SAN FRANCISCO — Dave Nieland, a Weber Shandwick exec for the last 16 years, has been named tech-focused Big Valley Marketing’s first client partner.

In his newly created role, Nieland will be “completely embedded” in clients’ businesses to build the kind of relationships that reap results — and often elude account leaders who don’t have the time to get in that deep, said founder and CEO Tim Marklein.

He will also lead the creation of a larger client partner program, bringing others onboard so that they ultimately can focus their attentions on just two or three clients, which is far fewer than most communicators have to juggle, he said. “This speaks to a problem that’s across the agency landscape,” Marklein said.

Nieland, who for the last eight years was an executive VP in Weber Shandwick's global tech practice, said he sees the new job as an opportunity to establish best practices around client experience and grow the client partner offering across Big Valley. “This is someone who lives and breathes accounts and helps the team deliver expectations,” he said.

Marklein said Nieland's hiring is a hallmark in the evolution of the agency, which he founded in 2014 to serve Silicon Valley. The agency has done work for Symantec, Bain Capital Ventures, Sitecore and FourKites among others.