Project Manager (merchandising) - 6 month FTC

Hogarth is the Global Content Experience Company. Part of WPP, Hogarth partners with one in every two of the world’s top 100 brands including Coca-Cola, Ford, Rolex, Nestlé, Mondelez and Dyson. With a breadth of experience across an extensive range of sectors, Hogarth offers the unrivalled ability to deliver relevant, engaging, and measurable content across all channels and media - both established and emerging.

The number of channels at our fingertips; the need for speed; and the drive for mass personalisation, all mean that brands need different solutions. Our global team of over 7,500 craft and technology experts brings together creative, production and innovation to help clients navigate this exciting and ever-changing world of today’s content experience.

WPP is the creative transformation company. We use the power of creativity to build better futures for our people, planet, clients and communities. Working at WPP means being part of a global network of more than 100,000 talented people dedicated to doing extraordinary work for our clients. We operate in over 100 countries, with corporate headquarters in New York, London and Singapore.

WPP is a world leader in marketing services, with deep AI, data and technology capabilities, global presence and unrivalled creative talent. Our clients include many of the biggest companies and advertisers in the world, including approximately 300 of the Fortune Global 500. Our people are the key to our success. We’re committed to fostering a culture of creativity, belonging and continuous learning, attracting and developing the brightest talent, and providing exciting career opportunities that help our people grow.

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.

What does the Central Order & Logistics (CO&L) team do at Hogarth? The Central Order & Logistics (CO&L) team manage the production and distribution of printed merchandising materials for new store openings and new product launches across Hogarth’s Client’s Partner Stores.

• Be a key part of campaigns from client brief through to delivery completion.
• Responsible for allocating correct merchandising materials to stores at an individual level based on the client’s strategy.
• Maintain a database of client stores and individual allocations, used for validating merchandising orders for each campaign.
• Review the dispatch schedule planning at an individual country level based off of product availability dates, historical transit times and vendor capacity/resource.
• Track vendor spend against budget by ensuring 100% accuracy of finance trackers, recording vendor quotes and flagging to team lead when actual spend is close to budget.
• Build a hindsight report after every campaign, outlining elements that worked well/didn’t work so well and areas for improvement across vendor, client and internal processes.
• Demonstrate expertise in the delivery of projects through management of client expectations, internal processes and cross-functional department involvement.
• Set and manage client expectations ensuring they follow the agreed workflows.
• Build strong, trusting relationships with all key stakeholders – e.g. function leads, cross functional producers, senior managers and 3rd party vendors that are directly involved with the work.
• Write, prepare and present documents, presentations and reports where required.

The Project Manager reports to the Senior Project Manager / Regional Team Lead. This role works closely with the Regional Localisation and Studio teams. The Project Manager has no direct reports.

• Experience working on global retail and/or shopper accounts, from creative development to final production (critical path management).
• Relevant merchandising, demand planning or print production and localisation experience; additionally, logistics experience will be beneficial.
• Advanced Excel skills essential (complex formulas, large database management, dashboards, pivot wizard etc – VBA advantageous but not required).
• Experience of Budget Management.
• Excellent communication skills; written, verbal and presentation.
• Attention to detail, analytical thinking ability and passion for the work are essential.
• Calm under pressure with a positive attitude and a hands-on, can-do approach to solving problems.
• The ability to prioritise and work quickly and efficiently within very tight time frames.
• Able to work weekends and longer hours on-site with the client during time constrained projects up to 4 times per year. Due to client confidentiality, remote working is not allowed during this period.

WPP 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.