ZS Associates - Associate Principal - Business Commercial Operations

ZS is the world's largest firm focused exclusively on improving business performance through sales and marketing consulting solutions, from customer insights and strategy to analytics, operations and technology. Together, we design and implement strategies that lead to greater market share, more competitive operations and increased use of today's latest technologies. From 22 offices worldwide, ZS professionals draw on deep industry and domain expertise to deliver impact where it matters for clients. We are particularly known for our expertise in the pharmaceutical and health care sectors, yet work across a range of industries.

ZS's India Capability & Expertise Centers house more than 60% of ZS people across two locations in Gurgaon and Pune. Our teams work with colleagues across North America, Europe and East Asia to deliver sales and marketing projects to our end client, who drives our business. The Centers primarily support projects in the areas of Business Analysis, Business Operations and Business Technology.

ZS's Business Operations group helps improve and operate clients- sales and marketing functions. ZS identifies challenges and improvement opportunities across the entire system, and designs new processes that deliver substantial improvements in effectiveness and efficiency. We also offer outsourcing solutions that operate sales and marketing activities more effectively and at lower cost.

ASSOCIATE PRINCIPAL (BUSINESS OPERATIONS): This role will have responsibility to take ownership of one or more client engagements at a cross office level; provide thought leadership in developing the firm's services and offerings in the Business Operations space and add leverage to the overall leadership span for the aforementioned group in India.

The person in this role will be responsible for growing the capabilities in the Business Operations group by developing and managing the existing client relationships and also aid in generating new business engagements. This person will need to fully understand the company and its service lines and actively assess/present ways to serve clients by developing solutions and offerings relevant to that client base.

The successful candidate will work closely with ZS leadership; grow the practice by expanding client and customer relationships and building trusted advisory relationships with executives at the company's various accounts.

Responsibilities:

Overall India lead of the operational workstreams for global cloud-based data warehouse and reporting workstream for the client:

- Scope includes Americas, EU, Japan

- Annual revenue of $6-8 MM

- Ops team currently split Pune/Delhi, but will consolidate in Pune over time. But Tech team will continue to be split across Pune/Delhi

Delivery:

- Lead delivery of Operations of the global cloud-based data warehouse and reporting workstream for the client

Operations include regular production of:

- data load, process, and QCs

- report refresh and QCs

- business validation

- change requests

- Ensure strong quality process and framework

People Management-

- Be accountable for overall success of the operations workstreams

- Drive a cohesive team culture across sub-teams working across geographies (Americas, EU, Japan), including the technical team working on the build part of the project.

Client Management:

- Drive client engagement for change requests, especially larger requests focusing on domain requirements

- Develop relationships with key stakeholders across the geographies for long-term success

- Effectively communicate trade-offs to bring the client into the decision making during tough situations

Business Development:

- Proactively identify opportunities that will best meet client needs to grow the operations and technology footprint

Firm:

- Lead and drive BO CG or other Firm initiatives as required

Qualifications:

Bachelor's/master's degree in Business Administration, Management, CS, MIS or related disciplines;

17+ years- of relevant consulting-industry experience working on medium-large scale engagements;

Minimum 10+ years of experience in managing and leading delivery of one or multiple engagements;

Ability to focus on business aspect of operations with a basic technical bent (vs a strong technical person leading operations);

Ability to be hands-on when needed to review details with the team as well as drive overall Operations project plans with all stakeholders (off-shore team, on-shore team, client, etc.);

Ability to manage clients through operational change requests via domain specific discussions as well as basic technical requirements;

Ability to inspire the team to deliver high-levels of quality on a consistent basis;

Ability to partner with analytics team (both within ZS and client) to enable broad adoption of the global cloud-based infrastructure;

Demonstrated experience with driving revenue within existing clients and in developing new prospects at the "C" level of Pharmaceutical companies;

Assist/be involved in the selling process by writing proposals and giving product demos;

Significant supervisory, coaching and hands-on project management skills;

Characteristics of a forward thinker and self-starter that thrives on new challenges and adapts quickly to learning new knowledge;

Ability to lead a virtual team of consulting professionals across multiple projects;

A high level of motivation and self-starting attitude;

Strong analytical and problem-solving skills;

Excellent oral and written communication skills;

A strong work ethic;

A willingness to travel to meet client needs;

Executive-level presence and communication.

ZS is a global consulting firm; fluency in English is required, additional fluency in at least one European or Asian language is desirable.

Candidates must possess work authorization for their intended country of employment. An on-line application, including a cover letter expressing interest and a full set of transcripts (official or unofficial), is required to be considered.

ZS offers a competitive compensation package with salary and bonus incentives, plus an attractive benefits package.