The Account Director is responsible for complete ownership of the the P&L, relationships, delivery, quality, planning, resourcing and operations of a particular business unit. The role is critical as it aims to build solutioning, servicing and delivery for clients and help build a culture of responsibility and performance.
Responsibility:
1. Problem solving mindset:
- Critical and quick thinking, effective + prompt communication, and the ability to find solutions that align with both the client’s and agency’s goals
- Address challenges and issues that arise during the course of work. Be smart and fast or fail-fast with problem-solving, conflict resolution, and decision-making to ensure smooth delivery
2. Relationship management:
- Build and maintain strong relationships with clients.
- Understand their business deeply, objectives, and challenges. Be the main point of escalation between the agency and the client
- Stay abreast of industry trends, market conditions, and opportunities. d. Provide clients with strategic insights, suggestions, competitve data and innovative solutions to help them achieve an advantage
- Work to retain existing clients by delivering exceptional service, demonstrating the value of the agency’s work, and building long-term relationships
3. Delivery and Operation excellence:
- To ensure quality output and suggest the right solutions to customers b. Ensure 100% utilization of resources – therefore driving efficiency
- 100% adherence to the quality standards
- Lower rework and wasted effort
- Plan workloads and work schedules
- Commitment to delivery timelines
4. Business Performance :
- The BU head is responsible for ensuring that the BU delivers on revenue and margin commitments. This includes
- Tracking team performance
- Analyzing performance of BU, understanding core issues and suggesting programs to alleviate issues/roadblocks
- Driving value with quality of work and fulfilment of revenue and margin goals d. Highlighting roadblocks /issues with executive’s in a regular and structured manner
- Actively participate in new business development by identifying upsell opportunities within existing accounts and contributing to pitches and proposals for new clients.
5. Team management:
- Be empathetic. Lead and manage the entire team within the business unit. Provide guidance, mentorship, and support to ensure the team is working effectively and efficiently
- Ensure good cross-functional collaboration
- Reward and recognize efforts of team members and plan for ‘making work fun’ and not another ‘job’