Director of Federal Presales

Sterling Computers Corporation•North Sioux City, SD

3d•Remote

About The Position

The Sterling Federal Presales Leader will lead a team of highly effective sales engineers to support and enable Sterling’s Federal sales across all DoD, IC and Global segments. This is a highly visible position at Sterling that will require cross-functional leadership to execute technical sales strategies within the Federal government. This leader will attract, recruit, retain and develop engineers of various capabilities and align them to federal segments at Sterling and be a point of escalation for all teams. The Federal Presales leader will develop technical sales strategies of deeply complex and large organizations articulate the value of Sterling to customers and industry peers. We are looking for a high caliber technical thought leader in the areas of server, storage, cloud, cyber, AI/ML, compute & infrastructure that can accelerate our growth by inspiring and enabling individual contributors to perform at high levels.

Requirements

Must have Federal (Civilian or DoD) experience.
The Federal Presales leader should possess a strong aptitude and understanding of a wide breadth of information technology, products, tools, services, and solutions.
Additionally, the Federal Presales leader will have deep expert level experience with infrastructure solutions provided by Dell, Cisco, HPE, VMware, Microsoft, Red Hat and more.
This individual must understand the tactical and strategic elements of Solutions Consulting as a technical VAR or vendor.
Virtualization: must have a strong understanding of virtualization technologies, including hypervisors such as VMware, Hyper-V, KVM, and Citrix
DR/Backup: should have a strong understanding of backup and disaster recovery strategies from vendors such as Veeam, Zerto, Dell, Commvault, Rubrik and Cohesity.
Storage: must have knowledge of storage architecture, including storage area networks (SANs), network-attached storage (NAS), and software-defined storage such as: vSAN, Dell, HPE, Pure Storage, NetApp, NetApp, Pure Storage, Qumulo and Nasuni
Network Architecture: should have in-depth knowledge of network architecture, including software-defined networking (SDN) and network virtualization such as: Cisco , Fortinet, Palo Alto, Juniper, Extreme, Ruckus, VMware and HPE/Aruba
Application & Automation: should have experience with automation tools such as Ansible, Puppet, and Chef to automate the deployment and management of infrastructure. Also, high level familiarity with: F5, Nginx, AVI/NSX, Citrix ADC and A10 Networks
Security: should have a strong understanding of security principles, including authentication, authorization, and encryption, to ensure that infrastructure is secure from vendors: Fortinet, Cisco, Palo Alto, Darktrace, Checkpoint, ZScaler, Nessus, Mimecast, Proofpoint
Cloud: should be familiar with cloud computing technologies, including public, private, and hybrid clouds, and be able to recommend the best cloud solution based on customer requirements. Must be familiar with: AWS, Azure, Google, Oracle, Gov Clouds
Cost Optimization: must have a good understanding of cost optimization techniques, including using open-source solutions and scaling infrastructure based on demand, to provide cost-effective solutions to customers.
DevOps: should be familiar with DevOps practices and tools, including continuous integration and delivery (CI/CD) pipelines, source control, and testing frameworks.
Services: MSP and Deployment experience

Nice To Haves

high caliber technical thought leader in the areas of server, storage, cloud, cyber, AI/ML, compute & infrastructure

Responsibilities

Developing and executing department strategies that win
Develop strategies for your team, build plans, execute, measure, and grow.
Work with internal resources to develop programs for execution of your strategy.
Align strategies to corporate level strategies.
Properly align engineers based on skillset and demand from various sales segments.
Ensure technical strategies within the company make sense and will be profitable.
Develop and maintain relationships with key customers and vendor stakeholders.
Work with other cross-functional departments to push initiatives and be an advocate for our customers.
Work with the executive staff to present your strategies and articulate the success of your team.
Participate in account planning and QBRs with sales and sales leadership.
Balance customer advocacy and need with what’s best for Sterling as a business, and articulate organizational goals to team members and customers.
Plan staffing levels to meet Sterling’s strategic objectives.
Work with HR staff to recruit, interview, select, hire, and employ an appropriate number of employees
Lead employees using a performance management and development process
Clearly communicate job expectations; plan, monitor, and appraise job results against these expectations
Provide effective performance feedback through employee recognition, rewards, coaching, counseling, and disciplinary action (with the assistance of HR, when necessary)
Develop, coordinate, and enforce systems, policies, procedures, and productivity standards
Lead employees to meet Sterling’s expectations for productivity, quality, and goal accomplishment
Coach, mentor and develop team members; provide career development planning and opportunities
Successfully onboard new employees and train them to be fully productive team members
Empower employees to take responsibility for their jobs and goals
Delegate responsibility and expect accountability and regular feedback
Consciously create a workplace culture that is consistent with Sterling’s overall mission and core values
Work to understand employees’ current morale and create an environment that supports high morale and happiness
Foster a spirit of teamwork, supportiveness, and unity among team members that allows for healthy disagreement over ideas, expeditious conflict resolution, and appreciation of diversity
Provide oversight and direction to employees to ensure compliance with the company’s policies and procedures
Maintain transparent communication within and between teams
Appropriately communicate organization information through department meetings, one-on-one meetings, and appropriate written and regular interpersonal communication
Proactively solicit and listen to employee feedback and convey this to other leaders or individuals as appropriate
Resolve conflicts between individuals and teams