Team Leader, Brand Experience MTC

At McLaren Racing, we’re not just here to try to take the chequered flag. We’re here to excite our fans, inspire our people and deliver for our partners. And we’re also committed to evolving our sport, our industry, and our technology, too.

Purpose of the Role:

The successful applicant will deliver Brand Experiences at the MTC for our key stakeholders, the team and guests, delivering through innovative experiences and events which all take place on site at our Technology Centre in Woking.  You will lead the end-to-end execution of a diverse range of events, manage key projects, and collaborate with the team to create truly world-class experiences.

This role is essential in delivering exceptional and unique events that enhance guest interactions with the brand, effectively communicate key messages, and create meaningful emotional engagement.

You will ensure all activations represent the McLaren Brand and are positioned as world class to generate commercial opportunities for McLaren throughout all touch points.  Using your knowledge and experience you will help innovate ways of working and ideas to develop the experiences.

Our goal is to deliver world-class, industry-leading experiences. This role demands an unwavering commitment to continuous improvement, always seeking innovative ways to enhance efficiency and refine best practices. The events we produce span all five of our Championships, ensuring excellence at every level.

Role Dimensions:

You will be collaborating widely across the wider Brand Experience team, and you will quickly discover it’s a pro-active team that thrives on working at pace with agility and are determined to push boundaries in everything they do through continuous review and innovation.  Most of all we support each other and roll our sleeves up when it matters.

This role will be reporting to the Senior Manager, Brand Experience MTC and will have 2 direct reports as well as direct responsibility for your own events and projects.  You will be responsible for overseeing and guiding your team with a primary focus on managing individuals to ensure they are motivated, productive and aligned with the business goals. 

Building excellent relationships across multiple business functions and with external clients is essential to ensure the commercial success of all events and the wider business. 

This role requires a high level of attention to detail and an ability to work in a fast paced, high-performance environment.  There is a high volume of administration as well as being on event in Woking.  Whilst some events are pre planned most are often very last minute, so flexibility and agility is key to this position.

There is hybrid working in place with a minimum of 3 days in the office, however due to the specific nature of this role it will be essential for the successful candidate to be office based more frequently and the days vary week to week.  The role requires unsociable hours including weekends and can often include long hours on your feet.

Principal Accountabilities:

People Management

• Manage 2 direct reports, providing coaching, feedback, and performance reviews.

• Support onboarding and training of new team members.

Event Management

• Full on-site event management for own events working with various internal and external stakeholders.

• Plan and execute a variety of events including dinners, conferences, race viewings, and employee engagement activities.

• Supporting the team with other events as required on the day and sometimes in the planning.

• Build strong stakeholder relationships and manage challenging situations to protect brand integrity.

• Deal with conflicting and challenging situations as they arise to ensure no impact to the brand experience.

Administration

• Manage and oversee the event enquiry process, ensuring all enquiries are handled efficiently and promptly.

• Working with the team to schedule events, manage conflicting requirements and ensure adequate staffing levels.

• Responsible for tracking and managing event-related assets using the asset management system on Salesforce, ensuring accurate documentation, timely updates, and resolution of any flagged

• Budget creation and management for own events.

• Develop and distribute detailed event schedules in a timely manner to keep all stakeholders informed and aligned, while overseeing the team's work to ensure seamless execution.

• Ensure the health and safety requirements are met for all events.

• Oversee supplier relationships and processes to ensure seamless collaboration.

• Drive the agenda with the partnerships team and other internal stakeholders to improve collaboration and ways of working.

Innovation & Strategic

• Ownership of some wider projects to enhance the brand experience.

• Support the Senior Manager with the event packages, pricing structure, booking process and cancellation policy.

• Identify additional revenue streams for Partner events.

• Develop the race view experience for Partners.

• Be a team champion for new business systems.

Knowledge, Skills and Experience:

• Experience in team management

• Experience in a similar events role in either a corporate, hotel, or sporting environment with customer focus.

• Ability to manage and plan own workload within a dynamic and time constrained environment.

• Strong event management skills with the ability to plan, execute, and oversee events to successful completion.

• Proven experience in supplier management, including, performance monitoring, and relationship building to ensure quality and cost efficiency.

• Strong stakeholder engagement skills, with the ability to build and maintain relationships, manage expectations, and drive collaboration across diverse groups.

• Extensive experience in planning and executing various types of events, including corporate conferences, B2C and B2B.

• Skilled in budgeting, vendor coordination, logistics, and on-site management to ensure seamless event execution.

• Proficient in MS Office; Salesforce and Smartsheet experience preferred.

• High attention to detail and ability to thrive in a fast-paced settings.

Personal Attributes:

• Wining Mindset – Always working and striving for the best, pushing the boundaries to world championship material on everything we do.

• Problem solving - with a solutions-based approach, adept at operating effectively in ambiguous situations. Demonstrates an inquisitive mindset to understand the ‘why’ behind challenges, then applies extensive knowledge to develop creative solutions and workarounds, ensuring team success.

• Results – someone who is driven, who comes with an outstanding work ethic and expects the best from themselves and people around them.

• Challenges – challenges others to strive for more, both in innovation and meeting stakeholder needs.

• Ownership - demonstrates behaviours that support a high-performance culture within and across teams.

• Collaboration – an approach which fosters teamwork, open communication and shared decision making

• Driven – a track record of getting things done.

What can McLaren offer?

We constantly strive to be better tomorrow than we are today. Our ambition is to be the most pioneering and exhilarating racing team in the world, and our collective task is to set the standards for high performance in sport. We show up every day with energy and enthusiasm, ready to play our part.

We encourage and support diversity, equity and inclusion. We will actively promote a culture that values difference and eliminates discrimination in our workplace.

McLaren Racing is based at the iconic McLaren Technology Centre (MTC) near Woking. Here at McLaren, we offer hybrid working with 3 days a week based in the MTC.

Our state of the art, sustainable campus offers many facilities including a gym, restaurant and indoor and outdoor break-out areas, as well as direct access to park and common land. The MTC is connected to Woking mainline station via regular shuttle buses, from which London Waterloo is a 30 minute train ride.

We offer a comprehensive package of benefits including private healthcare, car schemes, life insurance and generous pension contributions.