Strategic Planning Director

Full Time | Ho Chi Minh City

Job Summary

As the Strategic Planning Director, you oversee and ensure all work completed by the Strategic Planning team has a solid strategic foundation, aligned with the company’s vision and client’s objectives, and can provide high-value consulting to our clients. In this role, you also evaluate market dynamics, foster innovation, develop strategic frameworks, and nurture the talents of the team. You will be an active reader, consistently engaging with industry publications, academic research, and diverse thought leadership to broaden your strategic perspective and share back with the rest of the team.

Supervisory Responsibility

As part of this role, you will directly lead and guide a team of 3 – 5 members including Planners, Senior Planners, and Strategic Planning Managers to mentor and develop your team, fostering a culture of collaboration and innovation, and delegate effectively, providing opportunities for growth and empowering your team members to excel.

Job Responsibility

  • Lead client briefing sessions and oversee the strategic planning process.
  • Oversee the development and implementation of strategic initiatives that align with the company’s vision and client’s objectives.
  • Evaluate market dynamics, identify opportunities for innovation, and develop advanced strategic frameworks.
  • Deliver compelling presentations in both Vietnamese and English, focusing on clarity, conciseness, and persuasive storytelling.
  • Establish and foster a productive working relationship between Strategic Planning and cross-functional teams (especially Client Service and Creative).
  • Communicate effectively with C-level executives and improve your ability to advise C-level audiences.
  • Design and run workshops of various styles (e.g., alignment, ideation).
  • Proactively engage with Hakuhodo’s Creative Directors and Executive Creative Director, demonstrating a deep understanding of creative strategy and a collaborative spirit; offer insightful and constructive feedback.
  • Set the strategic agenda for the department and ensure alignment with the company’s overall strategic goals.
  • Drive innovation and thought leadership within the department, ensuring the team stays ahead of industry trends and best practices.
  • Mentor and support young strategic talents in the department.

Required Skills/ Abilities

  • Rational thinker.
  • Strong strategic thinking capability.
  • Deeply understand all marketing communications platforms, especially the emerging digital and social ones, ensuring our plans are integrated and scalable.
  • Strong research and analytical skills with the ability to synthesize different data/ inputs into a clear and accurate roadmap or direction.
  • Business-driven mindset, passionate to use strategic creativity to help businesses thrive.
  • Excellent presentation skills to influence decision-makers and drive success for our business presentation.
  • Strong leadership skills.
  • Master the application of Hakuhodo’s planning tools, such as the Sei-katsu-sha Creative Brief format, and champion their use within the agency.
  • Embrace and reflect Hakuhodo’s “Unimagined Way” philosophy in strategic recommendations, showing a growing ability to inspire fresh perspectives and challenge conventional thinking.
  • Excellent communication skills, capable of engaging with C-level executives and advising them effectively.

Experience and Education

  • 10+ years of planning/brand strategy experience.
  • Managerial experience; demonstrable experience in a variety of strategic engagements with regional or global Client brands.
  • Deeply understand all marketing communications platforms (especially the emerging digital and social ones); and able to ensure that our plans are integrated and scalable.

Benefits

  • Working in a dynamic, friendly, and supportive environment.
  • Growing business.
  • Once the employee has passed probation and signed a labor contract, the employee will have other benefits as follows:
    • 16 annual leave per year;
    • 13th-month salary;
    • Year-end bonus based on performance and business result;
    • Salary review annually;
    • Annual health check;
    • Social insurance, health insurance, unemployment insurance (Vietnamese Law);
    • Insurance benefits package (PTI Care);
    • Mobile phone fee allowance based on the company’s policy;
    • Participate in company events, company trip;
    • Participate in the company’s training programs, self-studying program (supported by the company).

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Strategic Planning Manager

Full Time | Ho Chi Minh City

Job Summary

As a Strategic Planning Manager, you will lead the strategic planning process, oversee research activities, and ensure the successful delivery of presentations to clients. You play a key role in analyzing market trends, identifying growth opportunities, and developing comprehensive strategic plans to achieve organizational goals. You will partner with cross-functional teams to align strategies with business objectives and provide insights to drive decision-making.

Supervisory Responsibility

As part of this role, you will directly mentor and guide a team of 2 – 3 members including Planners and Senior Planners. You foster their professional development and ensure high-quality output by providing direction and support to them to achieve departmental and organizational goals, helping them sharpen their thinking and deliverables through structured feedback and mentoring.

Job Responsibility

  • Participate in the client’s briefing sessions. Take the overall responsibility and lead the full strategic planning process.
  • Examine the information or insights from the research and develop a strategic direction to formulate and develop creative briefs
  • Conduct and manage any necessary research including but not limited to desk research, internal research, etc.
  • Collaborate actively with Account teams, Creative teams, and Media teams, contributing to idea development and ensuring strategic consistency throughout the creative process.
  • Build strong working relationships with Creative Directors by being a reliable strategic partner and communicator.
  • Create plans for the strategy with measurable KPIs for marketing communications campaigns. This typically necessitates tight coordination between Planners and Media Specialists/ Media agencies/ Market research agencies.
  • Oversee the execution of strategic plans to ensure alignment with the intended direction, proactively monitoring campaign progress to identify and address any deviations or opportunities for optimization in real time
  • Deliver clear, concise, and engaging presentations in both Vietnamese and English, tailored to client needs with a strong emphasis on storytelling and logic.
  • Assist in designing and facilitating internal and external workshops (e.g., alignment, idea development), under the guidance of the Planning Director or Strategic Lead.
  • Mentor and support young strategic talents in the department.

Required Skills/ Abilities

  • Rational thinker with strong strategic thinking capability.
  • Ability to look at both the big picture and details.
  • Excellent research and analytical skills. Ability to synthesize different data/ inputs into a clear and accurate roadmap or direction.
  • Exceptional presentation skills to influence decision-makers and drive success for our business presentation.
  • Deep understanding of all marketing communications platforms, especially emerging digital and social ones, ensuring our plans are integrated and scalable.
  • Confidently applies Hakuhodo’s planning tools (e.g., Sei-katsu-sha Creative Brief) and contributes to embedding them into day-today team practice.
  • Embraces and reflects Hakuhodo’s “Unimagined Way” philosophy in strategic recommendations, showing a growing ability to inspire fresh perspectives and challenge conventional thinking.

Experience and Education

  • More than 7 years of working experience in planning/ brand strategy.
  • Bachelor’s degree in Marketing/ Communications/ Journalism or related fields.

Benefits

  • Working in a dynamic, friendly, and supportive environment.
  • Growing business.
  • Once the employee has passed probation and signed a labor contract, the employee will have other benefits as follows:
    • 16 annual leave per year;
    • 13th-month salary;
    • Year-end bonus based on performance and business result;
    • Salary review annually;
    • Annual health check;
    • Social insurance, health insurance, unemployment insurance (Vietnamese Law);
    • Insurance benefits package (PTI Care);
    • Mobile phone fee allowance based on the company’s policy;
    • Participate in company events, company trip;
    • Participate in the company’s training programs, self-studying program (supported by the company).

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Senior Strategic Planner

Full Time | Ho Chi Minh City

Job Summary

As a Senior Strategic Planner, you’re expected to contribute to client discussions and present where appropriate. You’re grounding your opinions and comments in fact-based knowledge rather than experience, but are expected to be making more creative and lateral leaps from that fact base. You are expected to have all the basic skills and knowledge in place and be able to apply them autonomously. You will be working with the team on current and new business projects under the supervision of the line manager and assisting the manager and director with big clients.

Job Responsibility

  • Clarify client brief and understand client objectives from a business POV.
  • Deep understanding of client business and the ability to analyze marketing requirements.
  • Mine consumer insight, and turn insights into a powerful strategy (with help from the supervisor) that will lay a solid foundation for developing creative big ideas and a full-pledged integrated campaign.
  • Develop a strategy proposal that could not only address client briefs but also solve other aspects of client business that drive growth opportunities.
  • Be able to create, sell & lead strategy presentations & discussions with internal teams and clients.
  • Occasionally work on Consumer and Market Research.
  • Conduct research and cooperate with research agencies if needed.
  • Assist and support other teams if needed.
  • Help other teams to roll out strategy direction with strategic POV on Creative, Social, and Media.
  • Work closely with other departments for the successful delivery of campaigns.

Required Skills/ Abilities

  • Critical & creative thinking.
  • Be able to communicate and explain things simply, and logically.
  • Effective communication skills for internal communication and client-facing situations.
  • Strong time-management and organizational skills.
  • Excellent command of English both written and spoken.
  • Be able to cooperate smoothly with internal teams especially Client Service and Creative teams.
  • Be able to handle pressure.
  • Independent, determined; problem-solving first mindset.
  • Strive for delivery excellence.
  • Collaborative mindset – willingness to help others and ask for help when needed.

Experience and Education

  • Brand/ Agency-centric experience or accumulated experience in brand & agency.
  • At least 3 years of strategic planning/ IMC planning/ brand experience.
  • Maturity to deal with complex situations and briefs.
  • Experience in managing multiple, competing priorities, duties, and projects.
  • Understand thoroughly the fundamentals & correlation of marketing strategy, brand strategy & communication strategy.
  • Demonstrated ability to create good-quality proposals and build campaigns.

Benefits

  • Working in a dynamic, friendly, and supportive environment.
  • Growing business.
  • Once the employee has passed probation and signed a labor contract, the employee will have other benefits as follows:
    • 16 annual leave per year;
    • 13th-month salary;
    • Year-end bonus based on performance and business result;
    • Salary review annually;
    • Annual health check;
    • Social insurance, health insurance, unemployment insurance (Vietnamese Law);
    • Insurance benefits package (PTI Care);
    • Mobile phone fee allowance based on the company’s policy;
    • Participate in company events, company trip;
    • Participate in the company’s training programs, self-studying program (supported by the company).

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