Group Director Strategy - RTCDP Consultant

Who We Are

VML, part of WPP, is a leading creative company that combines brand experience, customer experience, and commerce, creating connected brands to drive growth. VML is celebrated for its innovative and human first, award-winning work for blue chip client partners including AstraZeneca, Colgate-Palmolive, Dell, Ford, Microsoft, Nestlé, The Coca-Cola Company, and Wendy's. The agency is recognized by the Forrester Wave Reports, as a Leader among Marketing Creative and Content Service Providers, Commerce Services, Global Digital Experience Services, Global Marketing Services and, most recently, Marketing Measurement & Optimization.

In addition, VML's specialist health network, VML Health, is one of the world's largest and most awarded health agencies. VML's global network is powered by 26,000 talented people across 55+ markets, with principal offices in Kansas City, New York, Detroit, London, São Paulo, Shanghai, Singapore, and Sydney.

About WPP

WPP is the trusted growth partner for the world's leading brands. We unite cutting-edge media intelligence and data solutions, world-class creativity, next-generation production, transformative enterprise solutions and expert strategic counsel in a single company - powered by exceptional talent and our agentic marketing platform, WPP Open, to help our clients navigate change, capture opportunity and deliver transformational growth. For more information, visit

About the Role

We are looking for a Group Director, Martech Consulting to lead VML's Adobe Real-Time Customer Data Platform (RTCDP) practice as its most senior strategic and technical authority. This is a high-impact, high-visibility role at the forefront of one of the fastest-growing capability areas in enterprise marketing technology.

As Group Director, you will own the end-to-end strategic vision and technical governance of RTCDP engagements - spanning identity resolution, audience architecture, data ingestion, destination activation, and privacy compliance. You will bring the data engineering acumen to govern complex CDP implementations and the leadership presence to shape how clients invest in and scale their customer data capabilities.

This role sits at the intersection of data architecture, marketing strategy, and enterprise consulting - and represents a genuine opportunity to define how VML delivers one of the most in-demand capabilities in the market.

This position requires a minimum of 4 days per week in-office to support team collaboration and development, with travel to client sites as required.

The Impact You'll Make

* Define and lead VML's strategic approach to Adobe RTCDP across enterprise client engagements

* Serve as the most senior RTCDP voice at VML - advising clients, leading pitches, and shaping practice direction

* Architect and govern enterprise-scale customer data platforms that drive measurable business outcomes

* Build and develop a specialist team of CDP consultants and data-focused architects

* Contribute directly to business growth - identifying new opportunities, leading proposals, and deepening existing client relationships

* Establish VML as a recognised leader in Adobe RTCDP delivery and thought leadership

Core Responsibilities

Strategic Leadership & Client Advisory

* Define and own the strategic vision for RTCDP engagements across VML's enterprise client portfolio

* Act as the primary senior advisor to VP, Director, and C-suite client stakeholders on CDP strategy, data investment priorities, and platform roadmap

* Lead executive-level workshops and strategy sessions - translating complex data challenges into clear, actionable technology recommendations

* Develop compelling business cases and ROI frameworks that articulate the value of RTCDP investment to senior client decision-makers

* Build and maintain trusted, long-term client relationships that position VML as a strategic partner in customer data capability

CDP Architecture & Technical Governance

* Lead the end-to-end architecture and governance of Adobe RTCDP implementations at enterprise scale

* Define standards and best practices for identity resolution strategy - including identity graph design, namespace management, and profile stitching across known and unknown customers

* Own the data ingestion architecture - designing and overseeing batch and streaming pipelines that bring together first-party, second-party, and third-party data sources into unified customer profiles

* Lead the design and governance of XDM schema frameworks aligned to enterprise data strategy and downstream activation requirements

* Define audience segmentation architecture - including segment taxonomy, profile attribute strategy, and real-time vs. batch segmentation approaches

* Govern destination activation strategy - overseeing the configuration of paid media, owned channel, and partner destinations to ensure accurate, timely, and compliant audience delivery

* Establish and enforce technical governance standards across all RTCDP environments - covering data quality,…