Job Description
As Account Director you will manage your accounts to deliver long term contracts and additional growth with full accountability for meeting and/or exceeding order, revenue, profit and cash targets. You will be fully accountable for driving sustainable growth within your accounts, creating strong and positive client relationships, overall customer satisfaction and delivery of contracts. You will ensure successful delivery of existing contracts and requirements, ensure customer expectations and service levels are met, and achieve long term client retention and contract growth.
You will need solid commercial and financial acumen, customer focus, commitment to delivery excellence and creativity in order to develop the strategy and direction for your accounts, aligned to Business Unit strategy and objectives. Working within a matrixed organisation as Account Director you will be required to lead and develop a highly effective and motivated team to ensure the execution of the strategy is successful. You will work with the wider Results team, and in particular the Product team, to support understanding of customer requirements, and the development of the short, medium and long term Product strategy for Results.
You will have the ability to effectively manage a range of stakeholders (internally and externally) and you will lead the strategic relationships within your designated customer accounts, including Managing Director level and C-suite relationships.
Financial and Commercial
* Fully accountable for their customer portfolio and accounts P&Ls, with accountability and responsibility for meeting and exceeding Order, Revenue, Profit and Cash targets set in line with budget.
* Understand financial & commercial risks and opportunities for their accounts and how they deliver to the overall sector those accounts operate within. Embed provided frameworks for assessing probability and impact and taking proactive management for any matters that require action to improve or deliver upon.
* Drive an important level of financial and commercial acumen across the teams that support and deliver for the portfolio of accounts led by the account director, through mentoring, coaching and support.
* Maintain a clear view of the financial performance (actual and forecast) of all elements of the account portfolio and be able to lead discussions confidently with the team and stakeholders across the business as required.
Customer Delivery and Satisfaction
* Accountable for delivery across the portfolio of accounts owned by the AD, ensuring that customer contracts and expectations are delivered by the team, across all stages of a customer/contract lifecycle.
* Ensure that service levels provided by the Functional Divisions meet the requirements of the existing and new contracts by working closely with the Head of Delivery role and the Customer Relationship Managers. Ensure service does not impact opportunity for growth and where it is at risk own corrective action planning to resolve.
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o Experience in developing regional/sector account/sales strategy that drives significant growth.
o Experience in managing multimillion pound IT service accounts and a portfolio of strategic accounts.
o Strong experience in successful key account planning using Miller Heiman or other planning tools.
o Proven experience of managing and motivating teams during periods of high pressure and operational challenge, in a high stakes, high volume, and high quality (ideally regulated) environment, excelling at maintaining a positive customer relationship.
o Experience of delivering, successfully and sustainably, against revenue, order intake, cost/profit, and cash collection/debt targets across a complex range of accounts
o Experience of leading strategic bid leadership and or contract renewal cycles to protect and grow revenue and profitability.
o Strong ability to develop and manage business relationships at all levels, including senior customer relationships, and to effectively influence senior internal stakeholders.
o Organisational planning, resource mobilisation and problem-solving abilities.
o Creative solutions to customer priorities and objectives
o Experience on-boarding new customers with a range of £50k up to £5m revenue per annum, into a managed service and/or the delivery of IT software and services change programmes is desirable.
o Ability to work effectively under pressure with competing and rapidly changing priorities
o Effective communication skills applicable through multiple channels (written, spoken, workshops, presentations)