Director, Sales Compensation Strategy
About The Position
The Director, Sales Compensation Strategy leads a team of incentive designers and establishes design frameworks and governance for global sales incentive programs. The role owns ongoing program optimization to align compensation with strategic growth objectives and financial discipline, partnering closely with Sales, Finance, and Revenue Operations. The position leads annual and in-year incentive plan design for direct sellers and overlay roles, develops compensation analytics and dashboards, supports governance and payout accuracy, and advises senior leaders. It also partners with activation teams to deliver global sales enablement and change management, including AI-assisted communications, FAQ generation, and plan-acceptance workflows. The role is part of Workday’s GTM Incentive Compensation team, which designs, plans, enables, communicates, and analyzes incentive compensation programs across GTM functions.
Requirements
- At least 10 years of experience in sales or GTM functions.
- At least 8 years of experience designing annual and in-year sales compensation plans for direct sellers and overlay roles.
- At least 3 years of people management experience.
- Strong executive communication and advisory skills, including the ability to simplify complex compensation mechanics for senior leadership.
- Proficiency in directing analytical and AI adoption initiatives.
- Deep knowledge of compensation and quota governance frameworks.
- Experience architecting new metrics, including for consumption and AI monetization models.
- Experience leading Executive Steering Committee meetings and driving key decision narratives.
- Experience delivering cross-functional initiatives across Finance, HR, IT, Product, and GTM.
Responsibilities
- Lead end-to-end design of annual and in-year compensation plans for direct sellers and overlay roles.
- Align compensation structures with GTM priorities, including new business, expansion, retention, and AI offerings.
- Design pay curves, accelerators, and performance levers that encourage desired behaviors while managing financial risk.
- Partner with Finance and Revenue Operations on quota-setting methodology and deployment.
- Ensure compensation mechanics align with territories, quotas, and fiscal planning.
- Support governance processes for true-ups, exceptions, and complex deals.
- Identify sales performance gaps and design targeted incentives, including SPIFFs and pilots.
- Measure incentive effectiveness and iterate based on data and results.
- Build and maintain compensation analytics to model outcomes before rollout and monitor performance during the year.
- Own dashboards that track attainment, payouts, risk, and variance.
- Partner with data teams to ensure reliable and scalable compensation data infrastructure.
- Play a key role in Workday’s Compensation Governance processes.
- Advise senior leaders in Sales, Finance, and Revenue Operations.
- Translate complex compensation concepts into clear, actionable insights.
- Continuously improve processes across the full sales compensation lifecycle.
- Partner with activation teams to deliver compensation enablement and change management for the global Sales team, including AI-assisted communications, FAQ generation, and plan-acceptance workflows.
- Partner with Compensation Administration and Operations Teams to ensure design intent translates into accurate, auditable payouts.
- Lead a team of incentive designers and establish overarching design frameworks and governance.
Benefits
- May be eligible for the Workday Bonus Plan or a role-specific commission/bonus.
- May be eligible for annual refresh stock grants.
- Workday offers a flexible work approach combining in-person time and remote work.
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What This Job Offers
Job Type
Full-time
Career Level
Director
Education Level
No Education Listed
