Sub Practice Lead (Financial Compliance)

The Opportunity

An exciting opportunity has become available to be part of our fast-growing team and to be a key part of the Client Services function. This role provides an outstanding opportunity to join a growing global integrated marketing advisory and will provide an ambitious individual with valuable experience for progression and development.

The Company

mediasense
is a global, independent advisor that brings the clarity, connection and confidence modern marketers need to fuel growth. We help marketers eliminate waste and maximize the impact of their most significant investments at scale. Our ambition is to define and own an entirely new category – recognized as the world’s most trusted, independent and impactful marketing advisor. We do this by elevating how clients operate, how agencies deliver, how platforms perform, and how all parts of the ecosystem connect. Because progress doesn’t happen in isolation, it takes alignment, intelligence, and trust. That’s what we enable. That’s what we stand for. That’s Unified Marketing Intelligence.

mediasense is designed around how we help marketers optimize and transform through best-in-class structure and governance (Organization), partners and platforms (Ecosystem), governance and controls (Assurance), and measurement and effectiveness (Science). We have the proven ability to effectively support large, complex organizations and deliver multiple projects simultaneously. As evidenced through our strong track record with clients, we pride ourselves on the consistent high quality of service delivery and the ability to accelerate transformation and growth.

mediasense and has over 200 employees across London, New York, Singapore and New Delhi.
For more information, visit www.media-sense.com

The Role

This role is for the Sub Practice Lead.
This role will report into the Media & Commercial Practice Lead.

Our financial audit practice is built on rigorous financial analysis, contract review, and audit methodologies, delivering industry-leading compliance audits designed to provide the highest levels of governance to advertisers over their marketing spend and agency fees. This role will be responsible for overseeing the delivery of our financial compliance audits for advertisers, and third-party verification audits for media owners, leading the Compliance team as well as directly managing client delivery for some of our largest clients.

The Sub Practice Lead owns “how” we deliver a service and ensures each product delivers measurable value, operates efficiently, and is consistently adopted across teams, markets, and clients. This is a client-facing role with responsibility for:

Auditing agency performance against client contracts as they apply to the financial and commercial aspects of marketing operations

Auditing media owner audience data and testing and reporting on processes and controls that underpin client commitments

Ensuring consistent and professional management of client financial audits

Leading the strategic development, oversight, and management of the financial compliance team

Building and maintaining strong working relationships with agencies and agency compliance teams in the delivery of the work

The role itself will involve a range of activities including:

Methodology & Ways of Working 

Develop the approach and methodology to deliver the outcomes and deliverables committed to our clients through our products for specific mediasense offerings

Deliver work against international audit standards where necessary e.g. ISRS 4400 revised

Develop and manage the standard ways of working including processes, roles, work allocation, and role location strategy for select products

Own and develops the capability (methods, people, ways of working, use of technology) used to create value through our products for our clients

Design and documents the operational blueprint for each product (methodologies, processes, templates)

Create and maintains best-practice playbooks and documentation to ensure global consistency

Partner with Practice Leads to ensure the product portfolio supports the practice’s strategic direction

Service Management

Oversee day-to-day delivery execution of financial compliance and third-party verification audits across teams and regions (US, EMEA, APAC)

Act as the primary point of contact for compliance audits, providing guidance to internal teams and external stakeholders

Manage client audit programmes, including creation of audit scopes, NDAs, and auditor/market engagement

Manage the consistency of process/project execution while continuously evaluating opportunities for improvement

Lead, manage (including line management), and coach a team (or several teams) of Project Leads

Oversee the quality of the work produced by the practice and its team members

Deliver select projects as a senior Project Lead, applying expertise to complex or high-value engagements as a “player coach”

Partner with the Practice Lead to oversee team chargeability and utilisation, using time-to-deliver data to guide operational and resourcing decisions, and manages resource allocation across client projects to ensure efficient delivery

Capability Enablement & Innovation

Work with the Practice Lead to support the evolution of our sub practice capability, identifying opportunities to improve the value, efficiency and scale of our offerings by defining and managing a capability roadmap

Work with the Practice Lead and Client Leads to monitor market changes and changes in client needs to identify changes in capability needed to serve our clients

Lead the growth of product capability across the organisation through structured training, documentation, onboarding, and enablement sessions that promote adoption and consistency

Partner closely with Technology & Innovation to enable and scale the service model by integrating automation, new tools, reporting, and data-driven insights into product workflows

The Candidate

The ideal candidate will have the following:

Chartered Accountant (ACA/ACCA/ICAS) or international equivalent, with strong financial acumen and analytical skills

8+ years of financial/commercial experience, ideally within agency, finance or audit environment

Preferred background in agency finance, commercial, compliance or internal audit teams, or audit experience at a professional accounting firm

Experience in contract management and client compliance audits is desired, with a proven ability to interpret and apply contract terms in practice (desired)

Excellent communication, stakeholder management and presentation skills, able to explain complex concepts clearly to diverse audiences (finance, procurement, marketing, senior stakeholders)

Experience in mentoring, developing, and training teams, with a focus on building capability and embedding knowledge of evolving industry practices

Organised with excellent project and time management skills; able to work under pressure and manage conflicting priorities

Strong interpersonal and negotiation skills, with the ability to build trusted long-term relationships and manage agency and client interactions effectively

Interest in the media and marketing industry and motivation to develop knowledge further

Demonstrable experience working across multiple markets, with proven exposure to global operations

Attention to detail and commitment to delivering high-quality outputs

What We Offer

Hybrid working

28 days holiday per year, up to a maximum of 32 days

Work from any location in the world up to 4 weeks per year

10 days Annual Leave Purchase per year

Day off for your birthday

Company bonus scheme

Pension

Private Healthcare

Employee Assistance programme

Group Life insurance

Annual season ticket loan

Cycle to work scheme

Eye test & contribution towards glasses for VDU

Employee Referral Bonus

New Business Bonus