Program Manager | Account Management | Ogilvy Africa

Role Summary:

Our Program Managers are essential to delivering value to our clients by passionately and professionally representing the agency on a day-to-day basis. As trusted partners and primary points of contact for junior to mid-level clients, they collaborate with account leadership to ensure operational discipline, delivery excellence, speed to market, resource optimization, and profitability management across their assigned business(es).

Program Managers are strategic thinkers and efficient operators who demonstrate strong planning capabilities, commercial acumen, and financial expertise. They are organized and accountable leaders who foster collaboration across teams and leverage Ogilvy’s diverse capabilities to deliver impactful results. They go beyond simply addressing immediate client requests, striving to understand and solve larger business challenges.

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Key Responsibilities:

• Serve as the primary day-to-day project contact and collaborator with stakeholders, creative teams, specialists, and external agency partners.
• Own and manage project workflows, including data entry, reporting, and utilization of project management systems.
• Oversee individual brand objectives within the DigiTribe-Feed program, ensuring timely project planning, execution, and monitoring completion rates to deliver projects on schedule.
• Provide clear briefs aligned with brand objectives to internal teams, enabling the development of effective content marketing strategies, community-building initiatives, measurement frameworks, and optimization plans.
• Identify potential risks, develop contingency plans, and ensure alignment with strategic goals.
• Advocate for efficiency, quality, and the agency-client relationship while driving integrated teams toward actionable results.
• Present work effectively from a delivery standpoint, showcasing progress and outcomes.
• Collaborate with project leads to define staffing and scoping requirements, ensuring optimal allocation of resources for achieving program goals.
• Champion compliance with the Diageo Digital Code and Marketing Code alongside community managers, content managers, and program teams.
• Partner with external agencies and third-party suppliers to fulfill briefs and meet business needs.
• Track campaign-specific KPIs to measure success and contributions to brand vision, optimizing where necessary.
• Foster team effectiveness through trust, communication, collaboration, diversity, engagement, and productivity.
• Build strong relationships across departments, respecting each role in delivering great work.
• Identify new initiatives and opportunities that align with overall team goals and contribute to strategic objectives.
• Adapt to changing circumstances, such as shifts in marketing conditions or emerging opportunities, and make informed decisions against the strategy.

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Role Requirements:

• Experience: 3–5 years of client-facing industry experience managing the creation and delivery of high-quality work; exposure to at least three different capabilities (e.g., B2C, CPG, digital, tech, influence).
• Knowledge: Demonstrable understanding of client and agency operations, with working knowledge of Ogilvy’s capabilities.
• Skills:
  • Strong project management skills, including scoping, resource planning, and execution, with proficiency in using project management tools.
  • Proven negotiation skills and ability to form strong client relationships.
  • Developing commercial abilities, business acumen, and financial expertise.
  • Ability to track KPIs and optimize performance against strategic goals.
• Attributes:
  • Curious and committed to lifelong learning.
  • A good listener with emotional intelligence, capable of reading people and adapting communication styles accordingly.
  • Calm, confident presence with accountability for results.
  • Collaborative mindset, fostering strong internal relationships, particularly with creative teams.

 Company Overview – Ogilvy Africa

Ogilvy Africa is the largest network agency on the continent catering to 39 countries with a team of ~900 people across Central, East and West Africa. Headquartered in Nairobi - Kenya, Ogilvy Africa manages a portfolio of over 100 brands for clients such as AB Inbev, Airtel, Africa CDC, Coca-Cola, Diageo, Distell, Equity Bank, Exxon Mobil, Kenya Airways, Mondelez, NCBA, Nestle, Philips, PWC, SAB Miller, Sanlam, Total, UNICEF, Unilever and WWF amongst others.

It offers services across the full spectrum of marketing domains including Communication (Advertising, branding and content), Experience (Technology & e-Commerce), Growth Consulting (incl. Digital Transformation), PR & Influence and Media; all under one unified setup. The agency has also created proprietary marketing products in areas such as real-time marketing, social intelligence, virtual experiences, influencer management, e-commerce enablement and content hubs. It’s unique operating model, One Ogilvy, allows clients and brands to cut the complexity of agency structures and create seamless omni-channel experiences for their consumers, across touchpoints. Fueled by the holy trinity of content, data and technology; Ogilvy Africa strives to be the best-practice agency model, for Developing & Emerging markets.

With 20+ years in Africa, Ogilvy Africa has won the highest number of regional and global awards for the region including Cannes Lions, Clio awards, Dubai Lynx Festival, SABRE Awards (Global and Africa); to name a few.

Ogilvy is a leading global creative network of WPP, founded by David Ogilvy in 1948.

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Beliefs at Ogilvy

1. Continuous Growth: Talent must evolve constantly to stay relevant.
2. Practitioners First: We contribute before we comment.
3. Creativity Redefined: Creativity now includes Data, Content, and Technology.
4. Diversity Strengthens Us: New skills and leadership styles make us better.
5. Collaboration Over Competition: Partnering with experts helps us scale faster.
6. Team Success: Teams succeed; individuals don’t.
7. Fail Fast, Learn Faster: Experiment, learn, and innovate quickly.