Sr Manager Implementation Planning & Activation

Role Summary and Impact

Your Global Media Career, Centred in Malaysia. Join WPP Media’s Regional Operations Centre (ROC) in Kuala Lumpur, our dynamic hub for delivering world-class media operations and strategy to global clients.

 Here, you will not just support, but influence. Working on a portfolio of international accounts, you'll tackle the kind of complex, multi-market campaigns that define a career. You will be part of a high-energy, multicultural team, collaborating with WPP experts across the region and gaining direct exposure to global best practices in media, data, and technology.

 WPP Media is channelling significant investment into our people, processes, and AI capabilities right here in Malaysia. Joining the ROC at this foundational stage means you will be at the core of our regional growth. This is more than a job; it's a launchpad for your global career.

The Senior Manager, Cross-Channel Implementation & Activation is a senior delivery role responsible for the overall quality, consistency, and strategic direction of implementation planning and campaign activation across a larger client portfolio. Working within a pod structure, you operate with a high degree of autonomy — owning the end-to-end campaign workflow, setting the standard for implementation best practice, and serving as the escalation point for complex delivery challenges within your pod.

You work closely with your Director and collaborate across client servicing, planning, and specialist teams to ensure every campaign is planned with rigour, activated with precision, and reported with clarity. Your seniority is reflected not through layers of management but through the depth of your expertise, the scale of your accountability, and your ability to drive quality and innovation across a broader portfolio.

Responsibilities

Brief Management & Planning

• Review incoming briefs from the client servicing team, ensure all gaps and questions are addressed, and confirm the brief is ready for planning.
• Lead the end-to-end implementation planning process across the portfolio — overseeing Senior Executive output, reviewing plans at each stage, and ensuring strategic alignment throughout.
• Serve as the quality gate on implementation plans before they are shared with client servicing for client distribution — ensuring accuracy, strategic cohesion, and consistency with agreed objectives.
• Receive consolidated client feedback, direct plan revisions with the Senior Executive, and ensure updated plans are returned promptly to client servicing.
• Communicate plan approvals from client servicing to the Senior Executive and ensure the team is ready to move to build.
• Set and continuously refine implementation planning standards and frameworks across the pod, ensuring a consistently high-quality approach.

Campaign Build, Activation & QA

• Receive campaign structure from client servicing, ensure the team is fully briefed, and confirm SLA timelines are in place and achievable.
• Maintain oversight of campaign build progress, staying informed of any risks to delivery or timelines and acting swiftly to resolve them.
• Check budgets across all active campaigns to ensure full alignment with the approved media plan before going live.
• Conduct final QA review and sign-off on all campaign builds before previews are passed to client servicing for client review.
• Receive client approval or feedback from client servicing, coordinate all required changes with the team, and confirm final campaign activation.
• Serve as the escalation point for complex QA issues, activation discrepancies, or delivery challenges within the pod.

Optimisation & Performance

• Maintain a portfolio-level view of campaign pacing, performance, and delivery risks — proactively identifying issues and directing the team to address them.
• Lead in-flight optimisation decisions across accounts, ensuring campaigns are consistently delivering against client KPIs.
• Drive a structured testing culture within the pod — championing experimentation across channels, formats, audiences, and bidding strategies, and ensuring learnings inform future planning.
• Conduct the final review and sign-off on all performance and post-campaign reports before they are shared with client servicing, ensuring reports are insightful, accurate, and go beyond surface-level metrics.

Platform & Innovation

• Maintain expert-level knowledge across key platforms — programmatic, paid social, paid search, and emerging channels — and act as the senior platform authority within the pod.
• Lead engagement with media partners, platform representatives, and WPP Media's internal product teams to identify innovations and new capabilities relevant to client needs.
• Drive the adoption of new platforms, betas, and activation approaches across the pod, keeping the agency ahead of the curve.

Client & Stakeholder Engagement

• Engage with clients on escalated delivery matters, complex planning questions, and senior performance conversations — providing clear direction and senior-level assurance.
• Partner with client servicing leads to ensure the pod is well-aligned with client expectations across all accounts.
• Contribute to QBRs, planning presentations, and senior client meetings where implementation expertise and campaign performance insight is required.

Team & Collaboration

• Provide day-to-day direction and guidance to the Senior Executive within the pod, supporting their development through clear feedback and coaching in the flow of work.
• Collaborate closely with client servicing, planning, data, and specialist teams to ensure seamless delivery across the full campaign lifecycle.
• Contribute positively to broader team initiatives, best practice sharing, and ways of working improvements across the implementation and activation function.

Finance & Compliance

• Ensure all bookings, loadings, budget reconciliations, proforma checks, and billing processes across the pod are completed accurately and on time.
• Maintain full financial compliance across active accounts and escalate discrepancies promptly.

 

Skills and Experience

• 6–8 years of media agency experience with a strong background in implementation planning and campaign activation.
• Proven ability to independently own and elevate implementation planning and activation output across a broader client portfolio.
• Expert-level platform knowledge across multiple channels — programmatic (DV360, The Trade Desk), paid social (Meta, TikTok, LinkedIn, Snapchat), paid search (Google Ads, SA360), and ad serving (CM360, Flashtalking).
• Track record of setting implementation standards and driving consistent quality across a team or portfolio.
• Comfortable engaging with senior clients and internal stakeholders on complex delivery, planning, and performance matters.
• Strong commercial awareness — able to connect campaign performance to client business outcomes.
• Excellent analytical and problem-solving skills — comfortable operating at portfolio level and diving into detail when required.
• Strong communicator — able to represent the pod credibly in senior forums and client settings.
• A balance of strategic thinking and hands-on delivery — equally at home shaping a planning framework as resolving an in-flight issue.
• Genuine passion for platforms, innovation, and staying ahead of the media landscape.

 

 

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, 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.