Strategy Director

Job Description

Collinson is the global leader in travel experiences and customer engagement, a business that builds loyalty 500 million times a day, across 140 countries, for some of the world's most ambitious brands. Our clients include major financial institutions, airlines, transport operators and retailers who trust us to design programmes that move customers from passive participation to genuine, measurable commitment.

Our loyalty practice sits at the intersection of behavioural strategy, data science and programme design. We believe that the best loyalty programmes are strategic assets - not cost centres - and we've built our methodology around the evidence: that incrementality, not points balances, is the true measure of a programme's worth.

Purpose of the job

This is a senior strategy role within our consulting business, with the opportunity to lead major client projects from discovery through to delivery. Working alongside the Experience Strategy Director, Loyalty Consulting, and wider strategy team, you’ll take ownership of strategic challenges, shape the direction of client programmes and be accountable for delivering work that makes a meaningful commercial and customer impact.

You’ll lead projects independently, champion the voice of the customer and bring together research, insight and data to uncover opportunities, challenge assumptions and develop compelling strategic recommendations. You’ll be confident setting the strategic agenda, navigating complex challenges and taking clients and colleagues with you.

This is a strategy role that takes data seriously. We are evidence-led in everything we do. The commercial case for a programme lives or dies on the quality of the insight behind it, and the strongest strategic thinking comes from a genuine understanding of what the numbers are saying. You don't need to be a data scientist, but you do need to know which questions to ask, how to interrogate the evidence and how to turn complex data into a clear, persuasive strategic argument.

Equally important is genuine curiosity and independent thinking. You’ll be someone who keeps asking why, digs deeper, connects the dots and brings fresh perspectives that challenge conventional thinking. You'll have the experience and confidence to lead client conversations, make informed strategic decisions and drive projects forward with autonomy, while knowing when to draw on the expertise of others.

As a senior member of the team, you'll also help shape and evolve our strategic thinking, approaches and capabilities. You'll stay close to developments in loyalty, customer engagement and behaviour change, bringing new thinking and fresh perspectives that strengthen our work, inspire colleagues and create opportunities for clients and prospects.

Key Responsibilities

Client strategy and programme design

- Lead strategy development across major loyalty accounts, from initial diagnostic and opportunity sizing through to programme design, commercial modelling and go-to-market planning
- Own the strategic narrative on client engagements - structuring complex problems, commissioning research and data analysis, synthesising those findings into clear recommendations, and presenting with confidence at senior levels
- Work with and enhance existing frameworks for programme evaluation including commercial modelling, incrementality modelling, headroom analysis, share-of-wallet assessment and behavioural segmentation
- Lead workshop design and facilitation with clients, from discovery sessions that surface the real commercial question, through to strategic alignment workshops that get the right people in the room making the right decisions
- Have a point of view on what good looks like: understand how the strongest long-term programmes (Clubcard, Avios, Nectar, others) have stayed relevant, how non-traditional models are working (M&S Sparks) and how that applies to the client and prospect challenges we are exploring
- undefined

Experience & Skills

###

Experience

- Some experience in loyalty, CRM, customer engagement, research or strategy. You don't need to be a loyalty expert, but you should have an interest in what makes customer programmes successful and a willingness to learn.
- An understanding of customer engagement and behaviour change. You’re curious about what motivates people, what gets in their way and how programmes can influence what they think, feel and do.
- A strong instinct for research, data and insight. You enjoy digging into evidence, asking questions, spotting patterns and turning findings into meaningful insights that help shape strategic decisions.
- Confidence working with data and commercial analysis. You don't need to build complex models, but you should be comfortable interpreting numbers, questioning findings and understanding what they mean for the bigger picture.
- Exposure to public sector, financial services, retail or travel is a bonus , but curiosity, adaptability and the ability to get to grips with new sectors quickly matter far more than category expertise.
- ## Skills and capabilities
- ##
Outstanding written and verbal communication: you write clearly, structure arguments rigorously, and can take a complex brief and turn it into a narrative that sparks fresh thinking.
- A genuine curious instinct - you can make the leap from insight to idea, from problem to solution.
- Data literacy and insight-driven thinking: you have an instinct to reach for evidence, strong experience with data as a strategic tool, and the ability to translate analytical output into clear strategic direction.
- Intellectual curiosity and range: you read widely, have genuine views on loyalty, and are interested in the psychology, economics and behavioural science that underpin how programmes actually work.
- A bias for clarity over complexity: the best strategy work makes the difficult simple, not the simple complicated.
- Commercial instinct — you understand that loyalty is ultimately there to solve business problems
###
- ###

## About you
- ##
You're proactive and self-motivated. Comfortable taking initiative, managing your own workload and working independently when needed, while knowing when to ask questions or seek guidance.
- You're a team player. Collaborative, supportive and happy to roll up your sleeves to help Strategy Directors and colleagues deliver great work.
- You thrive in a fast-paced environment. Adaptable, organised and comfortable juggling different priorities without losing sight of the detail.
- You care about the quality of your work. You take pride in what you produce, have an eye for detail and understand that every piece of work contributes to the standard of thinking our clients expect from Collinson.

Why Join Us

###

Reward & Benefits: What's in it for me?

We want our people to feel recognised, supported and able to thrive both at work and beyond it.

We offer a competitive reward package designed to support your financial, physical and mental wellbeing, alongside opportunities to learn, develop and be recognised for the contribution you make. Benefits vary by role and location, and full details will be shared as part of the application process.

Equal opportunities: Our commitment to inclusion

Collinson Group is an equal opportunities employer. We welcome applications from people of all backgrounds, identities and experiences, and believe that different perspectives make our business stronger.