Vice President, Program Manager - Digital Transformation

Company description

Heartbeat is a full-service agency for healthcare Challenger Brands. Challengers are playing a high-stakes game—they must battle behemoth market leaders, upend ingrained treatment habits, or transform a “me-too” product into “yes-please.”

The agency is known for serving up distinctive strategies and differentiating approaches, ensuring clients’ market positions are uniquely owned. Heartbeat designs their organization around a 100% integration model, housing media, strategy, med comms, creative, technology, and even point of care/population health under the same roof for the tightest, most integrated campaigns possible. They price work based on outcomes, not outputs. Their innovative model delivers not only alignment, but powerful orchestration, greater efficiency, and maximum impact for every dollar spent—all the necessary elements for Challengers to triumph.

That’s the philosophy, here’s the creds: 250+ employees between NYC & LA; 6 agency leaders with decades of tenure; a pile of awards from the likes of the Mannys, MM&M Awards, OMMAs, and Clios; an industry-leading commitment to diversity and inclusion (with a Med Ad News D&I Champion nod to match); and a President who dared to be quoted as saying, “We celebrate people who stand up and say, ‘You know what?

This is dumb.' Damn straight.

The VP, Program Management – Digital Transformation leads the end‑to‑end orchestration of a multi‑phased transformation initiative spanning both Client internal capability builds and Heartbeat’s operating model and delivery of work enabled by those new capabilities. This role ensures alignment, governance, and executional excellence across client teams, agencies, and technology partners.

This is a high-impact, highly visible leadership role with the opportunity to shape how Heartbeat and Publicis Health deliver transformation work across healthcare clients including :

• Governance of this large client transformation project
• Cross‑enterprise orchestration
• Agency operating and delivery design
• Change‑management leadership across client and agency teams

Location:

New York, NY (Hybrid)

Program & PMO Leadership

• Define and govern RACI development, program standards, operating models, and workflows across Client, Publicis Health, and Heartbeat teams
• Establish shared delivery frameworks and KPIs that align internal client processes with agency execution requirements
• Serve as a central source of guidance and clarity on process, execution quality, and delivery metrics
• Support process documentation, training, and onboarding across both organizations to ensure alignment and consistent adoption

Program Oversight & Execution

• Lead end‑to‑end delivery of a multi‑workstream transformation program spanning commercial, CXI, IT, data, creative, etc
• Ensure program stays aligned with strategic goals, with clear dependencies, handoffs, and decision pathways
• Drive structured risk, issue, and dependency management, including escalation routines and cross‑functional alignment
• Manage and forecast program resource and capacity requirements, ensuring alignment with budget
• Coordinate with Business Manager to maintain fiscal oversight and proactively address project health, scope, and financial risks

Digital Transformation Enablement

• Partner with client platform owners (CMS, DAM, data, identity, etc) and Publicis Health & Heartbeat teams to ensure technical and operational readiness
• Translate business and transformation goals into executable programs with clear inputs and dependencies

Cross-Agency & Partner Collaboration

• Work across Client, Heartbeat, and Publicis Health partners to align resources, processes, and delivery approaches
• Coordinate with production/delivery teams to ensure smooth program execution
• Improve communication and collaboration across teams to reduce friction and duplication

Client-Facing Program Leadership

• Serve as the senior program partner for client executives, supporting decision‑making, prioritization, and issue resolution
• Establish clear communication rhythms across sponsors, SMEs, and delivery teams
• Help clients navigate cross‑functional governance, ensuring program advances efficiently

Leadership &…