Account Director

Position: Account Director (AD)

Department: Account Services

Specific Titles and Responsibilities:

There are 3 titles that correspond to the position of Account Director:

• Associate Account Director
• Account Director
• Senior Account Director

The Associate Account Director has mastered project/account management skills and has the capability to execute the responsibilities and begin to establish the competencies outlined below (AD in training). This role may necessitate direct reports.

The Account Director is the client-facing lead responsible for executional oversight of an assigned book of work, ensuring that agency work remains consistent with client objectives and stays within established quality, budget, and timing parameters. Responsible for maintaining client satisfaction with a focus on execution of the tactical plan and identifying opportunities for efficiencies and improved team alignment. Responsible for maintaining day-to-day client/agency relationship. This role may necessitate direct reports.

The Senior Account Director is also client facing and has a proven record of not only independent execution of the AD responsibilities, but a successful track record of acquiring additional scope of work from current clients and the ability to successfully onboard, train, and coach others in the AD role. This role will have direct reports.

Position Overview:

Within the AD’s role, the primary responsibility is to partner with assigned clients to oversee all client deliverables, ensuring client objectives are met and projects are on time, within budget, and successfully executed. The AD has overall responsibility for managing and maintaining client relationships, potentially on multiple accounts, through focused attention to detail, team leadership, clear and concise communications, and the sense of urgency. The AD serves as the main point of contact for clients of all levels within the organization, including commercial, medical affairs, compliance, and regulatory teams.

The AD must have a thorough understanding of the client’s brands and therapeutic area from the strategic, marketing, and content/data perspectives as well as to understand and support their strategic goals and objectives. The AD is responsible for identifying and developing opportunities within the current accounts and to generate organic growth.

The AD manages direct reports (Account Managers or Project Managers) in the day-to-day execution of work, maintains communication with supervisor(s) on performance and/or areas of concern, provides mentorship and coaching, and creates and implements plans for their professional skill development.

The AD has had a record of success as a Senior Account Manager and has proven his/her abilities to manage multiple brands and/or accounts, effectively lead teams, and communicate with and develop employees on their team(s).

Core areas of responsibility include:

Client Focus & Service

• Serves as a point of contact for client/brand team
• Attends client/MLR review meetings in presenting new ideas/concepts or defend agency work
• Attends client strategy and launch meetings with AVP or senior leadership
• Provides on-site client/KOL/program management as needed
• Provides clear direction to team and cross functional departments and the resources in planning of initiatives
• Qualifies client needs and requests to ensure a clear understanding of the goals and objectives of a project
• Defines, recommends, and develops educational/promotional programs that are in line with the brand/product core strategic objectives as well as the brand’s position in its life cycle
• Oversees the implementation of projects and services, ensuring adherence to scope of work as defined in proposal and providing client with frequent status updates on progress and financial tracking. Ensures communication to the client is early and accurate if project is tracking late or over budget, or if scope of work has changed
• Provides clear and timely communication of client direction to entire team, outlining required next steps and/or deliverables based on the conversation
• Thinks broadly and globally to foresee any potential challenges and issues; provide recommendations and resolution to these issues before they become a crisis
• Proactively proposes concepts and ideas that will support the client’s core business objectives
• Thoroughly understands and enforces each client’s specified compliance and regulatory requirements; ensures that the Account Manager and/or Project Manager also understands and has a working knowledge, if applicable
• Has a thorough understanding of the brand and disease area, working closely with clinical services on content development efforts and key messaging
• Maintains client relationships through frequent correspondence and meetings
• Final sign off and approval of all materials before delivery to the client
• Be available and accessible
• Supports team in management of client by offering communication strategies for difficult situations and suggestions for proactive management of projects
• Ensures all services are delivered per contractual agreement
• Alerts supervisor(s) of any issues that may affect client relationships, deliverables, or budgets
• Thoroughly understands client process and key stakeholders for each process

Organic Growth/Business Development

• Identifies new business opportunities outside of current account through p-value current relationships or companies with pipeline products within p-value areas of expertise
• Develops proposals and budgets based on opportunities and/or as outcomes from new business pitches
• Works collaboratively with senior leadership on identifying new opportunities for expanding current business. Identify areas within account where there are unmet educational and promotional needs based on understanding of client brand strategy
• Stays informed on therapeutic area information by actively reading industry media; proactively send new and interesting information to client regarding competitive activity
• Be fully knowledgeable about client-specific compliance guidelines and offer recommendations and insight with regard to project-specific gaps in adherence

Team Leadership

• Performs with highest level of integrity and accountability and instills these values with the team and peers
• Leads and motivates team members so tasks are completed with the highest level of quality
• Includes team members in problem-solving and triaging issues to enforce commitment and accountability of each team member
• Provides mentorship and coaching to direct reports and creates and implements plans for their professional skill development
• Defines and documents performance goals for the upcoming year
• Engages direct reports throughout the development process, including regular coaching activities
• Writes and delivers annual performance evaluation for direct reports, reflecting employee progress and contributions throughout the year
• Engages in quarterly touch points with team to assess progress of development plan and provides summary report to supervisor(s)
• Works with supervisor(s) to develop management skill set and leadership style
• Defines onboarding plan for new hires before they arrive on the job and manages new hires based on the plan
• Ensures all team members understand the goals and objectives of a project
• Encourages and supports team members to move outside of their comfort zone by providing additional and varying levels of responsibility and tasks, while balancing guidance and autonomy
• Directs, mentors, and develops a team consisting of an Account Manager, Project Manager, and/or Project Coordinator, Meeting Planner, and Clinical Services
• Ensures all team members are fully versed on client compliance and regulatory requirements; ensures knowledge and compliance with industry guidelines
• Identifies gaps in team resources early and makes recommendations to their manager to meet program deliverables
• Demonstrates leadership through discussions and presentations to colleagues on relevant subjects
• Be available and accountable; takes responsibility for the team and projects
• Sets an example for willingness to pitch in and help the team; demonstrates a collaborative team dynamic and ability to gap fill as needed
• Manages and mentors direct reports in the day-to-day execution of work as well as professional growth within the organization
• Be available and accessible to internal team members and direct reports, including monthly/ bi-weekly check ins
• Maintains open lines of communication with Operations Team to ensure Project Coordinator growth and success

Business Knowledge/Operational Practices:

• Ensure full understanding of the company and the services we offer
• Ensure full understanding of medical education guidelines and requirements and standard drug life cycle
• Ensures project kick-off meeting and subsequent status meetings are productive and concluded with a recap of next steps, due dates, and assigned team responsibilities
• Ensures timelines are developed and followed
• Identifies and makes recommendations for process improvements; identifies areas to improve efficiency with the goal of gaining incremental profit
• Participates in internal “brainstorming sessions” of tactics, platforms, and solutions across agency account teams
• Shares best practices for account/project teams via meetings and presentations
• Follows agency standard operating procedures

Financial Accountability

• Responsible for the financial health of an account
• Develops scopes of work and budgets as required; ensures budgets are in line with scope of services throughout the project’s life cycle
• Manages the overall budgets for each project and advises client of any potential increases or overages in a timely manner; reviews periodic accounting reports of expenditures for each project
• Documents change in scope or added services and provides the client with an addendum/amendment; obtains client and management approval before proceeding with additional work
• Understands the payment provisions of each client and communicates to finance team during regular financial meetings
• Manages reconciliation process and ensures each is completed in a timely manner; provides necessary reconciliation documentation to client
• Keeps forecasting spreadsheet up to date and accurate with sold as well as proposed business opportunities; tracking fee vs pass-through costs
• Attends and leads invoicing meetings with finance department and any client finance meetings

Experience and Education:

Required

• A minimum of 6 year’s agency experience, with a minimum of 3 year’s account management experience in medical communications or client-side product management
• Solid comfort level with scientific information
• Travel as business requires
• Bachelor’s degree

Preferred

• Experience across multiple products, therapeutic categories, and client companies
• Experience managing direct reports