Director (Associate Director) - Up to £70k

Golin is a global public relations agency that helps companies create change that matters. Together, we discover powerful human truths that bind us, create with bravery and collaborate inclusively and obsessively. With 50 offices around the world and 60 years of experience, ‘Go All In’ is our agency’s ethos and commitment to bravery over mediocrity. 

We Go All In, in everything we do. We are committed to Go All In for our people, offering hybrid working and brilliant benefits that builds a culture of happy people who are the best at what they do. We’re proud of the work we do, and even prouder when it is recognised by our peers. For the past three years we’ve been named PRWeek Global Agency of the Year and AMEC Research and Measurement Team of Year and received many awards for our creative work. It’s a testament to our team’s excellent work and dedication to innovation and client service. 

About the team

The role we are recruiting for sits primarily within the Specsavers team, a new portfolio client for the Golin group. 

Specsavers has a well-established presence on high streets in the UK and across the globe, providing access to expert eye and ear health services for everyone. We are the proud national PR agency for them, working as a brand partner and closely alongside a host of integrated agencies across paid, social and creative OOH. Our partnership involves developing fully integrated creative campaigns, such as the recent Cannes Lion Grand Prix award winning, Misheard Lyrics, while simultaneously delivering a drumbeat of elevated always-on, proactive and reactive earned storytelling opportunities. All of which ladders up to the brand’s strategy and business needs.

The team is a blend of consumer and consumer healthcare specialists, to ensure we are not only providing an important healthcare message for your eyes and ears, but also showing up in culture with the well-known ‘Should’ve Gone To Specsavers’ tone of voice that Brits know and love. We also elevate the brand within the style landscape by showcasing its range of optical frames and sunglasses.

You will also lead the team across both travel accounts Celebrity Cruises (UK) and Hard Rock Hotels (EMEA), playing a vital role in integrating with our global Golin offices and empowering the core team to deliver coverage across the ever-evolving travel media landscape. 

As a Director, you will……

Play an essential role in creating change for our clients. You drive our clients’ business as a brand steward and should have a genuine interest and passion in the brands that you represent. You are curious, creative, brave, inclusive and collaborative. Furthermore, you should be driven and take pride in the commercial results driven by your work and obsessed and flawless in your execution. You ensure we’re delivering the maximum impact in leading and managing accounts for the agency.

Delivering great work should be what drives you every day and above this, you should be thinking about how each campaign can lead to bigger and better in the future. Good work is what leads to growth and with a large portfolio client like this the opportunity for growth in terms of the brands we work with is endless. 

As a Director, you are a relationship-builder. You add value to any conversation and always advocate for exceptional and brave work. You can identify and know how to bring great ideas and programs to life. You lead teams, campaigns and initiatives using your portfolio client lead above you to sense check, problem solve and push into innovative new areas for your clients.

Day to day responsibilities:

• Lead the Specsavers press office, managing a team of Managers and Associates to: 
  • Establish best-in-class operating practices for the press office, working effectively and efficiently to ensure Specsavers responds to – and features in – relevant media opportunities
  • Build trusted relationships with key media for Specsavers (in the Consumer and Consumer Health spaces), both individually and within the Press Office team
  • Identify and deliver media opportunities to the client, demonstrating close relationships with key titles and journalists
  • Closely manage the Press Office team ensuring the workloads are evenly distributed and take a caring and pastoral role over your team to ensure strong staff retention 
• Lead on a variety of consumer campaign briefs, working collaboratively with inhouse strategists and creatives when needed
  • Ensure all client responses work across PR and social channels 
  • Encourage blue sky thinking that’s culturally relevant, disruptive and/or sparks and emotional reaction/conversation 
  • Build relationships with interagency groups and demonstrate a strong understanding of integrated media in all client responses 
  • Develop a strong understanding of Specsavers measurement framework to ensure creative makes an impact against business objectives 
• Build inter-agency relationships on the Specsavers account and ‘show up’ as the Golin representative in relevant all-agency settings 
• Work with our Media Director to build media expertise within the Specsavers Team and the Agency (through newsroom processes, knowledge sharing processes, networking, hosting media events etc)
• Have a genuine interest and passion in media relations
• Demonstrate curiosity and resourcefulness - always looking to improve skills and find new/better ways to drive efficiency
• Assume responsibility and ownership for the quality of your work 

Key requirements:

• Experience working in a high pace press office team
• Media relations experience in the retail and / or the consumer health space is a bonus 
• You must have led a team, ideally of 4 or more people 
• Ability to provide clear and evidenced client counsel
• Experience operating in and managing inter-agency relationships 
• Ability to craft and shape earned narratives, knowing what lands with different types of media 
• Ability to develop strategic creative campaign responses 
• Demonstrate a strong understanding of integrated media