Manager, Planning

About WPP Media WPP is the trusted growth partner for the world’s leading brands. With exceptional talent, trusted data and intelligence, and world-class partnerships – all united by our pioneering agentic marketing platform, WPP Open – we help clients navigate change, capture opportunity, and deliver transformational growth.  WPP Media is WPP's AI-driven media operating unit, bringing together media, data, and partnerships to deliver creative personalisation at scale. Connected through WPP Open and powered by Open Intelligence, clients see exactly where, how, and why their media investment is working. For more information, visit wppmedia.com [wppmedia.com]. 2743 - Planning Manager, Client Leadership - UK Role Summary and Impact  Wavemaker positively provokes growth for clients by reshaping consumer decision-making and experiences through media, content, and technology. Our name is both our mission and our method. We do our best work for brave brands and people who relish being challenged to go further and faster, together.  Role Summary and Impact  The planning team are the guardians of creating industry leading, unrivalled work at Wavemaker. We are central conduits to all specialists, striving to push boundaries and have a positive impact on consumers and brand.  Wavemaker is looking for a Planning Manager to join our growing planning team, to create impactful cross channel campaigns and build your media planning skills.  In this role you will:  Media planning craft:  * Develop an in-depth understanding of media channels including where, when and how to use them based on the client brief.  * Have a skilled knowledge of Wavemaker and industry media planning tools and be able to train other team members.  * Have a skilled understanding of industry best practices and planning theory.  * Develop a fundamental knowledge of Wavemaker Purchase Journey thinking and Provocative Planning Philosophy.  Campaign management  * Ownership of campaign activity including briefing teams, collating response, managing client’s deliverables, and ensuring accuracy across all workstreams.  * Work closely with the planning and activation teams to ensure the day-to-day account is run efficiently and effectively.  * Be able to bring in specialist teams where needed to work on briefs and client questions.  * Ensure financial management processes are always excellent and met in a timely manner.  Effective communication:  * Become a trusted main day-to-day contact for junior clients, learning their business and ways of working. Ensuring that all requests & queries are answered with accuracy and in a timely manner.  * Support in managing Planning Executives to ensure they are on track with daily tasks, mentor and challenge them with new projects to develop their career.  * Start to develop a proactive problem-solving mindset but know when to flag any issues or concerns with Planning Director.  Skills and Experience  At WPP Media, we believe in the power of our culture and our people. It’s what elevates us to deliver exceptional experiences for both our clients and each other. In this role it will be critical to embrace WPP & WPP Media’s shared core values:  * Be Extraordinary by Leading Collectively to Inspire transformational Creativity.  * Create an Open environment by Balancing People and Client Experiences by Cultivating Trust.  * Lead Optimistically by Championing Growth and Development to Mobilize the Enterprise.  Practice Area Knowledge – Skilled - Demonstrates knowledge of the media landscape including future trends, best practice and challenges. Comfortable using (or briefing out) of the various products, platforms and systems that comms planning use.  * Develops breadth and depth of industry understanding. Becomes confident using tools, technology, techniques and systems and is able to train others.  * Comfortable presenting both direct from platform (OS, Architect etc) and developing a story from data but delivered outside of platform (Telmar etc).  * Can confidently answer client questions and liaise with internal teams on best solutions to use.  Problem Solving – Fundamental - Applies focused questioning and systematic research to understand the problem and wider impact. Translates business problems into solutions  * Uses critical questioning and maintains a broad perspective when analysing information to gain a deeper understanding of the problem and wider impact.  * Quickly generates appropriate solutions informed by previous experience.  * Understands how to resolve escalated issues and supports others to problem solve.  * Supports or leads troubleshooting communication for issues.  * Asks questions and performs routine or basic analysis to define problems.  * Generates some solutions in own area of work and suggests additional sources of information to further investigate problems.  * Seeks a variety of perspectives and inputs and probes for more information to fully understand the problem and wider impact.  * Provides communication support for troubleshooting issues internally and externally with third parties.  * Develops a broad understanding of industry tools, technology, techniques and systems as well as application.   * Can run simple tasks independently and either present to clients direct or package for wider team.  Stakeholder Relationships – Fundamental – Demonstrates knowledge of the agencies (or clients) organization structure and people, client relationships, business strategy, industry and challenges. Cultivates, nurtures and grow relationships with key clients, stakeholders and decision makers internally, externally and virtually.  * Has a good understanding of how the agency operates and works with their clients.  * Knows about the client’s business and who the key decision makers are there.  * Has good understanding of agency and client and their business goals and challenges.  * Builds a working knowledge of market trends effecting the client (and agency).   * Responds to stakeholder requests in an accurate, timely and professional manner and seeks to have a good understanding of client needs and challenges.  Effective Communications – Skilled - Is able to lead dialogues between and with internal and external people (strategy, comms planning, channel planning and activation teams as well as clients and media partners). Uses simple, clear and human language wherever possible but can be technical when required. Thinks about most appropriate communication channels and styles and employs active listening.  * Breaks down complex technical information into understandable language, guiding others on best practice.  * Uses knowledge and expertise to generate comprehendible, broadly-applicable communications.  * Designs differentiated communications (content focus, style, presentation, etc.) for various internal and external audiences based on an understanding of their differing levels of familiarity.  * Attends client and agency meetings to present.  Campaign Management – Skilled - Manages and takes ownership of several project/tasks accurately and thoroughly and with minimal error- without losing track of important details or deliverables.  * Teaches others the importance of accuracy and thoroughness so that sufficiently detailed information is logged correctly.  * Manages and takes ownership of campaigns from start to completion, maintaining accurate pipeline and campaign information across elements of the plans. E.g creative trackers and booking deadlines  * Delivers accurate reports with value-added insights and actionable findings to improve campaign performance.   * Be accountable for the ongoing management of campaign budgets.  E.g finance reconciliations  * Balances several projects and tasks simultaneously with minimal error and without losing track of important details or deliverables.  Compelling Storytelling – Skilled - Be able to use knowledge of the media ecosystem, industry trends and clients' business pressure points to build a persuasive story and recommendation that acknowledges their preferred communication style.  * Applies big picture thinking in work and proactively leverages an understanding of the organisation and key industry trends.    * Understand the different elements of responses.   * Designs differentiated communications (content focus, style, presentation, etc.) for various internal and external audiences.  Ideas Creation – Skilled - Generates or facilitates new ideas, methods, innovation or creative media solutions that can deliver growth.  * Regularly engages in new projects/activities that can help solve identified barriers or opportunities as part of planning.   * Can identify the relevant partners to bring ideas to life.   * Uses wider industry knowledge and trend understanding to help generate solutions that can deliver against communication objectives.  Comms Planning – Skilled - Find solutions for client business problems using media.  * Applies knowledge of client, audience, channel, market and category to effectively delivery compelling multi-media plans.  * Translates learnings and trends to create marketing communication strategies that are effective with clear measurement.  * Application of purchase journey thinking and visualisation of how the media plan works across channels.  * Translation of strategic direction / platform / provocation into directional role for media, channel role and behaviour in channel.  * Identifies and recommends budget shifts as campaign is in-flight where appropriate.  Life at WPP Media & Benefits  Our passion for shaping the next era of media includes investing in our employees to help them do their best work, and we’re just as committed to employee growth as we are to responsible media investment. WPP Media employees can tap into the global WPP Media & WPP networks to pursue their passions, grow their networks, and learn at the cutting edge of marketing and advertising. We have a variety of employee resource groups and host frequent in-office events showcasing team wins, sharing thought leadership, and celebrating holidays and milestone events. Our benefits include competitive medical, group retirement plans, vision, and dental insurance, significant paid time off, preferential partner discounts, and employee mental health awareness days.    WPP Media is an equal opportunity employer and considers applicants for all positions without discrimination or regard to particular characteristics. We are committed to fostering a culture of respect in which everyone feels they belong and has the same opportunities to progress in their careers.    We believe the best work happens when we're together, fostering creativity, collaboration, and connection. That's why we’ve adopted a hybrid approach, with teams in the office around four days a week. If you require accommodations or flexibility, please discuss this with the hiring team during the interview process.  Please note this is a UK based role and requires individuals to have the right to work in this location  Please read our Privacy Notice (https://www.wppmedia.com/pages/privacy-policy) [https://www.wppmedia.com/pages/privacy-policy] for more information on how we process the information you provide.  #LI-Promoted     Please read our Privacy Notice [https://www.wppmedia.com/pages/privacy-policy#:~:text=WPP%20Media%20Privacy%20Notice%20for%20Recruitment] for more information on how we process the information you provide.

Globality is the autonomous sourcing platform to manage the entire intake to award process. At Globality, we build agentic technology that transforms how global enterprises source goods and services — autonomously, at scale, and without the inefficiencies that have defined procurement for decades. Our platform interprets purchase intent, generates sourcing materials, evaluates suppliers, and executes negotiation strategies without manual intervention. The Role Globality's platform sits at the center of enterprise procurement workflows, which means our integration layer is a key aspect of our product. We connect into procurement platforms, vendor management systems, identity providers, and customer-managed middleware, and we are building that capability out aggressively. This role owns the integration product surface: defining how the platform connects to the systems our customers already operate, translating complex technical requirements into clear specifications, and ensuring those specs are delivered in a way that actually works in production enterprise environments. The right candidate brings procurement domain depth, hands-on familiarity with API patterns and integration architecture, and the communication range to run a discovery call with a customer's IT architects in the morning and a sprint planning session with our engineering team in the afternoon. What You Will Do * Product Definition and Roadmap * Own the integration product roadmap, including direct API integrations, webhook infrastructure, and middleware-based connectivity patterns * Define requirements for integrations with enterprise procurement and ERP systems including SAP Ariba, Coupa, SAP Fieldglass, and similar platforms * Translate customer workflow requirements into integration specifications that are unambiguous to engineering and implementable within agreed scope * Prioritize the integration backlog by weighing customer impact, implementation complexity, and strategic fit * Identify and document gaps in existing integration capabilities and build the case for closing them * Customer and Partner Engagement * Lead technical discovery with customer IT, procurement, and integration teams during pre-sales and implementation phases * Serve as the primary product point of contact for integration-related escalations and scope discussions * Produce customer-facing integration documentation, technical guides, and onboarding materials that meet enterprise standards * Work with partner and channel teams to support integration-related enablement for systems integrators and implementation partners * Cross-Functional Execution * Write detailed integration specs, API contracts, data mapping documents, and acceptance criteria for engineering * Collaborate closely with engineering on feasibility, trade-offs, and delivery; push back constructively when a proposed approach creates long-term maintenance risk * Define and own the integration test strategy alongside QA and engineering, including edge case coverage for real-world enterprise environments * Support go-to-market and sales engineering with accurate, current technical integration collateral What You Bring * Demonstrated experience in a product management or product owner role, with a track record of shipping integration-focused features in an enterprise SaaS context * Solid understanding of procurement workflows: requisition, sourcing, contract, purchase order, and invoice processes, and how they map to system configurations across platforms such as SAP Ariba, Coupa, or equivalent * Working knowledge of REST API design and consumption: you can read and write an OpenAPI spec, understand authentication patterns (OAuth 2.0, API keys, SAML/SSO), and reason clearly about pagination, error handling, rate limits, and versioning * Familiarity with middleware and iPaaS integration patterns (MuleSoft, Boomi, Workato, or comparable platforms): you understand when middleware is the right architectural choice versus a direct API integration and can speak to the trade-offs * Strong written and verbal communication: you can produce documentation that engineers, customers, and executives each find useful, and you can run a technical conversation without losing the business thread * Comfort operating with ambiguity in a fast-moving environment; you can scope a problem before the requirements are fully formed * Consulting background, particularly in enterprise technology implementation, systems integration, or procurement transformation * Experience working directly with enterprise customer technical teams on integration projects, including managing scope, communicating limitations, and navigating organizational complexity on the customer side * Exposure to ERP systems (SAP, Oracle, Workday) in the context of procurement or finance workflows * Familiarity with B2B data standards such as cXML, EDI, or PEPPOL Nice to Have * Hands-on coding experience in any language; you do not need to be a practicing engineer, but candidates who have written production code tend to produce better specs and build faster credibility with engineering teams * Experience with webhook architecture, event-driven integration patterns, or async messaging systems * Background in enterprise procurement technology, either as a vendor, implementer, or buyer-side practitioner Why Globality The opportunity is enormous. Enterprise procurement is one of the last major business functions to be transformed by AI. We're not optimizing at the margins — we're fundamentally rethinking how trillions of dollars get spent. The team is world-class. Our leadership team brings decades of experience from leading global enterprises, and our culture is built for people who want real ownership, not titles. You'll have real impact. This isn't a role where you execute someone else's playbook. You'll shape the strategy, build the programs, and see the direct business impact of your work. We work together — literally. We’re in the London office 4 days a week because the best ideas—and the fastest decisions—happen face to face.    We are an equal opportunity employer. We believe diversity makes our team better and that discrimination based on race, gender, or anything else is self-defeating. Keeping your data safe is important to us. Any information provided will be processed by Globality in compliance with applicable data privacy laws and regulations, including, but not limited to, the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 (CCPA). For any questions you may have in this regard, please contact HR@globality.com [HR@globality.com].