplier bench and onboarding.
• Drive utilization, recovery, and margin discipline with Finance/Commercial.
• Set operational SLAs/KPIs and monitor on-time, on-budget delivery; lead root-cause analysis.
• Lead and mentor Ops/Traffic teams and collaborate with HR on hiring and onboarding.
• Maintain risk governance, data privacy, and business continuity playbooks.

Skills

Leadership of multi-disciplinary teams

Data-driven decision making

Operations management

Commercial acumen

Education

Bachelor’s degree in Operations/Business/Production

Tools

Production tooling rollouts

Job description

Company description

Within Publicis Groupe’s Intelligent Creativity business, we specialize in bringing creative ideas to life, and to consumers. By combining 100 years of craft excellence with 6,000 experts across 52 locations of the world’s biggest studio network, we leverage the industry’s richest data, through the power of agentic AI, to radically redefine content production with Intelligent Content. We intuitively deliver this through Marcel Make, the world’s first Intelligent Content agent. The result? Predictively performing content that unlocks business growth in unprecedented ways. No more guesswork. No more waste.

Just content that works, working a lot harder.

Overview

Title: Operations Director

Location: Johannesburg or Cape Town South Africa

Reporting to: Senior Vice President

The Operations Director will lead the end‑to‑end operations of Publicis Production South Africa, building a high‑performing, data‑driven function that delivers work on time, on budget, on brief—and scales efficiently across brands and markets. You’ll own our ways‑of‑working, tooling, capacity planning, commercial hygiene, governance, and continuous improvement to unlock growth and margin while elevating client experience. This aligns with our hub/production ops blueprint and playbook.

Responsibilities

OPERATIONAL STRATEGY & WAYS‑OF‑WORKING

• Own the production operations roadmap; identify gaps and drive improvements to processes, tools, and governance across the studio and delivery lifecycle.
• Standardize SOPs from brief → scope → estimate/SOW → scheduling → production → QC → delivery → archiving, ensuring consistent adoption by all teams.
• Establish clear RACI and handshakes between Client/Brand Leads, Project/Delivery Management, and Resource/Traffic for smooth intake and throughput.

TOOLING, DATA & AUTOMATION

• Lead tool enablement and discipline (job opening, cost approvals, tasking, timesheets, utilization capture) and ensure all teams complete required Marcel learning and follow the “single source of truth” principle for work and capacity data.
• Partner with Tech/Workflow to evolve dashboards and operational telemetry (throughput, cycle time, right‑first‑time, rework, WIP aging).

RESOURCE & CAPACITY MANAGEMENT

• Run the capacity planning rhythm with Resource/Traffic Managers; align demand vs. supply by skill, shift, and market; elevate make/buy decisions (perm vs. freelance vs. supplier).
• Maintain an up‑to‑date freelancer/supplier bench with rates, capabilities, and compliance status; ensure timely onboarding and access.

COMMERCIAL HYGIENE & PERFORMANCE

• Drive utilization, recovery, and margin discipline with Finance/Commercial; ensure we charge appropriately for scope, track unbillables, and protect change control.
• Oversee estimates/SOWs for operational feasibility and pricing integrity; contribute to fee proposals and re‑scopes.

DELIVERY EXCELLENCE & CLIENT EXPERIENCE

• Set operational SLAs/KPIs per client program; monitor on‑time, on‑budget, and right‑first‑time delivery; lead root‑cause and corrective actions on misses.
• Serve as the operational point for escalations; support senior client sessions with data‑backed insights and improvement plans.

PEOPLE LEADERSHIP & CULTURE

• Lead, mentor, and grow the Operations/Resource/Traffic teams; embed a high‑performance, accountable culture with clarity of roles and career paths.
• Partner with HR/Talent on hiring briefs and structured onboarding using our Talent Briefing template.

RISK, COMPLIANCE & GOVERNANCE

• Ensure supplier and freelancer compliance, contracting, and rate governance; uphold data privacy and shoot/site safety protocols in partnership with HR/Legal/Facilities.
• Maintain business continuity playbooks for critical teams and tools; run periodic drills and update risk registers.

Success Measures (12‑month)

• Utilization & Recovery: Achieve target billable utilization and recovery at team and practice levels; reduce unbillable leakage.
• On‑time, On‑budget Delivery: ≥95% on‑time asset delivery; variance vs. estimate within agreed thresholds; reduction in rework rate.
• Throughput & Cycle Time: Improved WIP flow; shorter concept‑to‑deliverable cycle times per asset type.
• Client Experience: Positive trend in operational relationship health; fewer escalations and SLA breaches.
• Team Health: Improved engagement and retention in Ops/Traffic; demonstrable skills uplift against role matrix.

Qualifications

• 8–12+ years in production/studio operations or delivery management within an agency/production environment, including leadership of multi‑disciplinary teams. (
• Bachelor’s degree in Operations/Business/Production or equivalent experience; relevant certifications (Agile/Scrum, Lean, production safety) advantageous.
• Demonstrated success instituting standardized WoW/SOPs, production tooling rollouts, and data‑driven continuous improvement.
• Strong commercial acumen: utilization/recovery management, SOW/estimate oversight, and margin protection.

Additional information

Publicis Groupe Africa is an equal opportunity employer and prohibits any forms of Discrimination or Harassment. We celebrate diversity and are committed to creating an inclusive environment for all our employees in line with our Employment Equity Plan.