Senior Strategist in London

Who We Are

VML, part of WPP, is a leading creative company that combines brand experience, customer experience, and commerce, creating connected brands to drive growth. VML is celebrated for its innovative and human‐first, award‐winning work for blue‐chip client partners including AstraZeneca, Colgate‐Palmolive, Dell, Ford, Microsoft, Nestlé, The Coca‐Cola Company, and Wendy's. The agency is recognized by the Forrester WaveTM Reports as a Leader among Marketing Creative and Content Service Providers, Commerce Services, Global Digital Experience Services, Global Marketing Services and, most recently, Marketing Measurement & Optimization.

What We’re Looking For

You’ve done your time on the tools. You know how to build an insight, write a brief that excites a creative team, and hold your ground in a client room. This role is the next step: leading the strategic direction on iconic global and UK brands, with the creative ambition and commercial rigour to match.

You’ll operate with confidence across client, creative and planning teams. You’ll be the trusted strategic voice in the room — not just the person who fills the deck before the meeting. You know how brands work. You know how people work. And you’re hungry to prove that communications can make a measurable difference.

Your Accounts

• FMCG Client – Consumer Batteries — Global Strategy: This is one of the world’s most recognisable brands — and this role puts you at the centre of defining what it stands for culturally. Our work on this client has won the APG Grand Prix, Effie, WARC and IPA Awards.
• FMCG Confectionary Client – UK Brand Strategy: This is an opportunity to work on the most beloved confectionery brands in the UK, names that have earned their place in British culture over generations.

Key Responsibilities

• Own the strategic direction on your accounts with autonomy and confidence, from brief intake to creative sell‐in.
• Write compelling, insightful creative briefs that take genuine leaps.
• Build and sustain trusted relationships with mid‐to‐senior clients, positioning yourself as a strategic partner, not just a supplier.
• Actively contribute to new business pitches and proactive strategic thinking that opens new revenue opportunities for the agency.
• Manage and mentor junior strategists, setting high standards and investing in their development.
• Drive effectiveness thinking across your accounts, building measurement into briefs from the start.
• Contribute to departmental initiatives and help raise the quality of strategic output across the strategy team.

Key Performance Indicators

• Quality and ambition of strategic output; measured through client satisfaction, creative outcomes, awards and peer review.
• Client satisfaction and trust; evidenced by client retention, scope growth and qualitative feedback.
• Effectiveness outcomes; demonstrated through post‐campaign evaluation, effectiveness award entries and proof of commercial impact.
• Team development; progress & support of direct reports.
• Pitch contribution; proactive ideas and strategic inputs that meaningfully advance new business prospects.

Who You Are

• A self‐starting strategist who takes autonomous ownership of clients and briefs; you don’t wait to be told what to do.
• Analytically rigorous and creatively alive. You’re as comfortable reading a balance sheet as you are writing a brief that sparks brilliant creative work.
• A confident, empathetic storyteller. Your decks are clear, compelling and built around a single‐minded idea.
• Commercially literate. You understand what drives your client’s business and you connect communications strategy to business outcomes.
• Culturally curious. You’re a sponge for what’s happening in the world, and you know how to bring that into the work.
• A generous team player and a demanding but fair manager. You want the people around you to be better.

What You’ll Need

• Proven experience as a strategist in an integrated creative, CX or commerce agency environment.
• A portfolio of strategic work that demonstrates the ability to take real creative leaps, not just competent briefs.
• Deep fluency in comms and channel planning, with an understanding of how to orchestrate ideas across mass media, social, retail and digital.
• Experience managing and developing junior strategists.
• Confidence with data, from research interpretation to building effectiveness cases.
• An appetite for AI tools and a genuine curiosity about how they can sharpen and accelerate strategic practice.

What’s in It for You

• The chance to work on globally famous brands, with a track record of award‐winning strategy to build on.
• A strategy department that invests seriously in learning, development and career progression.
• A genuinely integrated agency model, where strategy works alongside world‐class creative, data, CX and technology capabilities.
• A culture that values brave thinking, honest feedback and the courage to push for better work.
• A competitive package, hybrid working and access to the full suite of WPP and WPP benefits.