Director, Skills Strategy & Execution (Skills COE Lead)

Visa•Atlanta, GA

6d•Hybrid

About The Position

Are you a designer, builder, and change agent? Are you passionate about creating a high-performance growth culture? Are you motivated by a diverse and inclusive environment that unleashes the potential in everyone, everywhere? Come join the Global Talent team as we help write a new story for Visa and reimagine the world of work. We are seeking an experienced Director of Skills Strategy & Execution to lead an enterprise Skills Center of Excellence (COE). Reporting to the Vice President of Organization Design and part of our wider Global Talent team, this leader will architect and operationalize a company‑wide shift to a skills‑based talent model, in support of our Visa 2030 strategy. The Director will play a key role in shaping our organization’s future, by designing the frameworks, governance, and organizational mechanisms needed to deploy the right talent to the right work at the right time - and accelerating Visa’s productivity, agility, and employee career journeys. The successful candidate will be responsible for driving overall strategy, and partnering with a wide range of People Team business and technology stakeholders to design skills solutions that suit Visa’s growth and needs. We are looking for passion, strategic thinking, and strong collaborators, as well as subject‑matter expertise in designing and implementing skills-based approaches, and strong Workday Skills experience to facilitate configuration, governance, and implementation of an integrated skills technology platform. Looking further ahead, the role will drive the embedding of skills into employee usage and mobility, business leader intelligence and resourcing, core talent processes, and strategic workforce planning – to drive the maximum impact and outcomes for our business, and our people. As a Director in Skills Strategy & Execution, you will play a crucial role in shaping our organization's future. If you are a collaborative and strategic thinker with a passion for skills transformation, we would love to hear from you.

Requirements

10 or more years of work experience with a Bachelor’s Degree, or at least 8 years of work experience with an Advanced Degree (e.g. Masters/ MBA/JD/MD), or at least 3 years of work experience with a PhD
Proven, progressive experience in a skills SME / talent transformation leadership role.
Strong understanding of skills trends, strategies, methods, and tools, and experience optimizing systems, processes, and workflows.
Hands‑on expertise implementing and governing Workday Skills in a complex, global environment.
Proven track record of successfully implementing large-scale skills change initiatives, with strong project management skills and demonstrated ability to lead complex cross-functional initiatives across a range of stakeholders.
Strong decision‑making, problem‑solving, and communication / influencing skills, including the ability to partner with senior and executive leaders.
Strong long-term strategic thinking, problem-solving, and decision-making abilities.
Ability to navigate ambiguity, manage multiple enterprise‑level workstreams, and lead cross‑functional teams.
Experience in job architecture, including design and implementation.
Excellent interpersonal and collaboration skills to operate effectively in a highly matrixed environment, with ‘test and learn’ and continuous improvement mindset that embraces creativity, agility, and comfort operating in fast‑changing environments.

Nice To Haves

10-12+ years of work experience with a Bachelor’s Degree, or 8-10 years of experience with an Advanced Degree (e.g. Masters, MBA, JD, MD), or 6+ years of work experience with a PhD

Responsibilities

Serve as the primary enterprise architect and thought partner for designing and delivering the company’s end‑to‑end skills strategy.
Advise senior leaders on integrating a skills lens into workforce planning, talent acquisition, upskilling, mobility, and career development.
Serve as project owner for the enterprise skills roadmap—including data governance, deployment timelines, skills ontologies, and user experience.
Champion the transition to skills‑centric practices across the organization, collaborating with and influencing leaders, HR teams, and functional stakeholders to seamlessly embed skills capabilities and tools across the full employee lifecycle—from hiring to performance to development, globally and regionally.
Design and execute enterprise skills programs, taxonomies, and capability frameworks aligned to strategic business priorities, partnering with wider teams to drive adoption and alignment to enterprise goals.
Lead cross‑functional teams and working groups to deliver skills‑related initiatives, identifying risks early and driving issue resolution.
Maintain expertise in external skills technologies, AI/ML‑driven skills intelligence, and future‑of‑work trends; translate insights into actionable recommendations.
Foster a culture of experimentation and iteration, ensuring programs continuously evolve based on business needs and user feedback.
Serve as the enterprise SME for Workday Skills—guiding configuration, governance, skills inference models, mapping, and data integrity.
Partner with People Systems and People Technology to optimize interoperability between Workday, Degreed, and adjacent talent systems.
Coordinate strategy and integration for Degreed Skills+, ensuring the platform drives meaningful skills insights, personalization, and curated development experiences.
Build governance models, taxonomies, and update processes to ensure high‑quality, reliable enterprise skills data.
Use platform analytics and insights to inform workforce planning, mobility recommendations, and targeted upskilling pathways to dynamically match talent to priority work, improving speed‑to‑skill and organizational productivity.
Foster a culture of experimentation and iteration, ensuring programs continuously evolve based on business needs and user feedback.