Research Director - Client Side

Job Description

Research Director

Client Side | Strategic Insights & Research

Hybrid – Central London

Unlimited Annual Leave

A globally recognised business is looking for a Research Director to join its growing in-house strategy and insights function. This is a high impact role focused on helping shape the organisation’s research capability, insight frameworks, and strategic decision making through strong, commercially focused execution.

Working within a collaborative and forward thinking team, you’ll lead and deliver complex research programmes that support business performance, audience understanding, and portfolio wide strategic planning across a large network of brands and events.

You’ll take ownership of key insight programmes from end to end, from research design and stakeholder management through to delivery, synthesis, storytelling, and implementation.

A major focus of the role will be managing and evolving large scale tracking and event insight programmes across a portfolio of 40+ events, ensuring outputs remain commercially valuable, operationally effective, and strategically aligned across the wider business.

The role combines:

• Strategic research leadership
• Hands on project delivery and execution
• Stakeholder management
• Agency management
• Team leadership

You’ll manage and mentor a direct report while partnering closely with stakeholders across multiple teams and markets.

Success in this role will require someone who is highly organised, detail oriented, commercially minded, and able to make smart decisions around prioritisation, resource allocation, and when to focus on macro-level trends versus individual event performance.

• Lead quantitative and mixed methodology research projects from briefing through to delivery and implementation
• Oversee large-scale tracking programmes, post event research initiatives, and portfolio wide benchmarking projects
• Manage multiple concurrent project streams while maintaining high standards of execution and attention to detail
• Translate complex datasets into clear, commercially actionable recommendations
• Consolidate multiple data sources into cohesive insight frameworks that support strategic planning
• Partner with external research agencies to ensure high quality delivery, consistency, and efficiency across programmes
• Drive continuous improvement of survey design and reporting frameworks to ensure comparability and alignment across global teams
• Support the evolution of audience measurement, social listening, and performance tracking capabilities
• Develop reporting approaches that help identify portfolio wide trends, opportunities, and strategic priorities
• Partner closely with stakeholders across the business, presenting findings clearly and confidently
• Manage and mentor a direct report, providing guidance, structure, and development support
• Act as a proactive research and insights partner to the wider business, identifying opportunities for improvement and innovation

• Strong experience within research and insights, ideally in media, entertainment, consumer, agency, or related sectors
• Excellent quantitative research foundations, particularly across tracking studies, ad hoc research, and large scale insight programmes
• Proven ability to manage multiple projects simultaneously in a fast paced environment
• Strong executional capability with excellent organisation, prioritisation, and attention to detail
• Comfortable being hands on across project delivery while maintaining a strategic commercial perspective
• Experience managing external research agencies and multiple stakeholder groups
• Strong stakeholder management and communication skills, with the confidence to navigate complexity and competing priorities
• Experience synthesising multiple data sources into clear strategic narratives
• Experience managing or mentoring junior team members
• Exposure to methodologies and tools such as Max Diff, conjoint, qualitative research, social listening, Tableau, or meta analysis would be advantageous, but are not essential
• Familiarity with social listening platforms such as Brandwatch, Sprinklr, or Talkwalker is beneficial
• Curious, proactive, adaptable, and…