Director of Planning, Disney Operations EMEA

This is a Full Time Job

Job Title:

Director, Planning, Disney Operations (DO), EMEA

Overview

The Director will lead the planning function for EMEA-originated content across all Lines of Business (LOBs), o verseeing and strategizing EMEA Forecast and Planning efforts, while focusing on continuous process improvement initiatives, and visibility for all key stakeholders and vendors.

Department/ Group Overview

Disney Entertainment & ESPN Product and Technology (DEE PT ) brings together the Company's best-in-class product, technology, and commercialization teams together into one global organization. DEEPT is responsible for the P&L management and all distribution, network and engineering operations, sales, advertising, data, and certain key technology functions worldwide for the Company's content engines. DEEPT also manages operations of the Company's streaming services including Disney+, Hulu, ESPN +, Disney+, HotStar , and domestic broadcast and cable television networks.

DEEPT's Distribution Operations (DO) team is r esponsible for the asset delivery to all Disney's direct-to-consumer (DTC) , Linear and third-party endpoints. This includes mastering services, localization operations, versioning, servicing, packaging and fulfillment. Delivery endpoints include Disney+, Hulu, Hotstar, Linear channels, VOD, Syndication, physical BluRay /DVD, and across hundreds of third-party endpoints depending on content sales deals. With the exponential increase in DTC content volumes across our regions, this organization plays the critical role of scaling distribution operations, vendor, and process strategies globally to meet the demand.

Job Summary:

This role spans the entire EMEA Content Operations workflow – from Vendor strategy and cost management ; through to planning, demand and capacity management ; and finally operational improvement and quality management. The role holder will identify opportunities for improvement across the chain and establish methods and processes for managing timely , efficient and cost-effective delivery of materials from Production through the Content Pipeline to meet distribution needs . The Director will partner with operations teams within EMEA and Globally, as well as business partners to provide critical information to business leaders to drive decisions related to content planning, localization, and distribution .

This role will focus on driving towards the following key outcomes:
• Reliable and accurate volume forecast s for EMEA production and distribution , including Original Productions and Acquisitions supporting Direct to Consumer (Disney+/Star), Media Networks, Theatrical and Content Sales
• Development of a planning and forecasting process and toolset, including aggregation of information for global demand plan, vendor capacity and system based forecast reporting
• Cost management through steering the vendor sourcing strategy and identification of cost optimization opportunities

Identify efficiency through :
• Timely, accurate , complete and easily accessible information
• Systems evaluation -development/consolidation/retirement/integration
• Performance metrics and process improvement
• Leveraging strategic vendors
• Managing costs – rushes – penalties – over/under commitments – lateness – defects

In addition to planning and cost management activities, this role will oversee the Quality Management team, responsible for tracking key quality metrics (Right First Time, On Time delivery), as well as identifying opportunities for operational efficiency.

As a leader of this group, you will be responsible for :
• Managing and driving the EMEA Quality Management approach, expanding the set of metrics tracked, and ensuring clear action plan definitions and accountability of actions across both internal and external teams to drive quality to achieve our goals
• Ensuring accurate tracking and reporting mechanisms are in place for all metrics, driving to maximize automation in reporting by collaborating with our Data Platforms teams
• Developing performance dashboards that allow for faster identification of issues or trends that require management intervention for resolution

Required Experience /Skills/Training :
• Experience in a planning/forecasting role, ideally within a motion picture, television or media production and distribution organization OR gained within a business consulting firm
• Experience in contributing to the design and delivery of planning, forecasting and associated workflow orchestration tools
• Experience managing systems, strategy, people and processes related to complex and wide-ranging planning activity
• Knowledge of content production, post-production, physical, digital, broadcast distribution and localization is preferred but not essential
• Ability to collaborate with, partner with, influence and persuade creative, marketing, distribution finance, legal and operational executives in the Production and distribution arena.
• Comfortable in fast changing environment, with frequently changing demands, building and managing relationships with cross-functional stakeholders and circumstances.
• Ability to balance technical and business issues.
• Ability to communicate with both technical and business experts at all levels within the organisation.