Director, Partnership Solutions

Summary:

The Corporate Partnership Solutions team is a new function within the overarching Corporate Partnerships department at the Washington Nationals, helping the organization with its partnership sales, retention and renewal efforts. The Solutions team serves as an internal agency for the department, responsible for crafting the strategic approach to partnerships, building compelling partnership stories, identifying new commercial opportunities, creating impactful marketing solutions for prospects and partners and measuring ROI against KPIs and other valuation metrics.

Reporting to the Vice President of Corporate Partnerships, the Director of Corporate Partnership Solutions will be responsible for monitoring, optimizing and reporting the effectiveness of partner campaigns, delivering audience insights to inform strategy for prospective and current partners and identifying opportunities to create best practices across commercial measurement.

In addition, the Director will strengthen prospective partner proposals and optimize current partner campaigns through data, driving new, renewal and upsell business opportunities. The role will require deep cross-functional collaboration with other departments of the Nationals organization.

The ideal candidate will have a passion for storytelling through data with a strong ability to synthesize insights from a variety of sources into clear, actionable narratives that resonate with both internal and external stakeholders. This role is best suited for an analytical and creative professional well-versed in brand partnerships, analytics, marketing and digital/social media.

This leader will influence the entire Corporate Partnerships department to build best-in-class partnerships that don’t just renew but rather grow over the years.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities:

Insights & Analytics

• Lead the Corporate Partnerships’ insights efforts with respect to data and analytics to identify impactful insights to support general go-to-market materials, prospect sales pitches and partner presentations
• Build and manage central dashboards that monitor cross-channel performance, analyzing data from a wide variety of sources to develop holistic views of partnership impact
• Create compelling valuation and brand equity reports that align with partners’ strategic goals and brand positioning objectives
• Present deliverables to internal and external audiences, ensuring insights are relevant, understood and actionable
• Own relationships with external research vendors and platforms, ensuring delivery excellence and strategic alignment
• Work with the Business Strategy & Analytics team to design new systems and models for storing, sharing and visualizing research outputs to increase stakeholder access and usage

Platform Development

• Partner with cross-functional teammates to create new revenue generating platforms for new sales, renewals and upselling opportunities
• Lead bi-weekly meetings to identify industry and category best practices as well as new brand targets

Sales & Renewal Support

• Lead the development of data-backed go-to-market strategy for priority categories, leveraging first- and third-party data
• Lead in-depth industry and category analysis and benchmarking for white space and emerging areas
• Develop and level-up sales enablement tools for prospects and renewals, including but not limited to: proposals, term sheets, prospecting sheets, thought starters, best practices, etc.
• Work with the Sales team to identify the business objectives of a prospect and translate them into a comprehensive, measurable marketing solutions.

Partnership Growth

• Identify strategic growth opportunities for the purpose of renewals and upsells
• Work with Activation to meet and exceed partner KPIs
• Develop concepts for incremental opportunities

Asset Management

• Oversee the annual rate card analysis for all sold and available assets
• Proactively identify and capitalize on new sales opportunities that support the brand and business
• Evaluate and provide strategies to create new inventory based on historical sales data from MLB and the marketplace

Innovation & Operations

• Develop and run systems and processes to empower the Sales and Activation teams to work more efficiently and effectively
• Develop foundational policies, standard operating procedures and best practices with respect to corporate partnerships and insights and analytics
• Work with cross-functional teammates to establish standard operating procedures that are transparent, efficient and effective

Leadership

• Support a work environment where teamwork, integrity and innovation thrive
• Serve as the departmental liaison with the Business Strategy & Analytics and CRM cross-functional teammates

Required (critical to successful job performance):

• Bachelor’s Degree in business administration, marketing, statistics, sports management, communications or other related field
• 8+ years of experience in brand strategy, sales and/or activation at a brand, team, league, agency and/or media setting
• 5+ years of experience in working with partnership measurement, marketing analytics and/or sponsorship strategy, translating complex data into clear, compelling narratives

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities necessary to perform essential functions:

• Excellent written and verbal communication skills
• Excellent negotiation skills
• Strong storytelling capabilities, crafting clear and compelling stories from insights and analytics

• Strong project management and organizational skills
• Motivated by “thinking outside of the box” and “challenging the status quo”
• Proven problem-solving skills
• High proficiency in platforms such as Nielsen, YouGov, Vision Insights, Zoomph and/or other syndicated tools
• High proficiency in Microsoft 365, Salesforce (or other CRM), etc.
• Passion for sports marketing, sponsorships, promotions and media sales
• Ability to be proactive, to take initiative and to communicate progress
• Ability to manage complex deliverables across multiple timelines
• Ability to build strong relationships with internal cross-functional teammates as well as externally with prospects, partners, agency partners and other key stakeholders
• Solutions-driven
• A self-starter and strategic, creative thinker with experience in defining tasks, seeking inputs and feedback and evolving work where applicable
• Ability to handle multiple tasks simultaneously in fast-paced environment
• Uphold Core Values: Integrity, Innovation, and Teamwork. These core values set the tone in everything we do, help us succeed on and off the field, make a difference in the community and provide the best guest experience in sports. It is important that the person in the position commits themselves to these core values so that we can constantly move forward in the same direction – Together.

Physical/Environmental Requirements:

• Working conditions are normal for an office environment. Work may require weekend and/or evening work.
• Occasional domestic travel will be required.

Compensation:

The projected annual salary range for this position is $120,000 - $125,000 per year. This position is eligible to participate in the Corporate Partnerships Incentive Program. Actual pay is based on several factors, including but not limited to the applicant’s: qualifications, skills, expertise, education/training, certifications, and other organization requirements. Starting salaries for new employees are frequently not at the top of the applicable salary range.

Benefits:

The Nationals offer a competitive and comprehensive benefits package that presently includes:

• Paid vacation and sick leave, paid holidays throughout the year and a holiday break in December
• Medical, dental, vision, life and AD&D insurance
• Short- and long-term disability insurance
• Flexible spending accounts
• 401(k) and pension plan
• Access to complimentary tickets to Nationals home games
• Employee discounts
• Free onsite fitness center

Equal Opportunity Employer:

The Nationals are dedicated to offering equal employment and advancement opportunities to all individuals regardless of their race, color, religion, national origin, sex, age, marital status, personal appearance, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, family responsibilities, matriculation, political affiliation, genetic information, disability, or any other protected characteristic under applicable law.

Equal Opportunity Employer


This employer is required to notify all applicants of their rights pursuant to federal employment laws.
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