Managing Director

Job Overview:

The Managing Director, PR & Integrated Media is a senior agency leader responsible for the vision, growth, evolution, and performance of CG Life’s integrated capabilities across earned media, owned media, paid media, and corporate communications. Reporting to the Chief Operating Officer and serving as a member of the Leadership Team, this individual leads a team of approximately 30 professionals and senior functional leaders while helping shape how CG Life creates measurable impact for pharmaceutical and life sciences clients.

The Managing Director brings deep expertise in the above outlined areas, with significant experience growing and shaping communications efforts that support pharmaceutical products, particularly within rare disease, hard-to-treat conditions, and other complex areas of medicine. They serve as a senior counselor to clients and prospects, bringing the credibility, relationships, strategic perspective, and commercial mindset needed to engage C-suite leaders. They also play a key role in fostering new relationships, expanding existing partnerships, and translating complex scientific and business challenges into meaningful communications opportunities.

Success in this role requires both a strong foundation in communications and a forward-looking perspective on how the discipline is evolving. The Managing Director will bring together earned, paid, owned, and corporate communications capabilities; advance the use of AI, data, technology, and new approaches to measurement; develop differentiated services and products; and ensure the Media Impact Group is an increasingly integrated and valuable part of CG Life’s broader agency offering.

Key responsibilities, including but not limited to:

Media Impact Group Leadership & Vision

• Set the vision and strategic direction for CG Life’s Media Impact group, bringing together earned media, owned media, paid media, and corporate communications into a differentiated and impactfully integrated client offering across new and existing client accounts.
• Lead and empower senior MI leaders, establishing clear accountability while enabling subject matter experts to independently lead their respective disciplines and teams.
• Identify opportunities to strengthen, evolve, and differentiate CG Life’s MI capabilities based on changing client needs, audience behaviors, industry dynamics, and emerging technologies.
• Build greater connectivity across earned, owned, and paid channels to create integrated programs that reach the right audiences, shape perceptions, and deliver measurable client impact.
• Partner with Strategy, Creative, Client Services, Business Development, and other agency leaders to ensure MI’s capabilities are effectively integrated into and supportive of broader CG Life solutions.
• Represent the Media Impact group as a member of the CG Life Leadership Team, contributing to overall agency strategy, growth priorities, capability development, and organizational decision-making.

Growth & Business Development

• Own the revenue growth strategy for the Media Impact group, driving growth through new client acquisition, organic expansion of existing client relationships, and development of new services and offerings to existing life science and pharma clients.
• Build relationships with senior client prospects and decision-makers, leveraging deep industry expertise and executive presence to open doors and establish CG Life as a trusted communications partner.
• Partner with CG Life’s business development team to identify, shape and participate in new business pitches, capability presentations, strategic workshops, and senior-level prospect conversations.
• Engage clients to identify evolving needs and opportunities to expand CG Life’s strategic support and services.
• Partner across Client Services and agency leadership to drive organic growth by identifying opportunities to bring Media Impact Group capabilities to existing CG Life clients.
• Maintain and foster a strong professional network across pharmaceutical, biotechnology, life sciences, healthcare communications, media, and related industries.

Client Leadership & Strategic Counsel

• Serve as a senior strategic counselor to C-suite and executive-level pharmaceutical and life sciences clients on product communications, corporate communications, reputation, media strategy, and integrated communications challenges.
• Apply deep experience in pharmaceutical commercialization communications to help clients navigate complex scientific, regulatory, competitive, and stakeholder environments.
• Bring expertise and perspective to clients’ communications challenges involving rare diseases, hard-to-treat conditions, specialty products, emerging therapies, and complex scientific stories across patient, HCP, and caregiver communities.
• Help clients connect corporate reputation, product narratives, earned media, owned media, and paid media, into cohesive communications strategies.
• Establish trusted senior-level relationships that strengthen client confidence, create long-term partnerships, and generate opportunities for continued growth across capabilities at CG Life.
• Maintain an informed perspective on the pharma and life sciences communications environments, including stakeholder expectations, technology, regulation, and the ways audiences discover and engage with health information.

Innovation, AI & Capability Development

• Reinforce and participate in the continued evolution of CG Life’s approach to AI, technology, data, and emerging technology to improve the quality, speed, intelligence, measurement, and impact of communications and media programs.
• Identify and champion practical applications of AI and emerging technologies across areas such as audience intelligence, insight generation, media strategy, content development, workflow, optimization, measurement, and reporting as it relates to MI’s offerings and capabilities.
• Work with MI leaders to develop new methodologies, services, tools, and commercial offerings that create differentiated value for clients and new growth opportunities for CG Life.
• Encourage thoughtful experimentation and innovation while ensuring new approaches meet appropriate standards for quality, accuracy, privacy, regulatory compliance, and client trust.
• Build a culture in which teams continually challenge existing approaches, test new ideas, learn from results, and translate innovation into better client outcomes.

Measurement & Media Impact

• Advance CG Life’s approach to measuring the effectiveness and business impact of communications and media programs across earned, owned, and paid channels.
• Partner with MI leaders and cross-functional leaders to connect channel performance, audience behavior, communications outcomes, and client business objectives more meaningfully.
• Establish expectations for data-informed decision-making and ensure insights are used to optimize programs, inform strategy, and demonstrate value to clients.
• Help evolve client conversations beyond activity and channel-level metrics toward a clearer understanding of communications and media impact.

Business & Operational Performance

• Maintain accountability for the overall business performance of the Media Impact Group within CG Life’s integrated agency P&L.
• Drive profitable growth by balancing revenue opportunities, client needs, staffing, investments, and operational efficiency with the Media Impact group.
• Partner with Finance, Operations, and functional leaders to manage revenue forecasts, gross-margin performance, billable utilization, staffing needs, and other key operating metrics.
• Evaluate investments in people, technology, tools, partnerships, and new capabilities based on their potential to improve client impact and create sustainable business value.

People & Organizational Leadership

• Lead and set clear expectations for leadership, collaboration, client service, innovation, business performance, and accountability across the Media Impact group.
• Coach and advise senior leaders, helping them strengthen their teams, grow their capabilities, address performance challenges, and prepare future leaders.
• Partner with agency leadership and People Operations to anticipate talent and capability needs and make thoughtful decisions about organizational structure, hiring, development, succession, and retention.
• Foster a collaborative culture that encourages expertise within individual disciplines while removing barriers between functions.
• Create opportunities for Media Impact team members to contribute their expertise across integrated CG Life client engagements and agency initiatives.
• Model CG Life’s leadership expectations and contribute to a culture of curiosity, collaboration, accountability, and continuous improvement.

Qualifications:

• 15+ years of relevant communications experience within pharmaceutical, biotechnology, life sciences, healthcare communications, or a closely related environment, including significant experience in an agency setting.
• 10+ years leading teams and growing clients within a pharma agency environment.
• Deep expertise in earned media and corporate communications, with demonstrated leadership of communications programs supporting pharmaceutical products, specifically during launch or critical moments of inflection in a product's lifecycles.
• Significant experience developing communications strategies for complex scientific and medical products, with experience in rare disease, hard-to-treat conditions, oncology, specialty medicine, or similarly complex therapeutic categories strongly preferred.
• Proven ability to generate revenue through new client acquisition and new business pitching, expansion of existing relationships, and development of new services or offerings within PR, corp comms, and/or integrated communications.
• Demonstrated ability to establish relationships with C-suite and senior-level pharmaceutical and life sciences executives, penetrate new client organizations, and convert relationships into meaningful business opportunities.
• Strong understanding of the role of paid media and owned media within integrated communications programs, with the ability to partner with and lead subject matter experts across these disciplines.
• Demonstrated curiosity of and experience in AI and relevant tools, emerging technology, data, and evolving approaches to communications and media, with a track record of applying innovation to improve client or business outcomes.
• Strong understanding of communications and media measurement, with the ability to connect program performance to meaningful client and business outcomes.
• Strong business and financial acumen, including experience managing revenue growth, profitability, staffing, utilization, forecasting, and investment decisions within an agency or professional-services environment.
• Exceptional executive communication, presentation, relationship-building, and consultative skills.
• Ability to translate complex scientific, clinical, and business information into clear, compelling communications strategies and narratives.
• Collaborative leadership style with demonstrated ability to work across disciplines, build alignment among senior stakeholders, and lead change within a complex organization.

Benefits:

We are proud to offer a comprehensive benefits package to all of our employees:

• Medical, Dental & Vision Insurance. We cover a generous portion of employee contributions
• 401K plan. We invest in present and future you, which is why we offer a generous match and immediate vesting on our plan
• Parental Leave. Generous paid time off for parents to bond with their newest addition
• Professional Development. Each employee has an annual budget to allocate to professional development opportunities. Employees are encouraged to take a workshop, attend a webinar, join associations, and do anything else that will help them grow in their careers.
• And more! We offer flexible time off, life insurance, LTD, a robust employee assistance program, and more!

At CG Life, we recognize that attracting the best talent is key to our strategy and success as a company. As a result, we aim for flexibility in structuring competitive compensation offers to ensure we are able to attract the best candidates. As required by law in this state, the estimated salary range for this position is $275,000 - $300,000 and represents our good faith estimate as to what our ideal candidates are likely to expect. We tailor our offers within the range based on organizational needs, internal equity, market data, geographic zone, and the selected candidate’s experience, education, industry knowledge, location, technical and communication skills, and other factors that may prove relevant during the selection process. At CG Life, it is not common for individuals to be hired at the higher end of the range, and compensation decisions depend on a variety of factors. This position is eligible to participate in a discretionary bonus program, subject to the rules governing the plan. CG Life offers a variety of benefits, including health benefits, 401K retirement with a generous company match and immediate vesting, and flexible time off.  

A Note to Candidates:

It has come to our attention that some candidates are being contacted by individuals falsely claiming to represent CG Life. Please note that all official communications from CG Life will come from an email address ending in @cglife.com. If you are contacted by anyone using a different domain, please consider it fraudulent. CG Life will never ask candidates to pay fees or share financial information at any stage of the hiring process

This job posting is intended for direct applicants only; please, no outside recruiters.