Senior Program Director

Who We Are VML 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 award-winning human‑first work for clients including AstraZeneca, Colgate‑Palmolive, Dell, Ford, Microsoft, Nestlé, The Coca‑Cola Company, and Wendy's. In 2026, VML was named Campaign’s Global Network of the Year and ranked #2 Creative Network of the Year at Cannes Lions. VML’s global network spans 55+ markets with principal offices in Buenos Aires, Kansas City, London, New York, São Paulo, Shanghai and Singapore. VML is part of WPP, the trusted growth partner for the world’s leading brands. Powered by exceptional talent and our agentic marketing platform WPP Open, WPP unites cutting‑edge media intelligence and data solutions, creativity, production, enterprise solutions and expert strategic counsel. For more information, please visit and follow along on LinkedIn #WeAreVML. Role Summary WPP Enterprise Solutions is seeking a Senior Program Delivery leader to run the day‑to‑day program operating engine for Ford’s AI‑enabled Content Supply Chain transformation workstream. This role will own how the program gets activated, governed, sequenced, resourced, tracked, and delivered across a complex ecosystem of Ford stakeholders, WPP capabilities, platform partners, production teams, data teams, technology teams, and agency workstreams. This is a high‑complexity transformation delivery role. The work spans content production, asset lifecycle management, taxonomy, metadata, DAM modernization, AI‑enabled production, customer data connectivity, decisioning, workflow, governance, measurement, and optimization. The Program Delivery Lead must be able to convert strategic ambition into an executable program model with clear workstreams, owners, milestones, dependencies, risks, operating rhythms, and decision paths. The Business Lead will own the overall business agenda and client growth strategy. This role will own the delivery architecture: how the program runs, how work gets organized, how teams stay aligned, how decisions get made, how progress is tracked, and how WPP ensures high‑quality execution across every workstream. The ideal candidate is a senior delivery operator and transformation leader who can build structure in ambiguity, manage multiple integrated workstreams, anticipate risk, drive accountability, and create the conditions for a large cross‑functional team to succeed. Core Responsibilities Program Delivery Leadership Own the integrated delivery model for the Ford Content Supply Chain transformation workstream. Translate the overall transformation agenda into a structured program plan with clear workstreams, deliverables, milestones, dependencies, owners, risks, and decision points. Design and maintain the program operating system: meeting cadence, governance forums, status reporting, escalation paths, decision logs, dependency tracking, milestone management, and executive updates. Ensure the program moves from disconnected initiatives into a coordinated, sequenced transformation roadmap. Partner with the Business Lead to turn business priorities into actionable delivery plans. Create clarity around what is active, what is planned, what is blocked, what requires decision, and what is ready to scale. Drive day‑to‑day progress across multiple workstreams, ensuring teams are aligned, accountable, and focused on the right outcomes. Workstream Management & Activation Lead the orchestration of all CSC workstreams. Establish workstream charters, success measures, delivery plans, timelines, dependencies, and operating models. Ensure each workstream has clear ownership, scope, inputs, outputs, and escalation paths. Coordinate across Ford, WPP, and partner teams to ensure workstreams are not operating in silos. Track the health of each workstream and identify where sequencing, resourcing, decision‑making, or dependency management needs intervention. Help convert early‑stage opportunities and pilots into structured delivery plans with clear objectives, assumptions, constraints, and measurable outputs. Ensure workstreams are delivered with consistency, discipline, and appropriate documentation. Governance, Process & Operating Model Build and manage the governance model required to run a large, multi‑stakeholder transformation program. Define how decisions are made, who needs to be involved, what forums are required, and how issues move from discovery to resolution. Establish operating rhythms across core team standups, workstream meetings, leadership reviews, executive readouts, and stakeholder workshops. Create templates, tools, and repeatable processes that improve how the team briefs, scopes, tracks, reports, escalates, and delivers work. Drive consistency across program documentation, status reporting, action tracking, risk management, and milestone planning. Ensure the program has a clear source of truth for scope, priorities, deliverables, decisions, dependencies, and next steps. Continuously improve ways of working as the program scales. Resource Planning & Team Coordination Own resource planning across the program in partnership with WPP capability leads, production teams, strategy, data, technology, analytics, account leadership, and finance. Identify the people and capabilities required to deliver each workstream. Anticipate capacity constraints and surface resourcing needs before they impact delivery. Coordinate across dedicated teams and shared resources to ensure the right expertise is applied at the right time. Reduce key‑person dependency by documenting processes, clarifying ownership, and creating scalable delivery structures. Support hiring, onboarding, and role clarity as the team expands. Help build a high‑functioning program team that can operate across ambiguity, speed, and complexity. Financial Management & Delivery Health Manage delivery financial health across the program, including budget tracking, burn management, resource efficiency, scope alignment, and delivery forecasting. Partner with Business Lead, finance, and capability leads to ensure work is properly scoped, estimated, staffed, and tracked. Identify financial risks related to scope creep, under‑scoping, resource gaps, inefficiency, or unclear ownership. Support SOW development, estimate creation, change requests, and delivery assumptions. Monitor progress against budgets, timelines, and resource plans. Ensure the delivery model is commercially responsible and operationally sustainable. Provide visibility into delivery performance, budget health, and operational risks. Risk, Dependency & Issue Management Own risk and dependency management across the program. Proactively identify issues before they become blockers, especially where workstreams rely on Ford decisions, platform access, data availability, legal approvals, technical feasibility, production inputs, or stakeholder alignment. Maintain a clear program‑level risk register and dependency map. Escalate issues with recommended resolution paths, not just status updates. Ensure teams understand downstream impacts of missed decisions, delayed inputs, unclear ownership, or shifting priorities. Create practical mitigation plans and drive closure against open risks. Help leadership make informed tradeoffs when timelines, scope, resources, or dependencies conflict. Delivery Across the Martech and Content Ecosystem Guide delivery across a complex marketing technology and content ecosystem, including Adobe, Salesforce, DAM, workflow, analytics, production, AI‑enabled content tools, decisioning platforms, and data environments. The role does not require deep technical architecture expertise, but it does require strong business and operational understanding of how these platforms are used by people, teams, and processes. Understand enough about the MarTech stack to coordinate SMEs, ask the right questions, identify dependencies, and translate technical constraints into delivery implications. Partner with platform, technology, data, and production experts to ensure workstreams are feasible, sequenced, and aligned to business outcomes. Help ensure tool discussions stay connected to operational use cases, adoption needs, governance, and measurable value. Stakeholder Coordination Coordinate day‑to‑day delivery across Ford stakeholders, WPP teams, agency partners, production partners, platform partners, and specialist SMEs. Ensure the right people are in the right conversations at the right moments. Manage meeting agendas, outputs, follow‑ups, decisions, and accountability. Keep teams aligned across time zones, offices, disciplines, and organizations. Create transparency across workstreams so stakeholders understand progress, blockers, and next steps. Support the Business Lead in preparing leadership conversations, workshops, program reviews, and executive updates. Build trust through operational rigor, responsiveness, and follow‑through. Documentation, Reporting & Executive Visibility Create and maintain program documentation that enables clarity, continuity, and scale. Develop program roadmaps, milestone plans, workstream trackers, dependency maps, RACI models, risk logs, action registers, status reports, and executive summaries. Ensure documentation is simple, current, and usable. Translate complex workstream activity into clear reporting for senior leadership. Provide regular visibility into progress, risks, decisions needed, delivery health, and upcoming milestones. Help the team move from informal updates to disciplined program management. Ensure the program has a reliable operating memory as workstreams evolve. Transformation Enablement Help operationalize a new model for how Ford and WPP plan, create, manage, activate, measure, and optimize content. Support the shift from manual, fragmented, channel‑led execution to a more connected, scalable, AI‑enabled content ecosystem. Identify process gaps and recommend improvements across intake, briefing, production, asset management, review, approval, activation, and measurement. Help teams adopt new ways of working, tools, governance models, and delivery practices. Drive continuous improvement across delivery effectiveness, team collaboration, decision speed, and operational maturity. Ensure transformation work is not only designed but actually activated. Requirements Senior program delivery, transformation, operations, or delivery management experience across complex agency, consulting, marketing, digital, technology, production, or enterprise client environments. Proven ability to manage large, multi‑workstream programs involving multiple stakeholders, partners, platforms, and delivery teams. Strong understanding of program governance, delivery operations, resource planning, risk management, dependency management, financial tracking, and executive reporting. Ability to translate complex strategic priorities into clear delivery plans, workstreams, milestones, and operating models. Business‑level understanding of enterprise MarTech and content ecosystems, including Adobe, Salesforce, DAM, workflow tools, analytics platforms, AI‑enabled production tools, and decisioning environments. Experience working with cross‑functional teams across strategy, creative, production, data, technology, analytics, account leadership, legal, and client stakeholders. Strong financial management skills, including budget tracking, burn management, resourcing, scope management, and delivery forecasting. Ability to manage ambiguity, competing priorities, shifting timelines, and complex stakeholder dynamics. Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to create clear program documentation and executive‑ready status materials. Experience establishing new processes, governance models, and delivery systems in complex environments. Automotive experience is highly valuable but not required. Competencies Highly structured operator who can create clarity, order, and momentum in complex environments. Strategic delivery leader who understands not just tasks and timelines, but how workstreams connect to larger business outcomes. Strong program architect who can build the operating model, governance, tools, and rhythms required to run transformation at scale. Proactive risk manager who surfaces issues early and brings practical resolution paths. Commercially aware delivery leader who understands scope, budget, burn, resourcing, and operational efficiency. Collaborative partner who can work across WPP, Ford, agencies, platform teams, and specialist SMEs. Strong facilitator who can keep meetings focused, decisions clear, and teams accountable. Comfortable operating across business, technology, production, data, and measurement conversations. Able to manage both the macro roadmap and the micro details. Calm, direct, resilient, and solutions‑oriented under pressure. Strong sense of ownership and follow‑through. Focused on building repeatable systems, not just managing one‑off tasks. Salary and Benefits The base salary range for this position at the time of this posting is indicated below. Individual compensation varies based on job‑related factors, including location, business needs, level of responsibility, experience, and qualifications. We offer a competitive benefits package. $100,000—$230,000 USD. 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 an average of four days a week. If you require accommodations or flexibility, please discuss this with the hiring team during the interview process. Equal Opportunity Statement WPP (VML) is an equal opportunity employer and considers applicants for all positions without discrimination or regard to 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. #J-18808-Ljbffr VML South Africa