Global Strategic Information Technology Business Partner – Global Business Services

WPP is the 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 accomplished people in 110 countries. We create transformative ideas and outcomes for its clients through an integrated offer of communications, experience, commerce, and technology. WPP and our award-winning agencies work with most of the world's biggest companies and organisations – from Ford, Unilever and P&G to Google, HSBC, and the UN. Our clients include 61 of the FTSE 100, 325 of the Fortune Global 500, all 30 of the Dow Jones 30 and 62 of the NASDAQ 100.

WPP has headquarters in New York, London and Singapore and a corporate presence in major markets worldwide. We are quoted on the London Stock Exchange and the New York Stock Exchange. Key performance indicators for WPP (2020) include Billings of £46.9bn and Revenue of £12bn.

WPP IT provides IT services for WPP, the world’s largest communications services group. As a creative transformation company, WPP is helping its clients transform the future through extraordinary work. WPP IT is an integral part of that journey and we are proud to provide technology for some of the world’s most creative brands.

The Specialist IT team in WPP IT are the technology solutions partner for the Specialist & Public Relations Agencies, Hogarth and WPPs Corporate Functions, and are accountable for co-ordinating and assuring end-to-end change delivery, managing the Specialist agencies technology life-cycle and innovation pipeline. 
WPP’s Corporate Functions includes Global Business Services, People Operations and WPP HQ (Legal, Compliance, Corporate Finance, etc.).  Our focus is around strategic partnership to enable business transformation, delivering solutions that enhance our businesses effectiveness and efficiency and support products that deliver work, engage clients and leverage collective intelligence.

The Global Business Services organization is transforming global Procurement, global Real Estate and Finance Shared Services across WPP.  We need a Global Strategic Business Partner to own the WPP IT relationships with the Chief GBS Officer ther their leadership team.  

The goal is to shape and deliver their short to long term technology strategy across areas such as Source to Pay, Process Mining, RPA, Collections solutions, Workplace Analytics etc.

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Why we're hiring:

You will lead technology for the Global Business Services organization. 

This new role will partner with WPP’s Chief Global Business Services Officer and their team on their journey to enhance and standardise colleague experience and to consolidate HR activities into shared Service Centres

You will establish a forward-thinking and multi-year technology strategy, that drives innovation, differentiation and simplification. 

Key activities include driving and overseeing delivery of strategic technology efforts :

• Enabling a multi-year transformation of the Global Business Services operating model, moving Finance, Procurement and Real Estate functions into Global Shared Services centres to drive operational efficiencies and enhance service levels.

• Defining and driving strategic global platforms including Process Mining, Close Process Management, Collections solutions, Source to Pay, Workplace Analytics and Robotic Process Automation

• Deploy platforms to underpin operational activities, case management and tracking requests for service, with reporting and metrics for each area.

We're looking for the next generation of senior technology leaders. You'll be bright, energetic, and be a strategic thinker by nature, a capable, trusted partner of WPP’s corporate level executives.

You will have a similar role in another company or be ready to step up into this role because your experience means you're ready for the challenge of leading technology for the Global Business Services function of the world's largest marketing services organisation.

You will work with the Leadership teams within Global Business Services and be the voice of technology and their strategic technology partner.  

You will develop and agree the technology strategy for the business, evolve roadmaps and work with Platform and Product teams to deploy.

You will directly partner with peers in the other corporate functions to combine platforms, solutions and investments.

You will drive simplification, always. Your mindset is one where you align to strategy by default and deviate from it by active decision. 

You will have outstanding people skills, be a clear communicator and know when the right approach is to be pragmatic. You are a problem solver. You are an agent of change. Trusted advisor to seniormost executives.

You will be passionate about delivering the right solutions and experiences for our staff and clients and get excited about the work we do both for our clients and across WPP.

Where needed, you will agree the development of unique products, with an eye to them scaling for greater benefit around Corporate Functions and the Specialist businesses at large.

What you'll be doing:

• Leads IT Business Partnering within Global Business Services for the Specialist Archetype.
• Owns and manages strategic relationships with senior stakeholders, representing their business within WPP IT and vice versa.
• Capture and shape business demand for new or changed products and services in their corporate function – ensuring their needs are considered and proposals are shaped, sized, aligned and prioritised.
• Liaise in with the Specialist Archetype Portfolio Lead – and relevant supporting WPP IT functions – to collate, size and align technology demand in support of value-based outcomes, engaging back with stakeholders on WPP IT prioritisation decisions.
• Act as a point of escalation and un-blocker for their Global Business Services’ business context – supporting IT project delivery, technical decisions, etc – but re-routing any service or support challenges via the Specialist Archetype’s Operations Assurance function / Service Management Lead.
• Maintain a lens on the value and commercial impact of both proposals and the reality of WPP IT activity and plans as it relates to Global Business Services – working with IT Operations and the Portfolio Lead to ensure transparency of value contribution and IT spend.
• Work with stakeholders across Global Business Services and WPP IT strategic programmes, to proactively ensure delivery – and to secure the engagement required to realise the value of the Specialist Archetype portfolio.
• Develop and maintain a view in Global Business Services of stakeholder alignment; delivery challenges; Agency business risks and strategies, and in-flight initiatives – able to engage readily in ongoing planning and roadmap discussions with the Archetype Portfolio Lead, Architecture and strategic programmes.
• Collate and manage a transparent plan to support visibility and focus on interdependencies, delivery risks and assumptions for all WPP IT work in Global Business Services.

What you'll need:

• Significant senior stakeholder relationship management and planning capability;
• Significant knowledge of change management and business adoption of digital solutions;
• Demand management – qualifying, shaping & sizing solution concepts, plans;
• Developing data-driven insights, analysis and strategic advice;
• Developing portfolio plans, budgeting and investment cases, and value realisation activity;
• Significant corporate function business knowledge and experience;
• Portfolio or programme management experience;
• Experience of developing business or functional strategic plans and roadmaps;
• Experience of bringing an organisation on a change journey; and
• Experience of working in an agency or consulting environment where People and Talent are truly the assets.

Who you are:

You're open: We are inclusive and collaborative; we encourage the free exchange of ideas; we respect and celebrate diverse views. We are accepting: of new ideas, new partnerships, new ways of working.

You're optimistic: We believe in the power of creativity, technology and talent to create brighter futures or our people, our clients and our communities. We approach all that we do with conviction: to try the new and to seek the unexpected.

You're extraordinary: we are stronger together: through collaboration we achieve the amazing. We are creative leaders and pioneers of our industry; we provide extraordinary every day.

What we'll give you:

Passionate, inspired people – We promote a culture of people that do extraordinary work.

Scale and opportunity – We offer the opportunity to create, influence and complete projects at a scale that is unparalleled in the industry.

Challenging and stimulating work – Unique work and the opportunity to join a group of creative problem solvers. Are you up for the challenge?

Job posted August 2022

WPP is an equal opportunity employer and considers applicants for all positions without regard to race, color, religion or belief, sex, age, national origin, citizenship status, marital status, military/veteran status, genetic information, sexual orientation, gender identity, physical or mental disability. We believe in creating a dynamic work environment that values diversity and inclusion and strives to recruit a diverse slate of candidates to help us achieve that goal.

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