Associate Director - Presales (Managed IT Operations)

Datacom; Wellington; Hybrid; NZD 120,000 - 150,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading IT services provider in Wellington is seeking an Associate Director – Pre-Sales to manage pre-sales activities and lead high-quality bid responses. The role requires strong expertise in IT Managed Services, bid management, and team leadership. Candidates should have a strong commercial acumen and proven experience in a similar field. A flexible working model is available to support work-life balance.

Benefits

Social events

Chill-out spaces

Remote working

Professional development courses

Qualifications

• Strong background in IT Managed Services in an outsource capacity.
• Experience in leading pre-sales teams for IT services.
• Expertise in financial management including IFRS and cashflow principles.

Responsibilities

• Manage pre-sales activity across Managed Operations.
• Oversee the end-to-end bid process ensuring quality responses.
• Lead and develop a high-performing pre-sales team.

Skills

IT Managed Services expertise

Bid management

Solution design

Commercial acumen

Leadership and communication skills

Job description

Our Why

Datacom works with organisations and communities across Australia and New Zealand to make a difference in people’s lives and help organisations use the power of tech to innovate and grow.

About the Role (your why)

The Associate Director – Pre-Sales will be responsible for driving the pre-sales activity across the Managed Operations domains ensuring the delivery of high-quality bid responses and managing complex deals. This role requires close collaboration with other Line of Business (LoB) and Market teams, sales, delivery, and technical teams to develop tailored responses that meet customer needs and business goals. The leader will be responsible for ensuring a high-performing and efficient pre-sales team, fostering a culture of excellence, collaboration, and continuous improvement.

Our offices are based in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch. We like to bring people together in person when we can, but we are mindful of the benefits of working from home for work/ life balance. We therefore leave it to you and the team you join to figure out what works best!

What you’ll do

The Associate Director – Pre-Sales (ITO) is responsible for (but not limited to):

Deal Management:

• Acting as a central point of contact for deal structuring and pricing, balancing competitive market requirements with profitability objectives aligned to stakeholder objectives
• Leading the assessment of risk and value in complex deals, negotiating terms that align with organisational objectives
• Supporting deal review processes with executive leadership, providing insights into win probability, solution design, and financial viability

Collaboration with Sales:

• Working closely with sales leadership to align pre-sales activities with the broader sales strategy and pipeline management
• Delivering solutions with innovative commercial deal structures and constructs to show differentiation vs market competitors, with a focus on intently listening to customers and solutioning the desired outcomes for Datacom and the customer
• Collaborating with account teams to tailor solutions for specific client needs, leveraging internal and partner capabilities
• Serve as a trusted advisor for sales teams, providing market insights and expertise in Managed Operations to guide deal pursuit

Bid Response Leadership:

• Overseeing and managing the end-to-end bid process, ensuring timely and high-quality responses to RFPs, RFIs, and proposals
• Ensuring bid velocity through development and management of high-paced bid engine, with the speed and quality of output to ensure successful submissions and positive win rates
• Aligning bid resourcing profiles to right-size deal and bid teams, managing correct levels of expertise and skillsets balanced with pre-sales budgeting controls
• Developing bid strategies aligned with client needs, collaborating with SMEs to ensure technical and service-based accuracy of submissions
• Ensuring that all bid materials reflect the organisation’s capabilities and align with strategic business goals

Team Leadership & Efficiency:

• Leading and developing a high-performing pre-sales team, fostering a culture of accountability, innovation, and continuous improvement
• Implementing efficient pre-sales processes and tools to optimise resource allocation and ensure scalability in high-demand periods
• Mentoring and developing Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) in IT Managed Services to deepen domain expertise across the team

We are a pretty agile company, and are keen to respond to customer, technology and internal stakeholders’ changing requirements and this can mean we evolve in our roles to meet those needs.

What you’ll bring

• Strong background and SME capabilities across IT Managed Services in an outsource capability, including capabilities like Intelligent Workspace, End User Experience, Server Management, Cloud Managed Services, Service Management and Service Operations
• Strong background in bid management, solution design, and deal structuring with a focus on large-scale IT services
• Strong commercial acumen across deal curation, financial management including IFRS, cashflow, amortisation and finance principles such as overheads, allocations etc
• Proven experience in leading pre-sales teams, preferably in IT Managed Services environments
• Expertise in collaborating with sales, delivery, and technical teams to develop client-centric solutions
• Strong leadership, communication, and negotiation skills

Why join us here at Datacom?

Datacom is one of Australia and New Zealand’s largest suppliers of Information Technology professional services. We have managed to maintain a dynamic, agile, small business feel that is often diluted in larger organisations of our size. It\'s our people that give Datacom its unique culture and energy that you can feel from the moment you meet with us.

We care about our people and provide a range of perks such as social events, chill-out spaces, remote working, flexi-hours and professional development courses to name a few. You’ll have the opportunity to learn, develop your career, connect and bring your true self to work. You will be recognised and valued for your contributions and be able to do your work in a collegial, flat-structured environment.

We operate at the forefront of technology to help Australia and New Zealand’s largest enterprise organisations explore possibilities and solve their greatest challenges, so you will never run out of interesting new challenges and opportunities.

We want Datacom to be an inclusive and welcoming workplace for everyone and take pride in the steps we have taken and continue to take to make our environment fun and friendly, and our people feel supported.

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