Pre-Sales Technical Programme Manager

The Requirement The Central Pre-Sales and Bid team play a key role in the sales cycle, ensuring we achieve a technical win in every engagement with the client. The client must see our solution as being the very best fit to their needs than any of our competitors’ solutions. To do this our demonstration systems need to be the best. They are our shop window, the view our customers see as being what they could achieve. Our demonstration systems should be the very best systems the company has and must showcase not just the extensive functional maturity of our solutions, but the benefits of the cloud/hosted platform we provide. To support the above the Pre-Sales function now has a vacancy for a Technical Programme Manager to manage the build, support and delivery of its many demonstration systems. Building and updating demonstration systems requires significant coordination of input from lots of functions, liaising with Development on new solutions, Professional Services to install, Hosting and Cloud Ops regarding the environment, IT regarding desktop matters and other parts of the Advanced Business as required. This role will be the focal point for our systems, working with the Pre-Sales team to understand demonstration needs then building projects to coordinate input to deliver these systems in a timely manner. The role is focused around managing the process, this requires excellent programme management skills plus a technical literacy to understand each step in the equation and work with the relevant function to ensure completion. It is not about building and maintaining systems yourself, it is to programme manage all updates and builds, coordinating input from multiple agencies and ensuring best practice in the build of systems to maximise future efficiency. The Goal The Goal is to have all Pre-Sales systems centrally hosted, updated in line with our internal “GTM” product release and go to market programme and provide the ability to quickly spin up new environments or copy environments as required. Specifically we want to provide to the Pre-Sales team: · Demonstration Masters – A “Clean” copy of all systems where all new core and new features are built in order to be able to clone to new environments · Demo environments – A clone of the master to provide a single environment for all Pre-Sales consultants to access · Opportunity Specific clones – where an opportunity requires a heavily customised demo we will create a clone of the master environment to spin up · Rapid responses – The demo estate needs to be built in such a way as to make the creation of new environments fast and scalable. Responsibilities: Manage the process of building and maintaining demonstration systems across the team by: · Initially o Build a plan for a full demo estate based on the existing footprint, the documented requirements, and the go forward needs of the team o Work with Development, Support, Cloud Ops, IT, and PS to build an effort estimate and timeline for the build o Pull together detailed programmes of work for each strand of the estate and work with the stakeholders to schedule resources. o Programme manage the build of the estate, ensuring any changes to the plan are incorporated and communicated properly and working with each person involved in the build to resolve issues and ensure they have the right access levels. o Ensure proper handover of each system to the Pre-Sales team · Post initial project o Attending GTM’s for new product releases as well as work with Pre-Sales attendees on other GTM’s to understand requirements for demo systems o Project Manage the building of new systems and maintenance/updating of existing systems through: § Working alongside Hosting Development Ops and Cloud Ops to specific the provision of new environments for demo systems and project manage timelines § Working with Development and Development Operations to coordinate their input to building of systems § Scheduling and managing work from Professional Services to install licences and software as well as configure systems § Liaising with the appropriate Pre-Sales Managers and Consultants to coordinate their input to systems, including, testing, data set up, demo customisation and access needs § Tightly manage deadlines and work with the relevant teams to ensure systems are built and handover in timely fashion, whilst setting realistic expectations around the team on timeframes. § Record details of elements that may have licences and their expiry dates to proactively ensure that the system is always available · General · Ensure all relevant stakeholders are kept informed of progress on systems · Work with function heads to schedule resources for work as appropriate · Work with the support team to manage any input needed for bug fixes, and ensure issues are correctly logged · Work with Pre-Sales team members to understand any specific requirements · Attend Pre-Sales team and wider Sales meetings as appropriate · Assist with any bespoke requirements · Document fully all components of the systems including any technical infrastructure, locations, access rights, versions etc · Liaise with Pre-Sales Managers to support the building of budgets for systems and required infrastructure/kit. · Maintain up to date project and deliverable plans · Work with other teams as appropriate · Provide regular reviews to assess whether we have the best method to show case our solution and make improvement recommendations Skills and experience required: Specific Pre-Sales experience is not necessary as we will provide training. However the successful candidates will demonstrate a number of key skills and attributes · Knowledge of at least one of our solution sets · Strong project and programme management skills · Good technical knowledge to be able to understand the needs of each stage of systems builds · Good communication skills to be able to clearly detail to each person what is required of them · Ability to work with senior managers and C Suite to identify priorities and gain support for programmes of work · Awareness of the needs of a Pre-Sales team and the absolute necessity of best practice demo systems · Have high level technical knowledge; software, environments, database technologies. · Commercial awareness; ability to understand and develop cost and effort models for each programme · Ability to report at various levels on progress · Goo