GroupM India Lead Local Systems

Why we're hiring:

At WPP, technology is at the heart of everything we do, and it is WPP IT’s mission to enable everyone to collaborate, create and thrive. WPP IT is undergoing a significant transformation to modernise ways of working, shift to cloud and micro-service-based architectures, drive automation, digitise colleague and client experiences and deliver insight from WPP’s petabytes of data.

GroupM is the world’s leading media investment company responsible for more than $63B in annual media investment through agencies Mindshare, MediaCom, Wavemaker, Essence and m/SIX, as well as the outcomes-driven programmatic audience company, Xaxis and data and technology company Choreograph. GroupM’s portfolio includes Data & Technology, Investment and Services, all united in a vision to shape the next era of media where advertising works better for people. By leveraging all the benefits of scale, the company innovates, differentiates and generates sustained value for our clients wherever they do business.

The GroupM IT team in WPP IT are the technology solutions partner for the GroupM group of agencies and are accountable for co-ordinating and assuring end-to-end change delivery, managing the GroupM IT technology life-cycle and innovation pipeline.

The GroupM India Lead is responsible for the local, day to day management of all staff in India working within GroupM. This includes responsibility for recruiting, managing, motivating, developing and maintaining all staff. The GroupM India Lead is accountable to take the vision of GroupM to all GroupM team members working out of India. The GroupM India Lead will be an advocate for usage of Indian resources and will help the global management team ensuring the utilization of Indian resources across markets. The role holder will be responsible for ensuring that the Indian team are as skilled and working as effective as possible whilst understanding the role expected of them and ensuring they are fulfilling their responsibilities. The GroupM India Lead will ensure that all GroupM team members in country are fully integrated with their colleagues around the world and have access to learning, development, and social experiences. The GroupM India Lead will report to the global management team and the India Lead will be responsible for leading and steering the GroupM management team in India.  

Role purpose:

The GroupM India Lead is responsible for the local, day to day management of all staff in India working within GroupM. This includes responsibility for recruiting, managing, motivating, developing and maintaining all staff.

The GroupM India Lead is accountable to take the vision of GroupM to all GroupM team members working out of India.

The GroupM India Lead will be an advocate for usage of Indian resources and will help the global management team ensuring the utilization of Indian resources across markets.

The role holder will be responsible for ensuring that the Indian team are as skilled and working as effective as possible whilst understanding the role expected of them and ensuring they are fulfilling their responsibilities.

The GroupM India Lead will ensure that all GroupM team members in country are fully integrated with their colleagues around the world and have access to learning, development, and social experiences.

The GroupM India Lead will report to the global management team and the India Lead will be responsible for leading and steering the GroupM management team in India.

What you'll be doing:

• Strategic Leadership. Align strategic direction within GroupMs goals and objective in WPP IT. Enable cross-market collaboration driven by technology. Support the role out of large-scale initiatives such as Uhub migration. Utilize round table meetings to understand WPP IT direction and escalate GroupM team issues.
• Business Growth and operational excellence. Drive business growth and profitability through effective management and operational excellence. Establishing aligned way of working across teams.
• Work with local management and external agencies to attract high quality staff from the Indian market. Understand the gaps, requirements and priorities of the Global team and focus on closing most pressing needs first.
• Understand the potential of each individual within the team and work with them to develop specific training plans and career paths to motivate and develop their capabilities and contribution.
• Team Management. Provide day to day local leadership for the GroupM team in India acting as a mentor, educator and motivator through the example personally set. Help management understand utilization and how to leverage teams in best way.

What you'll need:

• Experience of working closely with multiple teams across a geographically distributed footprint - understanding timezone and cultural differences, the challenges this brings and techniques to optimise and maximise the contribution of each location.
• Previous exposure and experience of operating in a matrix managed environment where day to day task leadership and priorities are being set outside ones own location.
• Minimum of 10 years of experience in a leadership role, preferably within a global organization.
• Proven track record of managing and developing large teams.
• Strong strategic thinking and problem-solving skills.
• Excellent communication and interpersonal skills.
• Ability to work effectively in a multicultural and diverse environment.
• Proactively and independently seek and solve opportunities for the team.

Qualification Requirements (Desirable)

Degree or equivalent (i.e. MBA) desirable but not essential

Who you are:

You're open: We are inclusive and collaborative; we encourage the free exchange of ideas; we respect and celebrate diverse views. We are accepting: of new ideas, new partnerships, new ways of working.

You're optimistic: We believe in the power of creativity, technology and talent to create brighter futures or our people, our clients and our communities. We approach all that we do with conviction: to try the new and to seek the unexpected.

You're extraordinary: we are stronger together: through collaboration we achieve the amazing. We are creative leaders and pioneers of our industry; we provide extraordinary every day.

What we'll give you:

Passionate, inspired people – We promote a culture of people that do extraordinary work.

Scale and opportunity – We offer the opportunity to create, influence and complete projects at a scale that is unparalleled in the industry.

Challenging and stimulating work – Unique work and the opportunity to join a group of creative problem solvers. Are you up for the challenge?