Director, Media Solutions - Platform Operations, UK

About WPP Media WPP is the trusted growth partner for the world’s leading brands. With exceptional talent, trusted data and intelligence, and world-class partnerships – all united by our pioneering agentic marketing platform, WPP Open – we help clients navigate change, capture opportunity, and deliver transformational growth. WPP Media is WPP's AI-driven media operating unit, bringing together media, data, and partnerships to deliver creative personalisation at scale. Connected through WPP Open and powered by Open Intelligence, clients see exactly where, how, and why their media investment is working. For more information, visit wppmedia.com. 3456 - Director, Media Solutions - Platform Operations, UK Role Summary and Impact The Director, Media Solutions - Platform Operations, UK is responsible for ensuring that solutions developed and released for the Solutions team are operationally ready, properly tested, clearly documented, effectively released, and provide support once live. The role acts as the bridge between delivery, business readiness and BAU operations. It supports the transition of work from project delivery into stable operational use, ensuring that users, stakeholders and support teams understand what has changed, how to use it, how to raise issues, and how ongoing support will be managed with appropriate priority, impact and SLAs This role is particularly important as Solutions Integration moves from a more reactive service model into a structured product and agile delivery function. The Platform Operations Director owns QA, release management, documentation, stakeholder communication, support processes, training, adoption and post-release improvement including BAU bugs and triage. The role works closely with Product Owners, Scrum Master, Engineering, Data, Reporting, QA, Platform Operations, and business stakeholders to make sure delivery does not stop at “built”, but continues through testing, launch, adoption, support and measurable operational value. Senior / Specialist-Level Expectations As a Director within the team, this role is expected to help define and improve the operating standards around BAU management, QA coordination, release readiness, business readiness and service transition. Manage and proactively manage risk, resolution SLAs and ensure we are adhering to platform operational best practices. The Platform Operations Director should be able to identify operational risks early, challenge whether a solution is genuinely ready for release, and recommend practical improvements to processes, documentation, testing, support models and stakeholder communications. For smaller initiatives, the role should be able to advise Product Owners and delivery teams on the appropriate level of QA, training, release planning, handover and BAU support required. For larger or more complex initiatives, the role should escalate risks, dependencies or readiness gaps to the Product Manager Lead, Scrum Master, Lead Engineer / Solutions Architect or relevant leadership stakeholders. Key Responsibilities 1. BAU Operations Management - Own and coordinate BAU operational processes for assigned platforms, tools, reports, workflows and solutions across all Media solutions. - Monitor recurring issues, support trends, operational risks and user pain points. - Triage and prioritise BAU requests, incidents, defects and enhancement requests. - Ensure BAU work is captured through the agreed intake and backlog process rather than unmanaged emails, verbal requests or fragmented ticket routes. - Work with Product Owners and the Scrum Master to distinguish between BAU support, defects, enhancements and new product requirements. - Maintain visibility of BAU demand and help identify where recurring issues should become product improvements or engineering fixes. - Support continuous improvement of support processes, documentation and operational workflows. This links directly to the team’s wider shift away from fragmented request routes and towards clearer delivery rhythms, structured backlogs and improved operational process discipline. The existing documentation notes the need for clearer team rhythms, sprint cadences, retrospectives and mentoring as part of the transition plan . 2. QA Coordination and Testing Readiness - Coordinate QA activity across delivery workstreams, ensuring testing requirements are understood before development begins. - Work with Product Owners to ensure acceptance criteria, test scenarios and success measures are clearly defined. - Support test planning across functional testing, regression testing, data validation, reporting checks and user acceptance testing. - Ensure defects are logged, prioritised, tracked and resolved through the agreed delivery process. - Work with engineers, analysts and business users to validate that solutions meet functional, operational and reporting requirements. - Support the creation of reusable QA checklists, test scripts and validation templates. - Ensure solutions are not released without appropriate testing evidence and business sign-off. This is consistent with the Product Owner responsibilities already defined around testing requirements, success criteria, UAT coordination, business validation, release readiness and operational handover . The Platform Operations Specialist would support and operationalise those activities. 3. Business Readiness and Adoption - Ensure business users and operational teams are ready to adopt new or changed solutions. - Coordinate training, guidance, demos, FAQs, release notes and user communications. - Work with Product Owners to identify impacted teams, users, processes and workflows. - Confirm that business teams understand what is changing, why it is changing, when it is happening and what action is required. - Support stakeholder communications before, during and after release. - Gather early feedback from users and ensure issues are captured and prioritised appropriately. - Help ensure delivered solutions are embedded into day-to-day operations, rather than remaining underused or misunderstood. The handover documentation highlights the importance of clear communication with users, proper release notes, demonstrations and adoption support for new features and solutions . This role should own the operational discipline around making that happen consistently. 4. Release Readiness and Service Transition - Own or coordinate release readiness checklists for assigned solutions. - Ensure each release has appropriate testing evidence, documentation, support ownership, training material and stakeholder communication. - Coordinate operational handover from delivery teams into BAU support. - Confirm that runbooks, troubleshooting guides, known issues and escalation routes are in place. - Work with engineering and data teams to ensure monitoring, alerting or manual checks are defined where required. - Support go-live planning, release scheduling and post-release hypercare. - Track post-release issues and ensure learnings are fed back into future delivery cycles. This role should become the person asking: “Are we actually ready to put this live, support it, explain it, and measure whether it worked?” 5. Documentation and Knowledge Management - Maintain clear operational documentation for platforms, reports, tools, processes and workflows. - Support the creation of user guides, SOPs, runbooks, release notes, FAQs and support documentation. - Ensure documentation is stored in the agreed location and kept up to date. - Work with Product Owners, engineers and analysts to document key dependencies, business rules, known limitations and support processes. - Help reduce reliance on individual knowledge by making processes and system behaviour transparent. - Support onboarding of new team members by maintaining accessible knowledge resources. This is important because the team is moving away from legacy ways of working and informal knowledge transfer into a more structured operating model. 6. Platform and Process Governance - Support the consistent use of agreed tools, workflows, ticketing processes and delivery governance. - Help ensure work is captured, categorised and progressed through the correct routes. - Maintain standards for BAU tickets, defects, release requests, support issues and operational change. - Identify process gaps, duplicated effort or inconsistent ways of working. - Recommend improvements to BAU processes, support models, QA standards and release governance. - Support reporting on operational performance, support demand, defect trends and release readiness. - Help ensure changes are controlled, documented and aligned to agreed team practices. This aligns with the documented need to improve proactive behaviour, structured product management, backlog grooming, stand-ups and retrospectives across the team . 7. Stakeholder and Cross-Team Coordination - Work closely with Product Owners, Engineering, Data, Reporting, QA, Scrum Master and business users. - Coordinate with Activation, Operations, Channel Development, Commercial and other impacted teams where relevant. - Ensure operational dependencies are understood and managed before release. - Help stakeholders understand support routes, known issues, timelines and release impacts. - Escalate operational risks, unresolved defects, readiness gaps or business adoption concerns. - Support regular BAU and platform operations updates for leadership where required. The existing Product Owner documentation already describes the importance of coordination across engineering, data, reporting, platform, operations and business teams . The Platform Operations Specialist should provide the operational control layer that supports this. Skills and Experience Essential - Experience in platform operations, service transition, QA coordination, business readiness, delivery operations or technical operations. - Strong understanding of BAU support processes, release management and operational handover. - Experience coordinating UAT, defect tracking, test planning or business validation activity. - Ability to create clear documentation, user guides, process notes, release communications and operational runbooks. - Strong stakeholder management skills, with the ability to work across technical and non-technical teams. - Good understanding of agile or product-led delivery environments. - Ability to identify operational risks, readiness gaps, support issues and process improvements. - Strong organisational skills and attention to detail. - Confident using Jira, Confluence, ServiceNow, Azure DevOps or similar delivery/support tooling. - Ability to communicate clearly with users, delivery teams and senior stakeholders. Desirable - Experience working in media, advertising, ad tech, martech, reporting, data or platform environments. - Experience supporting reporting platforms, dashboards, data products or operational workflow tools. - Understanding of data validation, reporting QA or campaign performance data. - Familiarity with cloud-based platforms such as GCP, AWS, BigQuery or Snowflake. - Experience working with engineering, data engineering or analytics teams. - Experience supporting transformation from reactive support models into structured product or agile delivery models. - Familiarity with WPP, WPP Media, Choreograph or similar enterprise platform environments would be beneficial. Life at WPP Media & Benefits Our passion for shaping the next era of media is powered by our commitment to Be Extraordinary, investing in our employees to inspire transformational creativity. We also Lead Optimistically, firmly believing in and Championing Growth and Development for every individual. This commitment allows WPP Media employees to leverage the extensive global WPP Media & WPP networks to pursue their passions, build vital professional connections, and learn at the cutting edge of marketing and advertising. We Create an Open environment built on trust and respect, where everyone feels they belong and has opportunities to progress. This inclusive culture is fostered through a variety of employee resource groups and frequent in-office events showcasing team wins, sharing thought leadership, and celebrating holidays and milestone events. Our comprehensive benefits package reflects this commitment, including competitive medical, group retirement plans, vision, and dental insurance, significant paid time off, preferential partner discounts, and employee mental health awareness days. WPP Media is an equal opportunity employer and considers applicants for all positions without discrimination or regard to characteristics. We believe the best work happens when we're together, fostering creativity, collaboration, and connection in this open and supportive environment. That's why we’ve adopted a hybrid approach, with teams in the office around four days a week. If you require accommodations or flexibility, please discuss this with the hiring team during the interview process. Please note that while our philosophy is the same across WPP, benefits may vary by office/country. Please note this is a UK based role and requires individuals to have the right to work in this location Please read our Privacy Notice (https://www.wppmedia.com/pages/privacy-policy) for more information on how we process the information you provide. While we appreciate all applications received, only those candidates selected for an interview will be contacted. #LI-Promoted Please read our Privacy Notice for more information on how we process the information you provide.