Director, Marketing and Corporate Affairs at Absa Bank Limited

Job Summary

• The Director Marketing and Corporate Affairs plays a pivotal role in driving Absa Group’s ambition of being a leading pan African Financial Services Group in Kenya and in Africa.
• The role is responsible for brand, marketing, communications, and corporate relations excellence within Kenya and responsible for representing the local franchise at the Absa Group level. The individual will play a key role in the direct management of centrally held capabilities and in influencing the execution of brand, marketing, communications, and corporate relations strategies and campaigns within Absa Kenya.
• Through a business partnership approach, the role will provide best-practice strategic marketing, communication, and corporate relations support to the business, helping the organization to execute against its business objectives. The role will support Absa Kenya and its divisions in meeting business goals through optimizing investments in brand marketing, communications and corporate relations including leadership, integration of and accountability for those respective functions.
• The Director, Marketing requires a strong track record for successful brand and marketing campaigns with a clear focus on digital marketing. Stakeholder and reputation management are also critical success factors in this role.
• The role reports geographically to the Absa Kenya Consumer Banking Director and functionally to the Absa Regional Operations (ARO) Executive: Marketing and Corporate Relations.

Job Description

Key accountabilities/Deliverables/Outcomes:

Accountability:  Brand Development

• Understand, own, and bring to life the Absa brand strategy, its positioning and performance within Kenya through the three lenses of marketing, communications and corporate relations.
• Contribute to business growth through brand development and as a key member of the senior leadership team own the overall organizational responsibility for translating corporate and business unit’s requirements into brand, marketing & communications objectives.
• Lead development and execution of in-country marketing, communication, and corporate relations strategy via associated annual plans, jointly accountable to the Absa Regional Operations (ARO) Marketing and Corporate Relations function 
• Act as the Brand Custodian for the franchise internally and externally and develop content and campaigns that are on brand and on strategy, tailored appropriately to the business needs, the target audiences and the media channels.   
• Drive brand experience and campaigns that achieve the organizational goals of customer acquisition and customer value management.  
• Craft and execute a brand sponsorship strategy to drive brand love and significantly advance brand consideration. 
• Engage and energize team members around the role of brand and marketing.
• Be comfortable working within a broader pan-African business which entails close collaboration with a center team and other country Heads of Marketing

Accountability:  Commercial Objectives

• Responsible for ensuring the marketing, communications and corporate relations strategy and execution is focused on business growth.
• Working closely with Heads of Businesses locally and regionally, provide clear direction on the marketing and brand objectives for each of the Business Units,
• Develop a network of internal and external suppliers in the context of delivery of the marketing objectives including and not limited to sourcing and management of the various agency networks viz a viz Media Agency, Creative Agency, Digital Agency, Public Relation Agency among others. 
• Drive media and production buying value for the firm.

Accountability:  Media Relations and Reputation management

• Own all media relations objectives for the firm at Corporate and Business Unit level.
• Act as the custodian of the firm’s reputation management framework and coordinated firm-wide activities towards avoiding (and in the event effectively managing) reputational crisis. 

Accountability:  Relationship and Stakeholder Management

• Develop strong relationships with business stakeholders to ensure an understanding of commercial priorities and requirements for marketing and communications support.
• Manage relationships with key business divisions across Absa, supporting the development of cross division income opportunities and efficiency synergies.
• Develop highly effective relationships with key contacts in Legal and Compliance in order to facilitate smooth implementation of legal and regulatory changes.
• Maintain strong relationship with frontline contacts to ensure you have a good understanding of the best way to implement any product or service initiatives internally.
• Act the joint custodian of customer experience with the business units, specifically through owning the customer engagement events and plans.
• Work with colleagues across Africa to integrate and align marketing and corporate.
• relations plans to ensure Group objectives are achieved. 
• Build strong relationships with media, government, suppliers, and other key stakeholders.

Role/person specification

Preferred Qualification:

• Bachelor’s degree in Business, Brand, Marketing, Communication, or related field.

Preferred Experience:

• Working knowledge of international and specific operating environments, relating to a marketing, brand, communications, and corporate relations strategy
• Demonstrable experience (10 years or more) in brand, marketing and communications in a senior management role, operating in a multinational business.
• Strong track record for marketing campaigns that have delivered tangible results with a strong bias to digital marketing.
• Experience in reputation and crises management.
• An understanding of the Financial Industry is preferable.

Knowledge and Skills

• Detailed understanding of the external economic, political, legal and regulatory environment and its internal impacts on the region and Kenya
• In-depth understanding of Absa Group and the Absa Africa strategy, operating structure, and interfaces with other functions/Ability to operate at strategic level in ambiguous/dynamic environment would be beneficial.

Education

• Bachelor`s Degrees and Advanced Diplomas: Marketing (Required)