Director, Corporate Strategy

Scotts Miracle-Gro; United States; Remote; USD 176,000 - 207,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Live Total Health

401K match

Stock purchase discount

Adoption assistance

Employee Resource Groups

Community service

Job summary

Scotts Miracle-Gro is seeking a Director of Corporate Strategy & AI Intelligence to lead AI-driven market intelligence and strategic decisioning for growth in home, lawn, and garden.

You will steer partnerships, build-vs-buy analyses, and due diligence across M&A and New Business Development with a high-velocity, tech-enabled approach. The role requires senior strategic leadership and hands-on AI expertise.

Qualifications

• 7–10+ years of progressive experience in Corporate Strategy, Management Consulting, Venture Capital, or Corporate Development/M&A.
• Proven track record designing and executing Partner/Build/Buy frameworks and market sizing.
• 3+ years of people management of analysts or strategic managers.
• Bachelor’s degree in Business, Economics, Engineering; MBA or advanced degree preferred.

Responsibilities

• AI Exploration & Market Intelligence: research and pilot AI tools for partnerships and market forecasting.
• Strategic Advisory: recommend Partner/Build/Buy options based on AI insights and market analysis.
• Cross-Functional Shared Service: provide technical insights for due diligence and product enhancement.
• Team Leadership: manage the AI Market Intelligence team including Managers and Analysts.
• Daily Tool Utilization: integrate AI tools and automated workflows into daily operations.
• Collaborate with Directors of M&A and New Business Development and participate in monthly Sync-and-Accelerate meetings.

Skills

AI strategy & leadership

Market intelligence

Team leadership

Cross-functional collaboration

Python/R

M&A framework design

Education

Bachelor's degree in Business, Economics, Engineering

MBA or advanced degree

Tools

Python

Tableau/PowerBI

LangChain/Make/Zapier

Vector databases

Job description

Here at Scotts Miracle-Gro there is no such thing as a typical day. Our culture is constantly energized by new and exciting growth opportunities and at a rapid pace. Below are details on an open job.

As the Director of Corporate Strategy & AI Intelligence, you will serve as “The Scout” for the Strategic Acceleration Business Unit. You will lead the charge in researching, piloting, and leveraging emerging AI tools and Large Language Models (LLMs) to uncover new growth opportunities, map competitive intelligence, and provide automated workflow insights. Your primary mandate is to define whether the company should “Partner, Build, or Buy” when evaluating new concepts to expand our home, lawn, and garden footprint.

Everyday you will:

• AI Exploration & Market Intelligence: Research and pilot cutting-edge AI tools to uncover potential corporate partners, conduct market forecasting, and deliver deep competitive intelligence.

• Strategic Advisory (“Partner vs. Build vs. Buy”): Formulate data-driven strategic recommendations for the Business Development and M&A teams based on AI insights and market analysis.

• Cross-Functional Shared Service: Operate as a centralized technical resource, providing technical insights to the M&A team (for due diligence) and the New Business Development team (for product enhancement).

• Team Leadership: Directly manage the AI Market Intelligence team, including Managers and Analysts focused on M&A, Strategic Planning, and Portfolio Enhancement.

• Daily Tool Utilization: Integrate advanced AI tools and automated workflows into daily strategic operations to maintain a high-velocity innovation pipeline.

• Key Collaborators: Cross-functional collaboration with the Directors of M&A and New Business Development. Participation in monthly “Sync-and-Accelerate” meetings.

To thrive in this role you must be:

Strategy & Business Leadership

• Experience: 7–10+ years of progressive experience in Corporate Strategy, Management Consulting (e.g., McKinsey, BCG, Bain), Venture Capital, or Corporate Development/M&A.

• Framework Mastery: Proven track record of designing and executing “Partner, Build, or Buy” frameworks, market sizing (TAM/SAM), and commercial due diligence.

• People Management: 3+ years of experience directly managing and developing high-performing teams of analysts or strategic managers.

• Education: Bachelor’s degree in Business, Economics, Engineering, or a related field. MBA or advanced degree is highly preferred.

Technical Execution & AI Proficiency

• Hands-on AI Experience: Demonstrated experience piloting and deploying LLM-powered solutions, custom GPTs, or retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) workflows to solve business problems.

• Data & Scripting Skills: Proficiency with Python or R for data analysis, market scraping, or API utilization (e.g., interacting with OpenAI, Anthropic, or Hugging Face APIs).

• The Tech Stack: Familiarity with modern data architectures, including vector databases (e.g., Pinecone, Chroma), business intelligence tools (Tableau, PowerBI), and workflow automation platforms (e.g., Make, Zapier, LangChain).

• AI Literacy: Deep understanding of current AI capabilities, limitations (hallucinations, data privacy, security restrictions), and cost structures (token management).

The starting budgeted pay range for this role will generally fall between $175,700.00 - $206,700.00 per year. Scotts will consider various factors in determining the actual pay including your skills, qualifications, experience, and geographical location.In addition to the determined base salary, this role is also incentive eligible under our corporate bonus programs.For remote roles where the final candidate resides in Alaska, California, Colorado, Illinois, New York, Oregon or Washington, state required pay thresholds will be factored into base salary.

Here at ScottsMiracle-Gro, we believe providing an enriching and engaging employee experience is what sets us apart from other organizations. We recognize our employees are so much more than just their job title so we offer programs and benefits that support them in all aspects of their lives. Wondering how we do it? Below is a glimpse of our highlight reel…

• Our Live Total Health program provides you with options to align to your personal needs. Selections range from medical, dental and vision coverage for you, your spouse/domestic partner and dependents to an outstanding wellness reimbursement program to an unbelievable 401K match (up to 7.5%) as well as a 15% discount on company stock and much more

• We know our talent is our most precious asset and your unique development contributes to our organization’s success now and in the future. Career growth at our company is not always a ladder. It’s much more like a rock climbing adventure. Grow through exploration and experiences rather than a predictable linear path.

• We value the importance of family. We provide access to Maven Family Planning and up to $30,000 to accommodate for adoption, fertility and surrogacy.

• Be part of something bigger by joining one of our Employee Resource Groups focusing on diversity and inclusion, family, education and sustainability : Scotts Women’s Network, Scotts Black Employees’ Network, Scotts Veterans Network, Scotts Young Professionals, Scotts Pride Network (GroPride), Scotts Associates for a Greener Earth (SAGE), Scotts Family TREE and our Associate Boards.

• Join a company with a strong belief in giving back to the communities where we live and work. We have a shared passion for service and volunteerism and believe participating in community service benefits our communities and strengthens our team.

Scotts is an EEO Employer, dedicated to a culturally diverse, drug free workplace.

EEO/AA Employer/Minority/Female/Disability/Veteran/Sexual Orientation/Gender Identity