The Client Account Director owns the senior client relationship and serves as the primary strategic partner to client leadership. This role is accountable for long-term account growth, financial performance, and overall client success.
Reporting to the Managing Director, the Client Account Director guides the direction of client engagements—surfacing new opportunities, solving complex business problems, and aligning One North’s capabilities to client needs. This role acts as the connective tissue between the client, agency teams, and sales partners, ensuring continuity, trust, and momentum across initiatives.
The ideal candidate brings deep digital agency experience, strong executive presence, and a proven ability to grow and retain accounts through strategic insight, creativity, and disciplined execution.
Location: Chicago is strongly preferred but open to remote within the U.S. (up to 25% travel).
Responsibilities
Client Leadership & Strategy
- Cultivate and maintain long-term, senior-level relationships with key client stakeholders.
- Develop and implement strategic, long-term account plans that align with client business goals and drive growth.
- Act as the primary senior escalation point for resolving complex client issues and ensuring high satisfaction.
- Identify new business opportunities, secure upsell opportunities, and lead pitch presentations.
Team Leadership & Collaboration
- Own the handoff from sales to delivery, ensuring client expectations are clearly understood, refined, and operationalized by project teams, even when inputs are ambiguous or evolving.
- Oversee multiple project teams across disciplines to ensure timely delivery of services and creative outputs.
- Coach and develop Client Account Managers and account teams.
- Partner with project management and discipline leads to ensure every deliverable meets client expectations and aligns with strategy.
- Inspire strong collaboration across strategy, creative, brand, technology, and delivery teams.
Growth, Sales, & Relationship Management
- Own a defined base portfolio of client accounts, with responsibility for retention, growth, and long-term relationship value.
- Participate in joint account planning with sales teams to align on targets, pursuits, and pipeline priorities and partner closely to expand existing client relationships.
- Identify and develop new opportunities emerging from ongoing work and client conversations. Lead pricing strategy, scoping, estimates, and negotiations in partnership with sales teams.
- Ensure SOWs align with client objectives, agency strategy, scope, and financial goals.
Financial Oversight
- Maintain accountability for financial health, forecasting, and profitability of accounts.
- Drive profitable growth across a portfolio of accounts while balancing client value and agency health.
Skills & Qualifications
- 5 or more years in an Account Director, Group Account Director, Client Partner, or similar role at a digital, marketing, or design agency
- Ability to engage credibly across business, technology, and creative discussions
- Demonstrated ability to manage a portfolio of 5–10 clients with multi-million-dollar recurring revenue, consistently owning, retaining, and expanding complex client relationships.
- Exceptional verbal and written communication skills with the ability to influence C-level executives
- Demonstrated success partnering with sales teams to expand existing accounts
- Experience translating sales-stage commitments and ambiguous client needs into clear, executable direction for delivery teams
- Solid business and financial acumen, including forecasting, scoping, and profitability management
Benefits
- Our comprehensive benefits program includes Blue Cross Blue Shield PPO Health coverage, as well as a health savings account with employer-funded contributions.
- We also offer Dental and Vision insurance. All of our full-time employees are eligible for Life/AD&D insurance and Short/Long Term Disability insurance free of cost, with the option to add additional voluntary coverage if desired.
- One North’s 401(k) plan allows employees to save for retirement through pre- or post-tax contributions along with employer-matched funds for maximized savings potential.
- Our Transportation Benefits enable employees to also make pre-tax contributions to pay for parking and public transit needs.
- We know how important unwinding can be for inspiration, innovation and productivity. Our full-time employees earn 4 weeks of paid time off, in addition to company paid holidays. Employees begin to accrue additional time off once they reach their 3-year and 10-year anniversaries with the business.
- One North also understands how critical it is for parents to bond with their new additions. We provide paid Parental and Primary Caregiver Leave to assist and support employees who experience a new birth, adoption or foster placement of a child.
- We also offer an Employee Perks Program that offers member-only discounts and corporate rates on everything from pizza and the zoo, to movie tickets, car rentals, and hotels.
We reserve the right to pay above or below the base salary range of $112,500-$168,700 based on factors unrelated to sex, race, or any other protected classification.
Additional earnings may be available through incentive programs like annual bonuses, profit sharing, etc.
Please click on the following link to learn more about our full-time internal employment benefits: https://www.teksystems.com/en/careers/benefits.
The expected posting close date is March 10, 2026.
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