Senior Strategist

Overview

• The Strategist is a strategic practitioner responsible for developing effective, inspiring and actionable strategy across client briefs, proactive opportunities and new-business projects.
• The role uses research, consumer understanding, culture, data and structured thinking to translate business objectives into strong strategic direction and compelling creative briefs.
• The Strategist works closely with senior strategy leadership, clients, creatives, media and partner agencies to ensure ideas are grounded in insight, connected across channels and aligned to clear objectives.
• A critical part of the role is to be a proactive thinker and collaborator — not simply an order taker — who can manage multiple workstreams, add value at every stage and grow toward greater strategic leadership.

Responsibilities

STRATEGIC THINKING & DIRECTION

• Develop fit-for-purpose strategic solutions to client briefs, including challenging the perceived deliverable where the problem requires a different answer.
• Translate business objectives, audience understanding and research into clear strategic direction.
• Use appropriate frameworks, tools and structured thinking to solve marketing and broader business problems.
• Support development of integrated strategies across brand, communications, digital, content and customer experience.
• Bring a provocative, curious point of view and add value beyond simply executing instructions.

CLIENT & BUSINESS PARTNERSHIP

• Work with clients to understand their aims, objectives, business context and brand challenges.
• Build confidence through strong preparation, accurate thinking and clear presentation.
• Participate in client briefings, workshops and strategic working sessions.
• Present ideas, findings and strategic recommendations clearly and confidently.
• Develop a practical understanding of each client's business and category so recommendations are relevant and commercially grounded.

CONSUMER, CULTURE & MARKET INTELLIGENCE

• Analyse existing data, market reports, trends and research to identify meaningful consumer and cultural insight.
• Develop, manage and analyse research projects where required.
• Understand primary and secondary research and appropriate methods such as surveys, focus groups and desk research.
• Interpret cultural and social trends relevant to client business.
• Understand how macro and micro-economic factors influence consumer attitudes and behaviour.

DATA, AI & FUTURE-FIT STRATEGY

• Use AI responsibly to support research, synthesis, knowledge retrieval, scenario exploration and strategic development.
• Develop confidence working with digital data, performance metrics and web-based research tools.
• Use data as an input to thinking, moving beyond description toward strategic implication.
• Build working knowledge of digital transformation, customer journeys, personalisation and emerging technology.
• Apply human judgement to AI-assisted work and check sources, assumptions and outputs critically.

INTEGRATED STRATEGY & COLLABORATION

• Work collaboratively with Creative, Media, Client Leadership, Data, Technology and other agency disciplines.
• Liaise with strategic counterparts at partner agencies to maintain alignment to the overarching strategy.
• Help ensure discipline-specific work remains connected to the approved strategic direction.
• Contribute to integrated planning across multiple channels, including digital.
• Collaborate without ego while also being able to work effectively independently.

BRIEFING & UPSTREAM PLANNING

• Challenge and craft briefs to ensure the right information is available and clarified upfront.
• Translate strategy into concise, inspiring creative briefs that provide a strong springboard for creative thinking.
• Support senior strategists in defining the business problem, audience, desired behaviour, proposition and measures of success.
• Attend internal briefing and review sessions and provide strategic guidance where appropriate.
• Connect individual briefs to broader client priorities and campaign context.

CREATIVE & EFFECTIVENESS PARTNERSHIP

• Work with creative teams to develop ideas that are aligned to the strategy and audience insight.
• Review creative output prior to client review and flag where work has moved away from the strategic direction.
• Provide rational strategic feedback while understanding what is essential to protect and where there is room to adapt.
• Ensure SMART objectives and measurements are considered in strategic recommendations.
• Monitor campaigns, analyse results and suggest changes or improvements where necessary.

GROWTH, INNOVATION & NEW BUSINESS

• Contribute to proactive ideas and new-business pitches.
• Support research, strategic framing and presentation development for growth opportunities.
• Use resourcefulness and structured thinking to tackle unusual or non-traditional briefs.
• Share trends, category developments and strategic opportunities with the wider team.
• Look for ways strategic thinking can unlock additional value for clients.

TALENT & PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT

• Take ownership of your development and actively seek feedback from senior strategy leadership.
• Build your ability to simplify complexity, identify insight, craft compelling presentations and influence audiences.
• Share learning, useful references and new strategic approaches with the wider team.
• Demonstrate initiative, curiosity, accountability and a willingness to push your own ambition.
• Support a collaborative strategy culture where ideas and perspectives are openly shared.

STRATEGIC TRANSFORMATION & FUTURE WAYS OF WORKING

• Be open to new ways of researching, briefing, collaborating and developing strategy.
• Use future-fit tools and platforms that improve knowledge access, quality, collaboration and speed.
• Contribute ideas that improve strategic processes and remove unnecessary friction.
• Develop practical fluency in AI, digital platforms and emerging strategic methods.
• Support a culture that manages change by actively initiating improvement.

OPERATIONAL PARTNERSHIP

• Manage multiple workstreams in an organised and reliable way.
• Plan workload proactively, meet deadlines and raise risks early.
• Use agency resources responsibly and make effective use of available tools and support.
• Participate in agreed project-management, briefing and review processes.
• Maintain attention to detail, accuracy and strong follow-through.

PERFORMANCE, EFFECTIVENESS & ACCOUNTABILITY

• Take personal responsibility for the quality and accuracy of assigned strategic work.
• Show initiative, proactivity and achievement orientation.
• Communicate effectively and build strong working relationships across clients and teams.
• Remain open to constructive feedback and use it to improve the work.
• Ensure strategic output contributes to stronger creative work and more effective client outcomes.

MEASURES OF SUCCESS

• Clear, well-researched and fit-for-purpose strategic recommendations.
• Briefs that clarify the problem and provide an inspiring creative springboard.
• Consistent ability to manage at least three workstreams with strong organisation and follow-through.
• Strong collaboration with clients, creatives, media and partner agencies.
• Evidence that strategy remains accurately reflected in creative work.
• Improving confidence in client presentation and strategic storytelling.
• Appropriate use of objectives, measurement, data and campaign learning.
• Visible initiative, curiosity, self-management and contribution to the wider strategy team.

CRITICAL CAPABILITIES

• Strategic thinking and problem-solving.
• Consumer, cultural and market research.
• Research synthesis and insight generation.
• Creative briefing and strategic storytelling.
• Integrated communications and digital planning.
• Effectiveness and measurement understanding.
• Data and AI literacy.
• Client communication and presentation.
• Cross-discipline collaboration.
• Project