Director of Delivery

Description

Why This Role Exists

Wildly original ideas need room to develop and a clear path into the world.

The Director of Delivery creates the conditions for RP3’s people to do the best work of their careers. You bring together Account Leadership, Strategy, Creative, Media, and Content, making sure the right talent, time, information, and resources are in place to turn ambitious ideas into work that delivers results.

You lead RP3’s Delivery team and continually improve how work moves through the agency. You anticipate needs, raise issues early, and make thoughtful decisions that protect creative quality, team capacity, and project profitability.

We’re a small team with big ambitions. As RP3 grows, you’ll build ways of working that can grow with us—so we can take on more opportunity while protecting the creative quality, personal attention, and close collaboration that make us RP3.

You also personally manage everyday creative assignments and larger client projects from brief through delivery. Hands-on, client-facing project leadership is a core, ongoing part of the role.

The Mission

Make doing great work easier.

Create a simple, intuitive, repeatable way of working so people know where to go, what to do, who owns what, and what happens next, without unnecessary layers.

Give wildly original thinking the time, talent, and clarity it needs to become exceptional work. Build simple, flexible ways of working that help people move confidently together and deliver strong results for our clients and the agency.

What Success Looks Like

In your first year, people should be able to say:

“We’re doing our best work and how we work together makes that possible.”

“We trust our plans, deliver on our commitments, and see the results in our work and our business.”

People have more time and energy for the work itself. Creative teams have realistic time to develop ideas, client commitments are reliable, and leadership can confidently assess capacity and project financial health.

You are accountable for improving on-time delivery, budget performance, project margin and profitability, forecast accuracy, resource utilization, scope-change capture and recovery, and workflow adoption. Teams experience clearer priorities, smoother handoffs, and fewer avoidable surprises.

Establish baselines and agree on measurable targets with agency leadership and Finance.

What You'll Own

Set the vision and lead agency-wide Delivery

• Own the Delivery team's vision, priorities, standards, and improvement roadmap with agency leadership. Anticipate needs and bring solutions forward rather than waiting for requests.

• Lead intake, prioritization, and weekly delivery reviews. Keep work, commitments, and risks visible; clarify ownership, decision rights, handoffs, and completion criteria.

• Set expectations, hold teams accountable, and exercise authority to resolve cross-functional issues and improve practices. Present tradeoffs; escalate decisions requiring commercial, staffing, or budget approval.

Personally manage creative projects from brief to delivery

• Personally manage assigned client work from brief through production, delivery, and closeout. Build and maintain schedules and job records in Scoro, including tasks, owners, milestones, dependencies, and deliverables, with realistic time for creative development.

• Run kickoffs, status meetings, and creative reviews; follow up on tasks and missing inputs, and keep priorities and deadlines current. Attend client delivery discussions with Account Leadership, explaining timing and tradeoffs.

• Coordinate feedback with Account Leadership and Creative, clarify conflicting direction, track revisions, and document approvals before work proceeds.

• Coordinate production handoffs, specifications, version control, quality checks, and final assets with responsible teams; confirm completion and close project records.

Plan resources and create predictability

• Bring together RP3’s core talent, shared resources, and Coalition specialists around the needs of each assignment. Plan clear roles, timing, budgets, and handoffs so everyone works as one integrated team.

• Partner with Talent/HR and discipline leaders to forecast capacity, match skills and availability, and distinguish committed work from potential new business. Account for leave and internal priorities; recommend reprioritization, timing changes, reassignment, or approved freelance support.

• Coordinate contractor deliverables, budgets, and engagement dates with discipline leaders and Talent/HR. Flag extensions and completed assignments promptly so contracting, access, and offboarding reflect active work.

Strengthen scoping and project financial discipline

• Partner with Account Leadership and Finance on estimates, statements of work, budgets, and staffing assumptions, grounding proposals in realistic timing and resources.

• Track planned versus actual hours, external costs, and remaining effort on your projects; maintain agency-wide visibility into project financial health to protect quality and agreed profitability.

• Document scope, cost, and timing changes; support Account Leadership in securing approval before additional work, and provide completion and billing inputs to Finance.

Build intuitive, repeatable systems and simplify the work

• Observe how teams work, then design and test improvements with them. Establish shared roles, workflows, tools, templates, and terminology that are intuitive, repeatable, teachable, and flexible.

• Maintain reliable reporting and change control in Scoro and supporting tools. Establish a source of truth for delivery information, resources, and institutional knowledge, with owners who keep it current.

• Use project wrap-ups to improve estimates and handoffs. Remove unnecessary meetings, steps, approvals, platforms, and administrative work.

• Implement approved automation and AI to reduce repetitive work. Protect confidential information, check outputs, retain necessary human judgment, and verify that changes reduce effort.

Develop the Delivery team and model accountability

• Lead and develop the Delivery team, manage assigned direct reports, and coach delivery managers and project owners. Set expectations, build capability, recognize strong work, and address performance and recurring delivery issues.

• Balance your project workload with agency-wide improvements. Flag capacity conflicts, recommend support, and model the practices you expect others to follow.

How You'll Partner

You own Delivery planning, visibility, escalation, and the adoption and effectiveness of its standards. Resource planning is shared with Talent/HR and discipline leaders. Account Leadership leads client relationships and commercial approvals; discipline leaders own strategy and craft; Finance owns accounting and billing; Talent/HR manages talent administration. Hiring, contractual commitments, and unbudgeted spending require agency approval.

The RP3 Difference

We’re building an agency where incredibly talented people can do the best work of their careers - and where wildly original ideas deliver meaningful results.That takes curiosity to question how things work, courage to have honest conversations, and collaboration to find better answers. It takes humility to keep learning, kindness when the pressure is on, and enough fun to enjoy the work together.

As Director of Delivery, you help make that promise real every day: clear priorities, thoughtful planning, shared accountability, and room for people to do something extraordinary.

Requirements

What We're Looking For

• You are a systems thinker, change agent, simplifier, and hands-on leader who connects people, workflows, technology, and business needs to remove friction.
• 10+ years in agency creative project management or delivery, or equivalent demonstrated experience; small, independent-agency experience is especially valuable.
• Recent, direct ownership of concurrent creative projects is essential: personally building schedules, managing review rounds and approvals, and coordinating production and delivery.
• Experience running projects across integrated production, media, strategy, and creative, and managing vendors, production houses, and contractors.
• Experience setting direction, developing people, and leading changes teams adopt, including simpler workflows and useful automation.
• Strong scoping, estimating, resource-planning, and analytical skills; confident client and leadership communication and sound judgment under competing priorities.
• Daily, hands-on proficiency with project and resource-management tools; Scoro experience is helpful. 
• Adaptability and a collaborative approach that combines accountability with care.
• A relevant degree or equivalent practical experience is welcome. PMP, Agile, or similar training is a plus, not required.

Position/Hours Worked

This is a full-time position. This position regularly requires long hours and occasional weekend work.

This position is only available in Central and Eastern time zones. We will not be entertaining candidates on the West Coast.

Why RP3?

Here's what we offer:

• Hybrid flexibility - RP3 is headquartered in Bethesda, Maryland, but we are looking for the best talent, wherever you are (EST or CST). 
• A culture built on curiosity, kindness, accountability, and wildly original thinking
• Company-paid health, life, short-term disability, and long-term disability insurance
• Employee-paid dental and vision plans
• 401(k) with immediate employer match
• Inclusive, world-class family leave policy
• Generous PTO - including Annual Leave, Sick Leave, Paid Holidays, Personal Time, and Karma Days
• Summer Fridays - we shut down at 2 PM every Friday from Memorial Day to Labor Day
• Voluntary benefits including commuter benefits and pet insurance   

Compensation

Salary Range: 120,000 - 130,000 Annual DOE. We believe in paying people fairly and transparently. Final compensation will reflect individual experience, qualifications, and internal equity considerations.

Equal Opportunity Employer

RP3 is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. We are committed to building a diverse and inclusive team that reflects the clients and communities we serve. We do not discriminate based on race, color, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, age, disability, veteran status, or any other protected characteristic. Different perspectives make better work.