Strategy Advisor

Introduction
IBM’s Industry Consultants are essential to our clients as they work to reinvent themselves for the future. Join our highly visible and highly skilled team of global consultants as we strive to accelerate sales deliver client engagements and build IBM’s market eminence. If you are a forward-thinker and a curious intellectual we welcome you to apply for your next exciting career challenge!

Your Role and Responsibilities
The Strategy Advisor will be responsible for managing a portfolio of our largest and most strategic customers to ensure successful adoption and expansion of the Apptio product suite. This position is an integral role at Apptio impacting the long-term success of the customer relationship. By developing and maintaining a high level of customer engagement the Strategy Advisor will partner with Account Management & Customer Success to ensure every customer realizes full value from their investment with Apptio.

With deep multi-domain expertise and an understanding of customer challenges and Technology Business Management (TBM) best practices Strategy Advisors leverage their strategic leadership and operational capabilities to help customers develop their TBM objectives while driving operational excellence and program governance. Strategy Advisors are accountable for driving customer adoption and success across a portfolio of customers by engaging broadly across the organizations from C-Level executives through operational staff focusing in particular on those in the TBM Office.

Strategy Advisors are customer-directed specialists solely focused on creating wildly successful customers through large scale programs involving change management innovation and developing processes and capabilities that make TBM internally sustainable. Strategy Advisors will help to accelerate and mature practices related to TBM which encompasses Business and IT Strategy IT Operational Management and IT Financial Performance Management.

Leadership & Influence
Strong self-starter with the ability to build a network within Apptio and your assigned portfolio of customers
Demonstrate ability to communicate present and influence credibly and effectively at all levels of a customer’s technology organization
Motivate inspire and coordinate a multidisciplinary internal Apptio team to solve customer challenges without direct management responsibility
Employ strong teamwork facilitation and soft skills such as listening and empathy

Strategic Consulting

• Credible and effective C-level advisor/coach especially with regards to the TBM discipline
• Experience with Organizational Change Management (OCM) Transformation Programs and IT Governance
• Consultative approach including the ability to translate customer needs into TBM outcomes
• Well versed within the fields of Organizational Efficiency and Operational Excellence

Innovation & thinking outside the box

• Capable of translating business initiatives and challenges into actionable roadmap and solutions
• Creatively solve problems with limited input and resources in a fast-paced high-pressure environment
• Inquisitive mind and passion for learning about customers industries and new approaches to doing things
• Always learning about IT industry drivers trends and technologies

Advisory

• Evangelize Technology Business Management (TBM) and its three subdomains:
  • Technology Financial Management (TFM)
  • Cloud Financial Management (FinOps)
  • Strategic Portfolio Management (Lean Agile & DevOps)
• Engage regularly with customers via workshops operational and business reviews to evaluate needs and strategic direction and align with a clear roadmap
• Find mentor and develop process owners into TBM Champions
• Develop and maintain long-term relationships with stakeholders in the account portfolio where appropriate by networking between customers partners and Apptio

Customer Advocacy

• Drive user adoption across the customer organizations by understanding their specific challenges and helping them to operationalize and realize benefit from their deployed TBM solution
• Understand and document customer process workflows that apply to TBM and implement strategies that integrate Apptio to those processes
• Identify risks to the customer achieving their stated business goals and develop then execute appropriate mitigation plans
• Mentor customers’ ability to become “insight hunters” by helping them uncover nuggets of information that will drive measurable value
• Serve as liaison between our customers and various Apptio teams to ensure that needs / requirements critical to customer success are understood and effectively communicated including gathering customer product feedback to shape product roadmap development

Thought Leadership

• Develop internal and external facing collateral to:
  • Support customer adoption efforts
  • Expand the knowledgebase & best practices leveraged by Apptio Teams
• Contribute internally to the Customer Success organization by sharing domain knowledge and advancing best practices and advisory skills including but not limited to:
  • Lead and contribute to internal projects and initiatives
  • Serve as a Subject Matter Expert (SME) for specific domain or process area
  • Contribute thought leadership and best practice on how to “Run IT Like a Business”

Stakeholder & Program Management

• Support the completion of project deliverables by assisting with sponsor / executive coordination within the customer process invocation / alignment and value conversations
• Establish and maintain relationships with ecosystem of implementation partners including but not limited to:
  • Provision of oversight and governance for partner-led projects
  • Liaison between partner organization and Apptio including acting as escalation point
• Drive key adoption metrics in line with company targets across your portfolio
• Working with Account Management & Customer Success Managers to drive customer renewals in line with company targets

Required Technical and Professional Expertise

• B.A. or B.S. ideally in a Technology Finance or Business-related discipline or equivalent work experience
• Demonstrable experience in a customer facing relationship role managing multiple clients in portfolio
• Most successful candidates having experience within the IT Finance and/or Technology industry

Preferred Technical and Professional Expertise