Manager, IT – Business Relationship

Breakthru Beverage Minnesota Beer, LLC; United States; Hybrid; USD 90,000 - 110,000; Full time

Job summary

Breakthru Beverage Group is seeking a Business Relationship Manager (BRM) to serve as the primary IT liaison for one or more business functions. The BRM will govern the initiative portfolio, develop business cases, manage budgeting, and report to executives, aligning IT strategy with BBG's product-centric operating model.

This role requires strong communication, financial acumen, and cross‑functional leadership.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s Degree in Information Technology, Business or related field.
• 5+ years of increasing responsibility in information technology, with demonstrated experience in portfolio management, business case development, and/or IT financial planning
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills; ability to translate complex technical subjects into clear business terms and present to executive audiences
• Ability to manage complex business issues, identify root causes, and actively resolve problems leveraging cross-functional partnerships
• Proficient in Microsoft Office 365 (Excel, PowerPoint, Word); experience with project/portfolio management tools (e.g., ServiceNow, Jira, or similar)
• Comfortable driving change and embracing innovation in complex, ambiguous environments. Must be result-oriented with the ability to multi-task and meet deadlines

Responsibilities

• Strategic Business Partnering Establish and maintain trusted relationships with assigned business-function leadership teams, key executives, and cross-functional stakeholders.
• Proactively engage business partners to surface demand, understand strategic priorities, and identify opportunities for technology-enabled value creation.
• Serve as the voice of the business within IT — translating goals, challenges, and opportunities into actionable technology initiatives aligned with BBG's enterprise roadmap.
• Communicate BBG's IT strategy, application portfolio, service catalog, and emerging technical capabilities to ensure the business fully leverages technology investments.
• Lead end-to-end business case creation for technology initiatives, partnering with business sponsors to articulate strategic rationale, scope, and expected outcomes.
• Own initiative-level budgets for the assigned portfolio, tracking actual spend versus plan on a monthly cadence and flagging variances with recommended corrective actions.

Skills

Portfolio management

Business communication

Problem solving

Cross-functional collaboration

Change management

Education

Bachelor’s Degree in Information Technology, Business or related field

Tools

Microsoft Office 365

ServiceNow

Jira

Job description

Time Type

Full time

Job Family Group

Information Technology

Job Description Summary

The Business Relationship Manager (BRM) serves as the primary interface between IT and one or more BBG business functions. This role is the main contact point for business leadership and stakeholders and is responsible for governing their initiatives’ portfolio by identifying and formulating technology initiatives, leading business case development, managing initiative‑level financials, and providing executive reporting — aligning with BBG's transition to a product‑centric IT operating model. The BRM understands current and emerging critical Business Function objectives, and communicates needs to relevant IT development, delivery and support teams. The BRM also deeply understands and communicates BBG’s IT Strategy, application portfolio, catalog of IT services and technical capabilities to the Business Function to ensure BBG fully leverages investments in technology solutions. The BRM coordinates IT demand across the business with other BRMs to support the development of a single integrated project portfolio spanning all BBG functions. The BRM role reaches beyond projects by maintaining focus on overall IT performance and acts as an escalation path for issues that are not being fully resolved in line with the relevant Service Level Agreement (SLA). The role requires equal fluency in technology strategy, financial analysis, and stakeholder communication.

Job Description

This role follows a flexible hybrid schedule, with two days per week in the office and three days working from home.

Job Responsibilities

• Strategic Business Partnering Establish and maintain trusted relationships with assigned business‑function leadership teams, key executives, and cross‑functional stakeholders.
• Proactively engage business partners to surface demand, understand strategic priorities, and identify opportunities for technology‑enabled value creation.
• Serve as the voice of the business within IT — translating goals, challenges, and opportunities into actionable technology initiatives aligned with BBG's enterprise roadmap.
• Communicate BBG's IT strategy, application portfolio, service catalog, and emerging technical capabilities to ensure the business fully leverages technology investments.

• Financial Tracking and Budget Management Lead end‑to‑end business case creation for technology initiatives, partnering with business sponsors to articulate strategic rationale, scope, and expected outcomes.
• Continuously validate that funded initiatives still serve the approved business case; recommend scope, sequencing, or continuation changes when assumptions shift.
• Own initiative‑level budgets for the assigned portfolio, tracking actual spend versus plan on a monthly cadence and flagging variances with recommended corrective actions.
• Collaborate with Finance and IT leadership to transition from project‑based funding toward product‑line funding models where applicable.

• Portfolio and Project Oversight Manage the centralized intake pipeline for strategic and enhancement requests, ensuring each initiative is properly captured, categorized, and triaged.
• Maintain a prioritized portfolio backlog across assigned product lines, coordinating with product‑line owners and other BRMs to align sequencing with enterprise capacity and strategic value.
• Monitor initiative health (scope, schedule, budget, risk) across the assigned portfolio; proactively identify challenged initiatives and recommend whether to continue, restructure, pause, or discontinue.
• Participate in cross‑portfolio program increment planning to align delivery timelines, resolve resource contention, and manage cross‑initiative dependencies.

• Executive Governance and Reporting Prepare and present portfolio status updates, decision briefs, and escalation summaries for ELT SteerCo and other governance forums.
• Frame executive decisions clearly: articulate options, tradeoffs, and recommendations when initiatives compete for shared resources or require reprioritization.
• Maintain governance artifacts — decision logs, escalation trackers, and risk registers — to ensure transparency and continuity across planning cycles.

• Value Realization and Metrics Define outcome‑based KPIs for each major initiative; establish baselines prior to delivery and track post‑implementation benefits to quantify realized value.
• Hold stakeholders accountable for value capture — partner with business owners to ensure organizational changes needed for benefit realization are executed.

• Cross‑Portfolio Collaboration Coordinate with peer BRMs and product‑line owners across business domains to identify enterprise‑wide synergies and avoid duplicative investment.
• Maintain cross‑project dependency views; proactively surface collision points, shared‑milestone risks, and sequencing conflicts to leadership.
• Contribute to the development of BRM team standards, templates, and best practices that drive consistency across the function.

• Other duties, as assigned by the jobholder’s supervisor, may also be required.

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelor’s Degree in Information Technology, Business or related field.
• 5+ years of increasing responsibility in information technology, with demonstrated experience in portfolio management, business case development, and/or IT financial planning
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills; ability to translate complex technical subjects into clear business terms and present to executive audiences
• Ability to manage complex business issues, identify root causes, and actively resolve problems leveraging cross‑functional partnerships
• Proficient in Microsoft Office 365 (Excel, PowerPoint, Word); experience with project/portfolio management tools (e.g., ServiceNow, Jira, or similar)
• Comfortable driving change and embracing innovation in complex, ambiguous environments. Must be result‑oriented with the ability to multi‑task and meet deadlines

Preferred Qualifications

• BRMP, CBRM, or PMP certification
• Experience with either SAP S/4HANA, Salesforce/CRM, or Modern Data & AI platforms
• Wholesale distribution or complex supply chain industry background a plus
• Familiarity with investment prioritization frameworks and capacity‑based planning

Physical Requirements

• While performing the duties of this job, the employee is regularly required to, stand, sit; talk, hear, and use hands and fingers to operate a computer and telephone.

Competencies

• Connects business objectives to technology strategy; anticipates how changes in one domain ripple across the portfolio.
• Builds coalition across competing sponsor priorities; navigates difficult tradeoffs without damaging relationships.
• Coordinates across BRM peers, product‑line owners, and delivery teams to resolve dependencies and maximize enterprise value.
• Operates effectively when scope, timelines, and priorities shift; makes sound recommendations with incomplete information.

This job description is only a summary of the typical functions of this position, not an exhaustive or comprehensive list of all possible job responsibilities, tasks and duties. Responsibilities, tasks, and duties of individual jobholders may vary from the above description.

Salary Range: 90,000 - 110,000

Bonus : 20%

Breakthru Beverage Group is an equal opportunity employer. We evaluate qualified applicants without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, veteran status, genetic information and other legally protected characteristics. The EEO is the Law poster is available here . If you need a reasonable accommodation because of a disability for any part of the employment process, please call [phone] and let us know the nature of your request and your contact information.