Director, Research & Development

Required

• 10+ years in audience research, insights, or marketing strategy inside a major media company, network, publisher, or agency — including a minimum of two years at the Director or senior-manager level leading work end to end.
• Demonstrated ComScore and Nielsen competency. Able to build, defend, and challenge audience claims using these tools without translation.
• Fluency with the broader research stack, including MRI-Simmons, GWI, social listening platforms, and first-party or behavioral analytics.
• Hands-on experience designing and fielding primary research, including quantitative surveys, qualitative studies, and audience segmentation work.
• Track record of building or scaling proprietary research assets — research communities, panels, or insight platforms — that produced ongoing first-party value to a commercial organization.
• Experience leading custom or syndicated intelligence engagements on behalf of advertiser or partner briefs, end to end.
• A portfolio of work that converted a data set into a commercial outcome: a pitch won, a category opened, or a narrative that became the house point of view.
• Outstanding presentation craft. Decks that read and look like they came from a major media company, not a research vendor; comfort presenting at every level from agency planner to CMO.
• A synthesizer’s instinct. The ability to hold multiple data sets, stakeholder agendas, and a CMO-level question in mind simultaneously, and return with the single insight that answers them.
• Comfort operating in a lean, global, fast-paced environment, with an ownership mindset and a strong bias toward action.

Highly Valued

• Background in sports media, automotive, or endemic enthusiast categories.
• Experience working in or with luxury, automotive, watches, finance, or travel categories on the brand side.
• Familiarity with social, programmatic, addressable, retail media, or first-party audience products and how they show up in a pitch.
• Experience supporting global sales teams, with an emphasis on the US and UK.

Compensation

$120K to $140K - Compensation package will depend on experience and training.