Director, Corporate Strategy & Business Transformation

Western Digital; San Jose (CA); On-site; USD 166,000 - 237,000; Full time

Job summary

An established industry player is seeking a dynamic leader to spearhead transformation initiatives that will drive innovation and operational efficiency. This role involves collaborating with corporate and product teams to implement strategic growth alternatives, including mergers and acquisitions. The ideal candidate will have extensive experience in managing complex transformation programs and will thrive in a fast-paced environment. Join a forward-thinking company committed to pushing the boundaries of technology and making a significant impact on the future of data storage.

Benefits

Paid vacation time

Medical/dental/vision insurance

401(k) plan

Tuition reimbursement

Employee stock purchase plan

Flexible spending accounts

Employee assistance program

Qualifications

• 7+ years of experience in strategic transformation preferred.
• Proven experience in managing complex, cross-functional programs.

Responsibilities

• Set up transformation program office and governance model.
• Collaborate with teams to execute company-wide transformation.
• Track initiative progress for transparency and decision-making.

Skills

Strategic thinking and planning

Financial modeling and analysis

Project/program management

Risk management

Leadership and team development

Effective communication and stakeholder engagement

Education

Bachelor's degree in engineering

MBA/MS from top tier institution

Job description

Salary Range: 166,940.00-236,500.00

Company Description

At Western Digital, our vision is to power global innovation and push the boundaries of technology to make what you thought was once impossible, possible.

At our core, Western Digital is a company of problem solvers. People achieve extraordinary things given the right technology. For decades, we’ve been doing just that—our technology helped people put a man on the moon and capture the first-ever picture of a black hole.

We offer an expansive portfolio of technologies, HDDs, and platforms for business, creative professionals, and consumers alike under our Western Digital, WD, WD_BLACK, and SanDisk Professional brands.

We are a key partner to some of the largest and highest-growth organizations in the world. From enabling systems to make cities safer and more connected, to powering the data centers behind many of the world’s biggest companies and hyperscale cloud providers, to meeting the massive and ever-growing data storage needs of the AI era, Western Digital is fueling a brighter, smarter future.

Today’s exceptional challenges require your unique skills. Together, we can build the future of data storage.

Job Description

Job Summary: This leader will partner with corporate, operations and product teams to play a key role in leading a broad set of transformation initiatives across the company. The primary responsibility is to support the company-wide Western Digital transformation program to accelerate innovation, drive efficiencies, modernize the way we operate, and to secure our competitive advantage. Further, the leader will have strong exposure in partnership with the Chief Strategy Officer to evaluate strategic growth alternatives, including: mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, license agreements, and strategic investments that support the company's overall business objectives. This role will include both strategic influence and support in the areas mentioned, as well as program management of assigned transformation initiatives according to agreed upon governance processes in partnership with senior initiative leaders.

Essential Duties And Responsibilities

• Set up transformation program office
• Support the leader in setting up the transformation office and building a matrixed team of workstream leads across the company including an efficient governance model. Support day-to-day transformation program level decisions, track and report results, and coordinate governance process for assigned initiatives.
• Support transformation program implementation
• Collaborate with initiative/workstream owners and cross-functional teams to execute the company wide transformation program.
• Ensure initiatives move into implementation and drive fast, pragmatic execution.
• Lead the actual execution of specific initiatives in partnership with workstream owners
• Serve as a support function to workstream owners, allowing line functions to focus on efficient implementation.
• Lead transformation program reporting
• Track and report initiative progress to create transparency and enable better, faster decision-making and results predictability, both for initiative teams and for senior executive leadership consumption.
• Ensure consistency between internal discussions and Board updates.
  

Stakeholder Engagement: Build and maintain strong relationships with key stakeholders, including the strategy and corporate development team and the initiative/workstream owners involved in the transformation program.

Qualifications

REQUIRED:

• Bachelor's degree in engineering; MBA/MS from top tier institution preferred
• Minimum of 7 years of experience with strong exposure to strategic transformation, experience in top tier management consulting/investment bank followed by technology company preferred
• Proven experience in successfully orchestrating/program-managing complex, company-wide, cross-functional transformation programs and delivering results at or beyond expectations.
• Willingness to work in a fast-paced “private equity like” environment
• Strong analytical, problem-solving, and decision-making skills
• Excellent leadership and communication abilities, strong financial skills
  
  

Skills

• Strategic thinking and planning
• Financial modeling and analysis
• Project/program management
• Risk management
• Leadership and team development
• Effective communication and stakeholder engagement
  
  

Additional Information

Western Digital is committed to providing equal opportunities to all applicants and employees and will not discriminate against any applicant or employee based on their race, color, ancestry, religion (including religious dress and grooming standards), sex (including pregnancy, childbirth or related medical conditions, breastfeeding or related medical conditions), gender (including a person’s gender identity, gender expression, and gender-related appearance and behavior, whether or not stereotypically associated with the person’s assigned sex at birth), age, national origin, sexual orientation, medical condition, marital status (including domestic partnership status), physical disability, mental disability, medical condition, genetic information, protected medical and family care leave, Civil Air Patrol status, military and veteran status, or other legally protected characteristics. We also prohibit harassment of any individual on any of the characteristics listed above. Our non-discrimination policy applies to all aspects of employment. We comply with the laws and regulations set forth in the "Know Your Rights: Workplace Discrimination is Illegal” poster. Our pay transparency policy is available here.

Western Digital thrives on the power and potential of diversity. As a global company, we believe the most effective way to embrace the diversity of our customers and communities is to mirror it from within. We believe the fusion of various perspectives results in the best outcomes for our employees, our company, our customers, and the world around us. We are committed to an inclusive environment where every individual can thrive through a sense of belonging, respect and contribution.

Western Digital is committed to offering opportunities to applicants with disabilities and ensuring all candidates can successfully navigate our careers website and our hiring process. Please contact us at [e-mail] to advise us of your accommodation request. In your email, please include a description of the specific accommodation you are requesting as well as the job title and requisition number of the position for which you are applying.

Based on our experience, we anticipate that the application deadline will be 07-01-25 (3 months from posting), although we reserve the right to close the application process sooner if we hire an applicant for this position before the application deadline. If we are not able to hire someone from this role before the application deadline, we will update this

Compensation & Benefits Details

• An employee’s pay position within the salary range may be based on several factors including but not limited to (1) relevant education; qualifications; certifications; and experience; (2) skills, ability, knowledge of the job; (3) performance, contribution and results; (4) geographic location; (5) shift; (6) internal and external equity; and (7) business and organizational needs.
• The salary range is what we believe to be the range of possible compensation for this role at the time of this posting. We may ultimately pay more or less than the posted range and this range is only applicable for jobs to be performed in California, Colorado, New York or remote jobs that can be performed in California, Colorado and New York. This range may be modified in the future.
• You will be eligible to participate in Western Digital’s Short-Term Incentive (STI) Plan, which provides incentive awards based on Company and individual performance. Depending on your role and your performance, you may be eligible to participate in our annual Long-Term Incentive (LTI) program, which consists of restricted stock units (RSUs) or cash equivalents, pursuant to the terms of the LTI plan. Please note that not all roles are eligible to participate in the LTI program, and not all roles are eligible for equity under the LTI plan. RSU awards are also available to eligible new hires, subject to Western Digital’s Standard Terms and Conditions for Restricted Stock Unit Awards.
• We offer a comprehensive package of benefits including paid vacation time; paid sick leave; medical/dental/vision insurance; life, accident and disability insurance; tax-advantaged flexible spending and health savings accounts; employee assistance program; other voluntary benefit programs such as supplemental life and AD&D, legal plan, pet insurance, critical illness, accident and hospital indemnity; tuition reimbursement; transit; the Applause Program, employee stock purchase plan, and the Western Digital Savings 401(k) Plan.
• Note: No amount of pay is considered to be wages or compensation until such amount is earned, vested, and determinable. The amount and availability of any bonus, commission, benefits, or any other form of compensation and benefits that are allocable to a particular employee remains in the Company's sole discretion unless and until paid and may be modified at the Company’s sole discretion, consistent with the law.