MullenLowe Lintas Group - Director - Brand Planning

Job Description

- The Brand Planner will work closely with his/her Business Director, Creative Team and Departmental Heads to ensure the effectiveness of the creative work the agency produces.

- The Brand Planner's focus is to deliver excellent strategic direction to the accounts assigned to him/her. He or she must ensure that the brand team remains focused on the development of new ideas and superior brand-building advertising/communication against the strategy.

- The duties broadly describe expectations at this level; some variations may exist due to client and business requirements.

- It is the Brand Planner more than anyone else in the agency that acts as the brand guardian. The Brand Planner should ideally be detached from the financial aspect and be responsible for only the long-term health and growth of the brand

Planning Knowledge :

1. Consumer Insight

- The Brand Planner must have a knowledge of their target consumer that goes beyond statistical descriptions or - illustrative pen portraits.

- They must be able to generate a genuine empathy for the audience in a Creative who may have little in common with their values or situation.

- They must be able to tell the Creative things about the audience which bring the audience alive, encourages understanding, answers questions and give Creative something interesting to think about.

- The Brand Planner's understanding of consumer attitudes and behavior must be brought to bear at every stage of communications development via continuous involvement in the process.

2. Context Insight -

- The Brand Planner must be able to apply target audience understanding to the brand's 360 communication needs.

- He/she must fully understand the audience's brand interactions and purchase cycle and be able to identify opportunities for traditional, non-traditional/activation engagement to occur.

3. Other Marketing Knowledge -

- The Brand Planner should have a good working knowledge of principles and practices in other areas of the marketing mix - pricing, packaging, brand architecture, NPD, retail etc.

4. Socio-Demographic Trends -

- The Brand Planner should have a strong grasp of what's happening in their market, culture, and society and to have ready familiarity with stimulating synopses and analyses of these trends.

- They should not just know what's in and what's out, but be able to tell you why. The Brand Planner should ensure that strategies are developed in light of or anticipation of these trends so that their brand gains a competitive advantage in capturing new - space-

5. Lowe Planning Toolkit -

- The Brand Planner will have an excellent knowledge of the Lowe Toolkit and apply it in full or part across all their accountable brands

6. Research -

- The Brand Planner must have a sound understanding of research principles and techniques (quantitative and qualitative) and be able to recommend their use accordingly.

Planning Discipline Skills :

1. Creative-Strategic Thinking - The Brand Planner must be able to fully understand the most complex challenges/situations and reduce them to simple solutions. He or she must not get carried away by the theoretical or intellectual but should maintain common sense and clarity.

2. Lowe Planning Tools - The Brand Planner must be skilled and conversant in the Lowe approach of problem bias thinking and the application of the Planning Tools to facilitate the process:

- Defining the right problem based on a detailed understanding of the audience and the market context through research expertise

- Insightfully interpreting and illuminating the data

- Developing intuitive hypotheses

- Incorporating wider cultural change and social trends

- Thinking laterally

3. Market Research - The Brand Planner must be able to devise, conduct, analyze, report on and monitor research, objectively, and to be able to challenge or exploit its findings from a perspective built on understanding.

4. Data Analysis - The Brand Planner must know how to interrogate data and find an angle in it; be able to recognize what will be useful to help create interesting, effective strategies and how to translate it into creative stimulus.

5. Anthropology and Futurology The Brand Planner should have a genuine interest in and capacity to generate knowledge about trends and anticipate social movements that their Lowe colleagues can actually use.

6. Brainstorming The Brand Planner must be able to contribute with knowledge and creativity to any brainstorm he/ she may be invited to (outside the direct brand accountability he/ she might have at that point of time) in order to contribute to the overall improvement of all Lowe Lintas brands.

7. Facilitation The Brand Planner must be able to professionally facilitate a brainstorm with flair and energy and lead it to new discoveries by encouraging the best contribution of all participants.

Interpersonal Skills :

1. Persuasion Skills - The Brand Planner must be able to sell their thinking internally and generate real enthusiasm for the direction they set. They should be able to able to - win- an argument without making the other party feel like a loser

2. Communication Skills - The Brand Planner is expected to demonstrate strong written and verbal skills. This includes the ability to run meetings, present and sell strategic and creative ideas and write strategy papers with the relevant input from the Planning and Business Director

3. Relationship Building - The Brand Planner's primary relationship is with the Creative department and the Brand Planner must develop a great working rapport with them.

4. Collaboration - The Brand Planner should be a team player; someone who can appreciate and use inputs from others; someone who knows when to push and when not, how to get the best from their colleagues, how to give and receive criticism, able to explore and encourage but also to have the steel to fight when needed.

Core Responsibilities :

1. Inspirational Creative Brief - The Brand Planner is responsible for providing the strategic direction and inspiration for the creative solution to the Client's communication need. It is the Brand Planner's responsibility to create an interesting, distinctive solution which is both strategically sound and creatively fertile (demonstrated by thought starting points). The Brand Planner must write an inspirational brief to encapsulate it and brief the Creative team accordingly.

2. Strategic Persuasion - The Brand Planner must bring to bear their persuasive skills, quality of argument and experience to sell their strategy to their colleagues.

3. Developing and Evaluating Ideas - Inspiration does not stop at the briefing. It is the Brand Planner's responsibility to feed the creative process with further insight and stimulus and to provide feedback on embryonic ideas to ensure effectiveness. This should be done, wherever possible with the input of first-hand creative development research. The Brand Planner is responsible for the effectiveness of the agency's work and should he or she has grounds to doubt the quality of the agency recommendation regarding its fitness for purpose they are duty bound to speak up and address it - first with their Brand Planning Heads, Creative and Account team but with CEO and Chairman if necessary

4. Impartial Championing of Ideas - The Brand Planner is the one person who must be seen by the client to provide impartial, informed appraisal of the work, from conception to in-market evaluation. It is the Brand Planner's role to establish the Client's strategic yardstick by which the agency's work is judged. The Senior Brand Planner must ensure the proper use of research (esp. external) in developing and testing the execution and must protect it from ill-founded criticism. After campaign launch, he or she must oversee monitoring of the effectiveness of the execution and must ensure proper interpretation of (tracking and market) results and the implementation of sound conclusions

5. Client Counsel - The Brand Planner is the brand owner - the key point person with the Client for strategy and he/she should provide the Client with upstream advice on how to improve their brands- competitive advantage. The Brand Planner must have the ability to absorb data from all aspects of the Client's business, understand market trends and external factors, and then identify opportunities or issues well in advance, as well as help, formulate solutions. The Brand Planner should be a major contributor to the development of brand plans based on a thorough understanding of the market and consumer

6. Context and Channel Solutions - The Brand Planner will provide the strategic inspiration for the context solution and actively seek to promote holistic communication solutions and ensure that a consistent strategy adheres throughout.

7. - Populist Creativity Problem Biased Thinking- Champion - The Brand Planner is responsible for actively promoting Lowe's strategic approach and associated Toolkit and incorporating it into the Agency's core offering on their accounts.

Key Duties :

1. Strategic Reviews - The Brand Planner is responsible for a full understanding of the Clients business context and the competitive strategies that they take. He/she will write and present insightful strategic recommendations based on a solid argument of the relevant data, commissioned research, first-hand research, and their own, well marshaled creative-strategic thinking. The Chief Strategy Officer and/or the Business Director prior to presentation must review all presentations.

2. Creative Brief Writing - The Brand Planner is responsible for all creative briefs and strategic papers that emanate from the Agency. All briefs must be approved by the Chief Strategic Officer. The Senior Brand Planner is responsible for sharing the strategic thinking leading to the brief with the CSO in advance of sign off.

3. Briefing Meetings - The Brand Planner is responsible for running Briefing meetings.

4. Strategic Analysis / Consumer Insight - The Brand Planner is the repository for all consumer and strategic information that relates to his / her brand and must regularly use desk research/groups to augment this understanding and bring it to bear on the strategic direction of the business. They must keep the brand team informed of any key developments or trends in the marketplace.

5. Toolkit Sessions - The Brand Planner is responsible for facilitating workshops and Toolkit sessions as part of the communications strategy development process. These could range from being full-blown senior client/pitch sessions to informal thinking and small groups.

6. Training / Coaching the Junior Brand Planners - The Brand Planner is to effectively coach juniors (if applicable) in all elements of his / her job description. This will require providing ongoing constructive feedback about their performance.

7. Awards - The Brand Planner should write submissions for planning/effectiveness awards. They should ensure that all possible angles for a case are explored on each of their brands and should acquire and maintain necessary data so that well-documented cases can be made.