People on the move: Hires and departures at Google, Post Office, Time, News UK and more

Channel 4’s director of audience technologies and insight, Gill Whitehead is to depart the broadcaster to take up the role of senior director of market insight EMEA at Google.

Whitehead spent eight years at Channel 4, joining as director of strategy and corporate development, before being asked to create and lead its Audience Technologies and Insight department in 2011.

The internet giant has also tapped Christopher Poole, founder of online community 4chan, to help with its ongoing efforts to be a successful player in the social media arena.

In a Tumblr post published yesterday (7 March) Poole said he couldn't wait to contribute his own experience "from a dozen years of building online communities, and to begin the next chapter of my career at such an incredible company".

The Post Office

Pete Markey is to leave the Post Office for a new role at insurance brand Aviva at the end of May, The Drum can reveal.

It marks a return to the insurance sector for Markey having previously spent eight years at the RSA Group before joining The Post Office two years ago.

At Aviva he will take on the role of brand communications and marketing director with responsibilty for Aviva's Good Thinking marketing campaign, taking over from Keith Bibby who previously held the role on an interim basis.

Time

Time UK has announced the appointment of Michel Koch as its first chief marketing officer.

Koch will head the newly created customer strategy team and will report to chief executive Marcus Rich.

Koch has over 20 years’ experience in digital, e-commerce and CRM at international level and has been working on various e-commerce projects within Time Inc. UK’s Lifestyle and Specialist groups for the past four months. Prior to this he served as the e-commerce director for Maplin Electronics before taking on the role of international multichannel trading for Marks & Spencer.

News UK

News UK has announced that David Wilcox and Tammy Willson will head up new title-specific sales director roles for the Sun and Times as part of a broader strategic shift addressing the increasingly differentiated sales propositions between the titles.

David Wilcox, who is currently the commercial head of sales development, has been appointed as sales director for the Sun while the commercial head of lifestyle Tammy Willson will take up the role of sales director for the Times and the Sunday Times.

The new roles have been created in light of the different audiences which the titles are attempting to target and subscription models.

Maxus

GroupM's Maxus has appointed Robert Marshall as head of programmatic to lead the agency’s programmatic approach and develop best-in-class programmatic excellence within the agency.

Marshall joins from Rocket Fuel, where he was head of UK platform and managed client services for the programmatic marketing platform provider. He has five years’ experience within programmatic, during which he delivered media buying campaigns and implemented data-driven marketing strategies for some of the UK’s largest advertisers.

PubMatic

Marketing automation software firm PubMatic has hired Paul Gubbins as country manager, UK. Gubbins joins the ad tech outfit from Millennial Media where he has been head of programmatic, EMEA for the past 18 months leading the company's strategic buy-side partnerships.

He is the latest senior member of staff to leave the AOL-owned company following the departure of client engagement head Stephen Jenkins on Monday (7 March).

In his new role, Gubbins will be tasked with increasing spend with key agency trading desks, programmatic buying units and demand side platforms (DSPs) as well as being responsible for developing new premium publisher relationships for the company.

Essence

Global digital agency Essence has appointed its co-founder Andrew Shebbeare to the role of chief product officer.

The move will allow the WPP-owned agency to invest in products for clients worldwide, and according to the firm reflects its emphasis on developing platforms to "guarantee quality, consistency and efficiency" across all service lines.

Having co-founded the agency in 2005 Shebbeare has been there for over a decade and was instrumental in establishing the agency's long-term relationship with Google and took the business to North America.

Innocean Worldwide

Innocean Worldwide has appointed Shamsa Jafri as senior vice-president, data science.

In this new role, Jafri will be responsible for spearheading the analytics function and designing models that will demonstrate and improve the effectiveness of the agency’s integrated advertising efforts. She will report to Tim Blett, chief operating officer.

Jafri also specializes in digital attribution and cross-media advertising effectiveness, and her research has resulted in multiple award-winning submissions. She has spoken at numerous industry events and has been hand selected to participate in product development efforts with companies including Google, IBM, and Tableau.

Unity

Creative Shop Unity has appointed John Carolan as the agency’s first planning director.

With over 12 years’ working in communications and strategy, Carolan brings a wealth of experience into the new role.

Carolan has spent the last four years as lead strategist on digital-centric clients at Carat. He previously worked as planning manager at Mindshare.

Metropolis

Metropolis Digital Outdoor has promoted Jawad Siddiqui to chief commercial officer from the role of commercial director.

The move follows Metropolis’s announcement about its strategic partnership with C&S Taxis London, a deal that Jawad and Danny Faughnan, chief executive, had been working on for over a year.

The firm has also launched a new recruitment phase which begins with its search for a head of specialist and agency media sales.

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