Global Alliance Operations Lead

Who We Are WPP Enterprise Solutions designs, builds, and operates the growth systems that competitive businesses rely on. In a world where Al is reshaping how companies drive growth, we lead clients in business transformation and marketing modernization, connecting strategy directly to execution. Our 12,000 experts in engineering and platforms, commerce, consulting, content transformation, CRM, and CX work within a unified global operating unit across 40+ markets. WPP Enterprise Solutions works alongside best-in-class partners including Adobe, AWS, Braze, Google, Microsoft, Salesforce, and Shopify, as well as innovators in AI, to deliver growth solutions tailored to the needs of our clients' businesses. VML, part of WPP, supports WPP Enterprise Solutions by helping brands activate transformation through creativity and experience. Global Alliance Operations Lead WPP Enterprise Solutions * Reports to the Chief Alliance Officer * Global The opportunity WPP Enterprise Solutions runs its alliance program as a portfolio of partner alliances, each with its own leadership and its own commercial mechanics guided by the strategy set by the Chief Alliance Officer with support from a direct global team, a layer of regional cross-alliance leadership, and a set of Specialty Company resources who carry alliance or marketing responsibility for specific partners or regions - some reporting directly, some on a dotted line. WPP Enterprise Solutions needs a leader who can bring the direct team, the regional layer and the specialty companies together into one coherent program, so that whichever partner, region or specialty company a client conversation touches, WPP shows up as one company. Enterprise Solutions is one of WPP's four operating units - approximately $1.8B in revenue, serving more than 80 of the top 100 WPP clients across 40+ markets. The Alliances function itself is young and still being built out, and it already operates across every WPP region and through resources it does not directly employ. This role exists to make sure that as the program grows, it grows as a system - with one cadence and one standard - rather than as a collection of partner teams, regional teams and specialty companies that each run their own version of it. Role summary You will run the Alliances program day to day on behalf of the Chief Alliance Officer: the leadership and governance cadence across all partner alliances and the Industry & Partner Solutions Commercialization Lead, the materials that represent the function upward, the internal QBR process for every alliance, and the systems of record - starting with Salesforce - that make partner pipeline visible and trustworthy across a structure built from direct reports, dotted-line resources, regional cross-alliance leadership and Specialty Company partners. You will also build and lead a small team of your own - a mix of direct and dotted-line resources, sized to the work rather than fixed in advance, starting small and growing as the program proves itself out. Even with that team in place, most of what this role coordinates sits outside its own reporting line, so authority comes as much from the standard you set as from the team you directly manage. The title says Operations. In practice this is closer to a chief of staff role for the Alliances function - less "keep the trains running" and more "make sure a client or partner experiences one WPP, no matter which partner, region, or specialty company is actually doing the work. What this role owns, and what it coordinates Owns: the Alliances operating cadence across all nine partner alliances and the Industry & Partner Solutions Commercialization function - leadership meetings, steering committees, internal QBRprocess and materials - pipeline data quality and reporting in Salesforce, the training and certification calendar, a small and growing team of direct and dotted-line resources, and the standard operating model that every alliance lead, regional cross-alliance lead and specialty company resource works against. Contributes to, does not own: the commercial content of each partner's joint business plan, which sits with that partner's Global Alliance Lead or co-leads, and the cross-partner technical roadmap, which sits with the Industry & Partner Solutions Commercialization Lead. You build and run the system this work operates inside; you do not own the partner relationships or the solution architecture yourself. Coordinates with, does not control: the Regional Cross-Alliance Leads (EMEA, LATAM, APAC, ANZ, Brazil/LATAM) and the Specialty Company resources (MAP, PMWeb, Verticurl, The Cocktail, MarketData/Match), most of whom report on a dotted line directly into the Chief Alliance Officer or into the alliance they support rather than into this role; and the Partner Marketing Leads who sit under the CMO and are dotted into each alliance. You set the shared standard these resources operate against; you do not own their reporting line. Core responsibilities Program governance and executive support for the CAO (25%) Own the Alliances leadership cadence across all nine partner alliances, the Industry & Partner Solutions Commercialization Lead, and the Regional Cross-Alliance Leads - recurring 1:1s, leadership team meetings, steering committees and executive reviews - making sure the right people, materials and follow-ups show up every time, whichever partner or region is on the agenda. Hire, direct and grow your own small team as the program's needs justify it - starting with a handful of direct or dotted-line resources and expanding based on demonstrated impact, not a fixed headcount plan. Build and own the materials that represent the Alliances function upward - Enterprise Solutions business reviews, leadership updates, and ad hoc requests from WPP leadership - so the Chief Alliance Officer walks into every senior conversation with a consistent, current narrative that covers the full portfolio, not just the partners with the most mature reporting. Run theinternal QBRprocess for every alliance end to end - templates, prep, scheduling with partner-side counterparts, and follow-through on actions - sointernal QBRs are a consistent institutional habit rather than something each alliance lead recreates from scratch, and rather than something that only happens for the partners with the most established teams. Act as a proxy for the Chief Alliance Officer in operational forums and follow-ups where direct executive presence isn'trequired, andknow which decisions need escalation versus which can be resolved directly. Pipeline systems and reporting (25%) Own the health of Alliances data in Salesforce across all nine partner alliances - partner-sourced, partner-funded and partner-influenced opportunities recorded consistently and reconciled against what each alliance lead, regional cross-alliance lead and specialty company resource believes is in motion, even where that resource sits outside WPP's core systems and reporting lines. Partner directly with WPP's central Enterprise Solutions growth and RevOps resources to align Alliances reporting to the broader ES pipeline model, rather than maintaining a shadow system the rest of the business can't read. Build the recurring reporting - pipeline, funding capture, co-sell conversion, delivery capability - that rolls up across all nine alliances and the Industry & Partner Solutions Commercialization practice into one picture for the Chief Alliance Officer and ES leadership, and flag where a specific alliance, region or specialty company's data quality is putting that picture at risk. Own the tools and templates - joint business plan format, funding tracker, opportunity registration checklist - that let a new alliance, a new region, or a newly engaged specialty company stand up its practice against a known standard instead of starting from a blank page. One-company alignment: cross-alliance, specialty company and partner marketing coordination (25%) Work with the Industry & Partner Solutions Commercialization Lead, the nine partner alliance leads, and Enterprise Solutions delivery leadership to define and operate the new-business handoff points, so a signed or funded opportunity in any partner or region moves cleanly #J-18808-Ljbffr Wunderman Thompson (DBA VML)