Director Solution Engineering

Company Description

Zayo provides mission-critical bandwidth to the world’s most impactful companies, fueling the innovations that are transforming our society. Zayo’s 133,000-mile network in North America and Europe includes extensive metro connectivity to thousands of buildings and data centers. Zayo’s communications infrastructure solutions include dark fiber, private data networks, wavelengths, Ethernet, and dedicated Internet access. Zayo serves wireless and wireline carriers, media, tech, content, finance, healthcare and other large enterprises.

Position Description

The Director, Solution Engineering (SE Dir.) is primarily responsible for enabling Solution Engineers (SEs) to maximize their potential in driving top line revenue in partnership with Sales. This Second-Line Manager (2LM) position will be responsible for coaching the SEs reporting to them to best navigate their day-to-day responsibilities and ongoing trajectory within their role, requiring both a thorough tactical and thorough strategic understanding of the role and responsibilities of the SE, including technical expertise, business and customer expertise, and workflow and process expertise. The SE Dir. is expected to occasionally be a “player-coach” and dive into opportunity-oriented work while also bringing management-level engagement to deal-level and customer-level engagement, both internally and externally.

As a 2LM, the SE Dir. will be responsible for driving a mentor-like relationship with each of their direct reports. As such, the SE Dir. is expected to bring the utmost integrity to their day-to-day interactions internally and externally, and is expected to handle confidential or sensitive matters within their purview with the utmost professionalism. Additionally, the SE Dir. is expected to be focused on talent development, engagement and retention within their teams, and be an evangelist of the SE Organization within the broader Zayo community.

Reporting to the Vice President of Solution Engineering, the SE Dir. will be responsible for not only ensuring compliance with pre-defined metrics of SE team performance, both in aggregate and at the individual level, but also contributing regularly to the development of strategy, tools, and measurements that allow for overall organizational growth. The SE Dir. will typically be tasked with strategic projects that further the broader mission and guiding principles of the SE Organization.

Responsibilities:

Leadership and Strategic Development

• Leading a team of five first-level managers with a total span of control of about 40 people within a defined scope, maximize the potential of direct reports relative to driving new revenue and otherwise fulfilling the mission and guiding principles of the SE Organization
• Serve as the primary mentor for direct reports across all elements of day-to-day and long-term role and responsibilities to maximize engagement and retention
• Serve as the primary point of technical and solutioning escalation for customers and internal stakeholders represented within the team
• Serve as a feedback loop between SEs and higher leadership levels to ensure organizational direction is clearly disseminated to the team and to ensure that directional feedback from SEs is adequately captured
• Manage the day-to-day responsibility queue of the SE team and drive activity to ensure fulsome completion of all needs in a manner that meets or exceeds SLA targets

Sales Focus and Solution Design

• Provide management-level technical consultation to customers and internal stakeholders to accelerate the sales cycle and drive opportunities from development to close
• Provide coaching to direct reports and others within the ecosystem to navigate complex solutioning scenarios
• Ensure fulsome communication among and between Sales and SE ecosystems to enable Sales priorities to be dynamically responded to by Solution Engineering
• Engage directly in solutioning on an as-needed basis

Technical Expertise

• Provide guidance to Sales and SEs on the most complex solutioning scenarios
• Keep abreast of competitive landscape and emerging technologies in order to best position Zayo in the marketplace
• Define opportunities for coaching of Sales and SEs in a technical, product or business-oriented manner

General

• Adhere to all company standards and overall business professionalism
• Maintain confidentiality in sensitive personnel matters
• Ensure all projects and tasks are completed accurately, timely, and independently
• Demonstrate regular, consistent, and punctual attendance
• Be a trusted expert for all matters technical
• Perform other duties as assigned

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or a related field, or equivalent experience
• Twelve (12) years’ experience in a technical or sales role within the telecommunications industry, with at least seven (7) years as a peer leader in technical sales engineering or Solution Engineering role
• Previous experience in a leadership role, especially a Sales or Sales/Solution Engineering leadership role preferred
• Demonstrated leadership and coaching capabilities a must
• Expert-level technical and design skills with MAN and WAN technologies required
• Experience with Colocation and Cloud IaaS offerings a plus
• Excellent presentation skills (development and delivery) with experience in front of CIO, CTO and other stakeholders
• Ability to handle sensitive issues with discretion and confidentiality
• Ability to handle ambiguity, and anticipate and quickly react to changes in a fast-paced, team-oriented environment
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills, including ability to explain technical concepts to laypersons in simple, understandable terms
• Consistent focus on results and goal achievement
• Preferred Areas of Technical Background:
  • Expertise in networking protocols (emphasis on OSI Layers 1, 2, and 3)
  • Understanding of Fiber Optic network design and implementation
  • Expert-level understanding of the telecom ecosystem and customer technology ecosystems

CO base pay range: $118,400 - $165,800

Benefits, Rewards & Wellness

• Excellent Health, Dental & Vision Insurance

• Retirement 401(k) Savings Plan

• Fitness membership discounts

• Generous paid time off policy including paid parental leave

Zayo provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state, provincial or local laws.

This policy applies to all terms and conditions of employment, including recruiting, hiring, placement, promotion, termination, layoff, recall, transfer, leaves of absence, compensation and training.