I am trying to remember the word that describes a person who holds a certain title and appears as the person who is making the decisions but in reality there is someone else who is actually making the decisions and pulling the strings. So this person is essentially just in title and the person behind the scenes is the real person who that title belongs to. The latter could be a person or even a group of people.
So for example a stand in. Not quite an imposter. I thought there was a better word than stand-in or a front, but it is escaping me.
Puppet is what first came to mind but I had thought there was a word that was even more specific.