GDS Microsoft Alliance Commercial Specialist - Associate Director

Position Summary:

The Microsoft Alliance Commercial Specialist is responsible for working with the Global Microsoft Alliance Relationship Director for one of EY’s largest and most strategic alliances to increase the investment year over year that we receive from our alliance partner. The Commercial Specialist will help manage the alliance relationship commercial activity including evaluating the alliance programs and securing appropriate approvals, working with GCO, QRM and Independence internally to enable EY’s participation in the program across Member Firm localization. The specialist will act as lead commercial negotiator / subject matter resource to increase velocity of contracting while reducing systemic risk. This role is part of the Global Alliance and Ecosystem Relationship Program which has responsibility for:

• Increasing Global sales and revenue, by leveraging EY’s alliance relationships to drive sales and delivery assisted and influenced by alliances across joint solutions, campaigns and active engagement in the field
• Increasing pipeline of EY opportunities through collaboration with alliance partner
• Increasing win rates and reduce delivery risk through collaboration with alliances

Essential Functions of the Job:

• Interact with the alliance partner (Microsoft) to interpret new programs, develop plan for how EY will leverage and optimize programs, and coordinate across teams to define processes to execute upon the repeatable aspects of the program
• Secure internal approvals to participate in new programs, including leading commercial negotiations
• Manage process to ensure that we show up in alliance company reporting and show up on their scorecard (Quota relief, deal registration) as required by the programs
• Manage EY’s participation on Alliance partner marketplaces to meet needs of programs while balancing global and local legal and independence complexities)
• Manage the alliance infrastructure such as partner program administration & deal registration that lead to further investment available to EY
• Provide management oversight and direction of the offshore team that manages on-going execution of program such as localization of programs to other EY member firms.
• Provide coordination support across Sector, regions, Areas

Analytical/Decision Making Responsibilities:

• Manage complex relationships with multiple stakeholders often with competing priorities, and understand when to escalate to Global Alliance Commercial Manager, Alliance Relationship Director, or Alliance Leader
• Ability to balance evaluating and building new programs while running existing programs
• Evaluate activities, efforts, requests against agreed strategy and plan as well as EY policies
• Assess and prioritize and manage financial requests against limited/set budgets as defined by allocated investments

Knowledge and Skills Requirements:

• Deep understanding of EY matrixed structure and stakeholder
• ability to identify who, where and how decisions are made within EY functional/regional/sector matrix
• ability to figure out how to access those stakeholders
• ability to craft and target communications that are carefully tailored to each audience
• Understanding of the specific technologies and solutions
• Ability to understand the broad array of technologies and solutions, client issues, and competitive landscape relevant for the Alliance
• Understand nuances and variables across technologies/solutions drive different marketing, sales, and delivery models 
• Understand how the business model for each technology/solution fits within EY’s strategy and the Alliance partner’s strategy
• Deep understanding of the consulting sales process and client-delivery process
• Ability to understand the technology and partner/EY sales model and apply understanding in order to interpret partner programs and how they should be applied within EY
• Ability to craft and refine executive-level content and communications
• Apply appropriate judgement and evaluate & prioritize appropriate programs and make high-level operational decisions

Supervision Responsibilities:

• Must be able to operate primarily independently to drive activation and engagement, direct activities of those in other practice areas or functions who do not report to the Alliance Commercial Specialist and be comfortable working with and providing guidance to resources senior to the Alliance Manager.

Other Requirements:

• Ability to travel up to 10% as needed

Job Requirements:

Education:

• Bachelor’s Degree preferably in Engineering or Technology
• Postgraduate preferably MBA (Business, Marketing or Communications)
• Microsoft certifications (e.g., Azure Fundamentals) are not mandatory but demonstrate commitment to the ecosystem

Experience:

• 15+ years of total experience working in technology and professional services environments, prior experience in Big Four, consulting, or large-scale tech ecosystems is highly valued
• 8+ years in Microsoft Commercial Management 
• Proven experience collaborating with diverse stakeholders (both internal and external) in a virtual environment, across geographies.