Vice President, Operations, Network Operations, Governance & Finance

Zenith is one of Publicis Groupe’s largest media agencies, spanning 95 markets globally with US offices in New York, Burbank, Chicago, Atlanta and Detroit. For more than 30 years, we have been at the forefront of media, helping to evolve and reshape the industry. We are highly regarded as a true agency partner by many high-profile brands for our expertise across numerous categories and wide range of capabilities that are unparalleled in the industry. Clients hire us for our track record of excellence in strategic planning, investment, and measurement. We also have specialist offerings, including content, commerce, multicultural and future-proofed data capabilities.

Overview

About the opportunity

PepsiCo is establishing a connected Above Market media operating model with Publicis as its global agency partner. The team will translate PepsiCo’s enterprise standards into a practical, repeatable global-to-local system, enabling specialist capabilities and markets to operate together with clear ownership, efficient workflows and transparent performance. The ambition is to build once, deploy everywhere, and reduce duplicate work rather than add another approval layer.

Role purpose

Lead the design and ongoing operation of the Above Market governance system connecting PepsiCo’s COE, International Beverages (IB), International Foods (IF), Publicis specialist teams, performance hubs and markets. This VP turns an agreed operating model into explicit responsibilities, service standards, decision pathways and a dependable rhythm of business. The role owns the connective “Big O” operating system, not the specialist “small o” execution within each capability.

The role also leads the design and coordination of the global financial operating model, including billing and purchase order (PO) workflows, media authorizations, financial forecasting, market-level aggregation and consolidated financial visibility, in partnership with specialist Finance and Investment teams.

Responsibilities

• Operating-model architecture and decision rights
• Translate PepsiCo’s approved operating model into end-to-end RACI, service catalogs, responsibility boundaries and handoffs across COE, IB/IF, Publicis and markets.
• Define the practical interface between global capability design, regional/hub support and local market planning, investment and activation, preserving PepsiCo and market decision rights.
• Develop a decision tree for mandatory global standards, local flexibility, exceptions, approvals and escalation, including turnaround times and accountable owners.
• Governance and integrated delivery
• Establish cross-capability governance forums, agendas, escalation protocols, decision logs and a single rhythm of business.
• Maintain an integrated dependency register, milestone tracker, issue log and cross-functional delivery status, separating January 2027 readiness from longer-term transformation.
• Create common service standards and SLAs for key requests and handoffs; track compliance and recurrent blockers.
• Partner with finance, data, measurement, investment and strategy leads to consolidate delivery, risk and value visibility without duplicating their specialist operations.
• Finance Operations and global financial governance
• Lead the design, standardization and governance of billing, PO and media authorization processes across the PepsiCo media network, including approval responsibilities, documentation, control points and escalations.
• Establish a consistent financial forecasting and market submission process, including cadence, required inputs, variance commentary, reconciliation handoffs and clear accountability for data quality.
• Coordinate financial aggregation across markets and capabilities to support consolidated global financial visibility, working with PepsiCo Finance, Publicis Finance, investment and market finance teams.
• Define the financial operations RACI, reporting definitions, exception handling and operational controls, ensuring processes align with existing Finance policies and contractual requirements.
• Partner with the Market Enablement VP to deploy financial workflows and support market adoption, training and compliance; resolve systemic process issues and escalate finance-policy decisions to authorized owners.
• Translate global financial visibility requirements into reporting specifications and workflow needs, without assuming ownership of transactional billing, statutory accounting or financial approvals.
• Partnership and continuous improvement
• Work directly with PepsiCo Network Operations leaders and Publicis operations leadership to resolve structural issues and clarify operating responsibilities.
• Surface recurring market exceptions and recommend process or standard changes for PepsiCo approval.
• Translate operational requirements into workflows and data requirements for Marcel and adjacent tools; partner with technology owners rather than owning the platform.
• Lead process improvement based on cycle time, repeat issues, service performance and stakeholder feedback.
• Core deliverables
• Approved global-to-local operating model and cross-capability RACI, including IB/IF and market interfaces
• Network Operations governance charter, decision rights matrix and escalation/exception decision tree
• Integrated rhythm-of-business calendar and forum/decision log
• Cross-capability service catalog, handoff standards and SLA register
• Single dependency, risk, issue and milestone register with January 2027 readiness view
• Integrated operational performance dashboard requirements and quarterly improvement backlog
• Global billing, PO and media authorization process maps, operating procedures and control/approval matrix
• Standardized financial forecasting calendar, market submission requirements and aggregation/reconciliation handoffs
• Global financial visibility reporting requirements, data definitions, exception dashboard and governance cadence
• Financial operations RACI, escalation pathways and market compliance/exception reporting framework
• Measures of success
• Decision and escalation cycle time; closure of cross-capability dependencies
• SLA adherence, handoff quality and repeat-issue reduction
• Governance cadence adherence, decision-log completeness and on-time critical milestones
• Reduction in duplicate requests, reports and unnecessary market coordination
• Timeliness and completeness of market financial submissions and global rollups
• PO and authorization compliance, billing process exceptions and financial issue resolution time
• Forecast reporting consistency, reconciliation quality and visibility of unresolved variances
• 8+ years of agency or client-side media operations, global account operations, transformation or operating-model leadership, with substantial senior stakeholder exposure.
• Demonstrated experience designing and operating RACIs, governance forums, service models, SLAs and escalation mechanisms across complex matrix organizations.
• Working understanding of integrated media planning, investment, data, measurement and activation sufficient to orchestrate specialists without replacing them.
• Strong written process design, facilitation, program management and executive communication skills.
• Experience leading multi-market change and resolving tensions between enterprise standards and local market needs.
• Hands-on leadership of multi-market media financial operations, including billing and PO workflows, media authorizations, forecast coordination and global reporting.
• Ability to partner effectively with Finance controllers and investment leaders, with sound understanding of financial controls, reconciliation, data governance and approval boundaries.

Preferred experience

• Global media agency-of-record transition or large multinational client experience
• Experience translating process designs into workflow tooling and automation
• Familiarity with enterprise finance/value reporting and operational dashboards

Role boundaries and working relationships

This is an Above Market Publicis operations role partnering with PepsiCo Network Operations and capability owners. PepsiCo retains enterprise direction, standards and material approvals; specialist capability teams retain their technical/functional operations; markets retain local business, investment, planning and execution decisions. This VP enables connection, consistency and execution across those groups. This VP owns financial process orchestration and global visibility requirements, while authorized PepsiCo/Publicis Finance teams and markets retain transaction execution, accounting controls, formal financial approvals and ownership of financial records.

Our Publicis Groupe motto “Viva La Différence” means we’re better together, and we believe that our differences make us stronger. It means we honor and celebrate all identities, across all facets of intersectionality, and it underpins all that we do as an organization. We are focused on fostering belonging and creating equitable & inclusive experiences for all talent.

Publicis Groupe provides robust and inclusive benefit programs and policies to support the evolving and diverse needs of our talent and enable every person to grow and thrive. Our benefits package includes medical coverage, dental, vision, disability, 401K, as well as parental and family care leave, family forming assistance, tuition reimbursement, and flexible time off.

If you require accommodation or assistance with the application or onboarding process specifically, please contact [email protected].

All your information will be kept confidential according to EEO guidelines.

Veterans Encouraged to Apply.

Compensation Range: USD $149,340.00 - USD $239,148.00/Annually. This is the pay range the Company believes it will pay for this position at the time of this posting. This role may also be eligible for bonus or incentive compensation. Consistent with applicable law, compensation will be determined based on the skills, qualifications, and experience of the applicant along with the requirements of the position, and the Company reserves the right to modify this pay range at any time.

Temporary roles may be eligible to participate in our freelancer/temporary employee medical plan through a third-party benefits administration system once certain criteria have been met. For regular roles, the Company will offer medical coverage, dental, vision, disability, 401k, and paid time off. The Company anticipates the application deadline for this job posting will be 11/17/2026.