Director, Business Development - Craft Education

Western Governors University • Nashville, TN

7d

About The Position

If you’re passionate about building a better future for individuals, communities, and our country—and you’re committed to working hard to play your part in building that future—consider Craft Education as the next step in your career. Craft Education is on a mission to solve skilled labor shortages by powering work-based learning pathways for all. At Craft, we’re revolutionizing the apprenticeship degree, combining on-the-job learning with accredited instruction to create innovative educational pathways that accommodate working professionals and meet employer needs. Our flagship product - Craft Connect - helps organizations administer apprentice degree programs and address mission-critical data and reporting needs. Through the same platform, Craft is also transforming how on-the-job learning converts into academic credits. Our team of technology, education and workforce professionals also provides technical assistance to organizations looking to launch and manage apprenticeship degree programs. We are working tirelessly to accelerate the expansion of these programs along with the data infrastructure that underpins them. If you’re looking to join the work-based learning revolution, we’d love to talk with you. At Craft, you’ll have the opportunity to solve hard problems in a high-growth startup environment and make a lasting impact on the future of education and workforce development. We couldn’t be more excited to advance this work as a team of innovative, collaborative and mission-oriented professionals - we hope you’ll consider joining us. The Director of Business Development will be responsible for growing business-to-business (B2B) revenue and forging strategic partnerships at Craft Education (“Craft”). This role is expected to develop and execute on revenue strategy, go-to-market, and sales for Craft’s existing & future technology products by leading departments and teams. The Director of Business Development is ultimately responsible for driving Craft’s north-star metrics of users, revenue, and partnerships. As the Director of Business Development at Craft this role oversees Sales and Marketing, in partnership with executive leadership, and serves as a key external-facing leader of Craft. This role requires a blend of strategy and execution: leveraging B2B software-as-a-service (SaaS) business acumen in a high-growth, startup context along with traditional business development practices, while balancing near-term execution with long-term scale goals.

Requirements

• Knowledge of edtech customer personas and technology trends
• Knowledge of B2B SaaS, including industry-wide business and revenue models
• People and project management skills
• Strategic business plan development skills
• Solution selling and customer discovery skills
• Strategic partnership development for both sales and service
• Collaboration skills, including written and verbal communication to drive clarity of thinking & action
• Ability to independently lead development and adaptation of biz dev and revenue strategies, knowing how to leverage resources and industry best practices
• Ability to analyze B2B SaaS business models for near-term execution and long-term “venture scale” outcomes (e.g. unit economics, financial modeling)
• Ability to build relationships, influence, manage conflicts, and generally network with key internal and external stakeholders.
• Ability to navigate through ambiguity to get things done with a strong bias toward action and “figure it out” mentality.
• Ability to analyze and interpret data to make sound business decisions – such as independently evaluating opportunities using risk-reward and impact-effort frameworks and making recommendations on where to prioritize efforts.
• Bachelor’s degree or equivalent experience
• 10+ years of professional experience in business development, growth and development of strategic business plans
• Experience managing people and teams
• Experience in lieu of education Equivalent relevant experience performing the essential functions of this job may substitute for education degree requirements. Generally, equivalent relevant experience is defined as 1 year of experience for 1 year of education and is the discretion of the hiring manager.

Nice To Haves

• Relevant advanced/graduate degree, such as MBA
• Experience in K12 education or healthcare
• Experience in education technology or future of work; including startups or venture capital
• Experience in product management, investment banking, private equity, or management consulting

Responsibilities

• Develops and activates strategy that will drive adoption of free and paid B2B technology and service products by decision makers.
• Drives decisions on new revenue & growth initiatives by conducting experimentation and data-driven iteration
• Identifies and develops strategic partnerships that increase adoption of Craft technology solutions
• Manages departments and teams to create organizational leverage, including mentoring/coaching
• Maintains an understanding of industry trends, current events, and related information that may impact current and future business.
• Identifies and develops Craft’s unique selling propositions and differentiators by consolidating customer discovery and analysis of competitive products
• Consults with department heads and senior level management on opportunities and challenges in the marketplace to develop new services, products, and distribution channels.
• Works with all internal stakeholders across Craft and WGU to support mutual needs.
• Attends and networks at conferences and events, conducting public speaking as needed.

Benefits

• medical, dental, vision, telehealth and mental healthcare
• health savings account and flexible spending account
• basic and voluntary life insurance
• disability coverage
• accident, critical illness and hospital indemnity supplemental coverages
• legal and identity theft coverage
• retirement savings plan
• wellbeing program
• discounted WGU tuition
• flexible paid time off for rest and relaxation with no need for accrual, flexible paid sick time with no need for accrual, 11 paid holidays, and other paid leaves, including up to 12 weeks of parental leave

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Director