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VP, Brand Strategy (Healthcare Provider)

Chicago, IL

Merge Storytelling and Technology

We bring together the minds and passions of creative pioneers, tech innovators, and data explorers to help ambitious clients solve business challenges and rise to the top. MERGE has enduring client partnerships with American Express, T-Mobile, Subway, Kate Spade NY, Coach, The North Face, Meta, Adobe, BlueCross BlueShield, Abbott, Astellas, Supernus, CSL, GE Healthcare, Broward Health, Indiana University Health, and Morgan Stanley. With offices in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Denver, Kansas City, Montreal, New York City and Los Angeles. MERGE uses a talent-to-task process that enables clients to think higher and feel deeper about their customers. 

Promote Health, Wellness & Happiness

We are committed to promoting health, wellness and happiness in the world by partnering with purpose-driven clients in purpose-driven industries in healthcare, life science, and consumer products. Our deep vertical expertise and category insights stem from decade-long partnerships with our top clients.

Emerge to the Top of Your Career

At MERGE, we strive to create a superior work experience where talented and ambitious people grow. An experience that encourages people to think higher and feel deeper. An experience where people engage their minds and hearts to do the best work of their careers.

As our VP, Brand Strategy you will…

Be a creative and intellectual leader who believes that Health brands can be as powerful, distinctive, and emotionally resonant as the best consumer brands. You'll serve as a strategic brand leader for our Provider and Health clients, partnering with the most senior leadership to guide them toward bold solutions and drive business growth. Internally, you will be a key leader, sparking new ways of looking at the world and helping drive strategies and solutions that solve the real client issue. Ultimately, you will independently lead the development of large-scale and complex brand strategy deliverables, ensuring excellence across all stages of the process.

You are joining at an inflection point for MERGE. With a strategic focus in Health and Wellness and leadership’s commitment to growing Brand Strategy, you will have the runway to help shape the next chapter of our practice.

About MERGE Brand Strategy

Our clients come to MERGE because they need more than a traditional brand strategy; they need a strategy built for the complex reality of the modern consumer. Where other agencies have a strategic blind spot, lacking either the health or lifestyle lens, MERGE has a superpower: The Whole Human Insight Advantage.

This is our proprietary strategic mindset that informs every recommendation we make. We believe that to drive true growth, you must deeply understand the individual across their entire life: as a consumer and as a patient. By intentionally triangulating insights across our Lifestyle and Health divisions, we gain a complete, empathetic view of their motivations and challenges, ensuring our strategy fuels a brand journey that is relevant, seamless, and ultimately advances the crucial work of our clients’ brands.

Strategic Command 

  • Architect of Strategy: Lead the development of large-scale, complex brand strategies and "Big M" marketing visions for both current clients and new business pitches. You will drive the creation of foundational outputs—including audience insights, positioning, launch strategies, and brand plans—while maintaining the agility to tailor strategic frameworks to the unique demands of the job at hand.
  • Collaborative Leadership: Lead effective collaboration with clients, creative leads, and extended partners in both informal and formal settings—such as brand workshops and creative ideation—to develop and sell inventive, strategic solutions.
  • Insight & Innovation: Champion the use of inventive research methodologies to discover fresh customer insights that others miss, ensuring our work is grounded in deep human truth. Leverage predictive and generative AI tools to validate brand hypotheses and scale hyper-personalized creative strategies.
  • Inspire Creative Excellence: Write the "master briefs" and partner closely with creative leaders to ensure our strategic vision translates into award-winning, culturally relevant creative work.

Leadership & Commercial Growth

  • Drive Business Growth: Uncover insights tied to client business objectives that unlock growth; actively leading strategy for new business pitches and identifying opportunities to expand services with existing clients.
  • Client Advisory: Act as a strategic advisor to C-Suite clients, guiding them toward bold solutions and encouraging investment in progressive brand building.
  • Technology Integration: Actively champion and embed AI-driven strategic tools and proprietary platforms into the Brand Strategy workflow, ensuring our team is a first-adopter and active contributor to our firm’s AI roadmap.
  • Cultivate Trust: Build trusting partnerships across MERGE by educating stakeholders and demonstrating the value of the Brand Strategy offering. In this role, you will foster an environment of curiosity regarding culture and human behavior, while actively overseeing the professional development and strategic deployment of strategy staff.

Industry Authority & Thought Leadership

  • Drive the Conversation: Author and publish forward-thinking thought leadership pieces (white papers, articles) that challenge the status quo and elevate our agency’s reputation.
  • Trend Analysis: Simplify market complexity to provide a clear analysis of trends, translating them into opportunities that position our clients (and our agency) ahead of the curve.

These are the qualifications we're looking for

  • Experience: 12+ years of relevant professional experience, primarily at an agency, with at least 4+ years of Provider/Health Systems experience. Proven track record of achieving ambitious outcomes for companies ranging from agile start-ups to Fortune 100 organizations.
  • Provider & Health System Focus: Expert ability to apply strategic principles across complex health systems while navigating industry-specific nuances and regulatory landscapes.

Integrated Marketing Leadership: Proven expertise in architecting holistic strategies across a complex stakeholder ecosystem—including consumers, physicians, donors, the business community, and internal teams. You possess a deep ability to design seamless, multi-channel brand journeys that leverage digital experiences and segment-driven insights to ensure a cohesive and impactful brand presence.

  • Strategic Fluency: & Innovation: Mastery of the modern strategist’s toolkit, including audience definition, segmentation, and the authoring of insightful Creative Briefs. You are a progressive brand builder who innovates upon traditional approaches to drive business growth and measurable impact.
  • Commercial Acumen: Demonstrated ability to consult with C-suite clients on how to drive business impact, providing clear KPI definition and measurement frameworks that justify and invite continued investment.
  • Storytelling Mastery: An outstanding storyteller with a proven ability to marry complex data with compelling narratives to inspire, persuade, and drive creative excellence and client conviction.
  • Executive Presence: Strong ability to consult with senior clients and lead cross-functional teams 
  • Collaborative Leadership: Strong ability to enlist cross-functional teams to develop culturally relevant ideas. You believe true partnership is the key to the best outcomes.
  • Adaptability & AI Proficiency: Motivated by an entrepreneurial spirit and a high degree of adaptability in a changing industry. You possess a deep comfort with AI tools, using them to enhance your strategic workflow rather than replace it.

At MERGE, we’re committed to fostering an environment where our team members can thrive in both their careers and personal lives, ensuring they feel supported and empowered to succeed.

MERGE believes in transparency and equity. In accordance with state regulations, we’re proud to include salary ranges in our job postings to ensure fair compensation practices.

The salary range for this role is $164,000 - $197,000, based on the individual’s skills, experience, qualifications, location, and other relevant factors. The salary pay range is subject to change and may be modified at any time.  

MERGE is proud to invest in benefits that include meaningful Medical, Dental, Vision, Life Insurance, 401K, Lifestyle Spending Account, Employer Paid Life & Disability Insurance, Flexible Time off & Holidays plus many other benefits and rewards.

Applicants for employment in the US must have work authorization that does not now or in the future require sponsorship of a visa for employment authorization in the United States.

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And here’s how we live our values at MERGE

  • Ability. Mastering our craft
  • Agility. Delivering with a growth mindset
  • Humility. Collaborating for shared success

MERGE is proud to be an Equal Opportunity Employer

MERGE welcomes and celebrates diversity regardless of race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, veteran status or people with abilities. We believe that the more diverse we are, the more creative our work will be!

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