Director, Marketing

Alzheimer's Association®•Berwyn, IL

8d•$140,000 - $160,000•Remote

About The Position

Advances the Alzheimer's Association mission and strategic priorities by leading integrated marketing for priority programs, products, platforms, and services across the Association's portfolio. Develops and executes marketing strategies that drive measurable outcomes — awareness, adoption, engagement, and retention — across professional, provider, partner, and public-facing audiences. This is a hands-on strategic marketing and management role in support of the Association’s Care & Support, Mission Engagement, Medical, and/or Scientific Research initiatives. The director works closely with partners and leadership across the organization to set the direction, build the plan, and then execute it: doing the desk research, writing the brief, building the calendar, directing the agency, reviewing the copy, and reading the results and pivoting based on performance to goals. Supervision is a player-coach relationship; the director develops and delegates a team member while remaining directly responsible for producing work, not solely overseeing it. The role calls for someone who operates with a high degree of autonomy, who identifies opportunities before they are assigned, brings forward recommendations in addition to questions, and moves the work forward in a complex, matrixed environment without waiting for direction. Cross-divisional relationship building, collaboration, and communication are essential pieces of the role, as well. This person operates across a broad and evolving portfolio, ramping quickly on unfamiliar subject matter and building durable working knowledge of the Association's programs, audiences, and operating realities, while becoming an expert in the disease. They balance fresh thinking with pragmatism, and bring new ideas and a willingness to test, while scoping them to what a large nonprofit can realistically resource, approve, and sustain.

Requirements

Demonstrated ability to build marketing strategy independently (defining the audience, the objective, the approach, measures of success, etc.) and to carry it through to execution.
Operates with minimal direction. Sets priorities against stated goals, anticipates what is needed next, and escalates deliberately rather than by default.
Learns complex material quickly and retains it. Builds working knowledge of unfamiliar programs, audiences, and subject matter fast enough to contribute substantively within the first month, and applies that knowledge consistently without repeated re-briefing.
Strong executive presence. Communicates clearly and concisely with senior leaders, states a point of view, holds up under questioning, and adjusts in real time.
Excellent project management skills, with a record of accomplishment of running multiple concurrent initiatives across teams, clients/agencies, and competing priorities, and delivering on schedule.
Exceptional writing and editing skills, with a demonstrated range across channels and audience types.
Genuine curiosity and a bias toward testing new approaches, paired with the judgment to scope ideas to what is achievable within a large nonprofit's budget, brand, staffing, and approval constraints.
Proven ability to lead and influence in a matrixed organization, working effectively with stakeholders at all levels.
Demonstrated people management skills. Delegates in a way that develops capability, gives direct and actionable feedback, and addresses performance issues early and constructively — while continuing to carry a substantial individual workload.
Comfort operating in ambiguity and wearing multiple hats while maintaining focus on priorities and outcomes.
Fluency with marketing performance data — able to define KPIs, interpret results, and act on them.
Commitment to ethics, integrity, collaboration, and mission-driven work.
Bachelor’s degree or equivalent experience in marketing, communications, or a related field.
7+ years of progressive marketing and communications experience, including demonstrated ownership of integrated marketing strategy for a program, product, platform, or service.
Healthcare, medical, or scientific marketing experience highly preferred.
Demonstrated experience working with peer-reviewed research, clinical trials, registries, clinical guidelines, pharmaceuticals, or other scientific content.
Demonstrated experience marketing to professional audiences and/or launching, growing, or repositioning programs, products, or services.
Experience working in a large, highly matrixed organization.
Supervisory experience, including direct management of staff, interns, or agency teams, with demonstrated responsibility for goal setting, feedback, and development.
Agency experience highly valued, either working in an agency or in a client-side role directing agency partners, including writing strategy briefs, directing creative, and holding partners accountable to scope, timeline, and results.

Responsibilities

Leads the development and execution of integrated marketing strategy for assigned programs, products, and platforms, from audience definition and positioning through channel plan, launch, optimization, and performance reporting.
Serves as the strategic marketing partner to assigned internal and external business owners, translating their objectives into marketing plans that deliver measurable results and strengthen the Association's brand.
Proactively identifies and pursues Monitors campaign performance, audience behavior, category activity, and internal priorities to surface innovative approaches, and brings forward recommendations with a clear rationale, resource estimate, and success measure attached.
Owns project management for assigned initiatives end to end, including scope, timeline, dependencies, stakeholder input, approvals, and delivery, while keeping multiple concurrent initiatives on schedule with limited day-to-day oversight.
Partners with the Association's channel teams to bring plans to market: developing creative briefs, defining requirements and timelines, directing agency and vendor work, reviewing creative, and interpreting performance data. Influences and aligns channel partners without direct authority to deliver cohesive, well-sequenced campaigns.
Stays close enough to the work to produce it directly when needed, including writing and editing copy, minor graphic design needs, and running reports. This is not a purely oversight role.
Supervises, coaches, and develops direct report(s). Sets clear goals and expectations, allocates work deliberately, provides timely and specific feedback, conducts performance conversations and reviews, and creates growth opportunities. Builds the team member's capability rather than simply routing tasks to them.
Translates complex subject matter, including scientific, clinical, and technical content, into clear, accurate, audience-appropriate communications, and adapts messaging for both professional and general audiences.
Builds credible working relationships with senior leaders, subject matter experts, field staff, and external partners. Presents recommendations to executive audiences, responds to challenges in the moment, and secures alignment without direct authority.
Brings innovative ideas, channels, and tactics to the team and shapes them into appropriately scoped, testable pilots that account for the Association's budget, brand, capacity, compliance, and approval requirements.
Defines and reports on KPIs for assigned work; uses performance data to adjust in-flight and to inform future planning.
Contributes to the continued evolution of the team's planning processes, tools, and templates, prioritizing simplicity, efficiency, and integration across teams.
Upholds and drives the organization's commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion and reducing and heading off health inequities.
Ensures exemplary stewardship and effective use of resources to drive the greatest impact for the greatest number of people.
Performs other duties as assigned.