Senior Pre Sales Technical Architect

AHEAD builds platforms for digital business. By weaving together advances in cloud infrastructure, automation and analytics, and software delivery, we help enterprises deliver on the promise of digital transformation.At AHEAD, we prioritize creating a culture of belonging, where all perspectives and voices are represented, valued, respected, and heard. We create spaces to empower everyone to speak up, make change, and drive the culture at AHEAD. We are an equal opportunity employer, and do not discriminate based on an individual's race, national origin, color, gender, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, religion, age, disability, marital status, or any other protected characteristic under applicable law, whether actual or perceived. We embrace all candidates that will contribute to the diversification and enrichment of ideas and perspectives at AHEAD. Senior Pre Sales Technical ArchitectThe Senior Pre Sales Technical Architect assists AHEAD Client Directors through formal technical presentations and technical design assistance of AHEAD’s solution and service offerings to existing and prospective clients. The Senior Pre Sales Technical Architectowns all technical aspects of a sales campaign and hand off to the consulting and services team; maintaining strong relationships with our clients.In this role, you are a thought leader within the Engineering organization, responsible for designing, architecting, and, at times, consulting for AHEAD clients. We expect our Senior Pre Sales Technical Architect to have deep knowledge across our Enterprise Cloud Framework including Cloud Management and Operations, Security, Datacenter Infrastructure and Public Cloud. Your goal as a Senior Pre Sales Technical Architect should be to build skills, relationships, and industry credibility across more than one of these segments to drive product and services sales. You will work in partnership with one or more Client Directors to help build a cohesive account strategy for each existing and prospective clients. As part of this strategy, you will help Client Directors identify potential technologies and vendors to partner within a given account and assist in driving this strategy throughout the sales campaign.Time management and prioritization are essential attributes of a successful Senior Pre Sales Technical Architect. Your goal is to evolve into the technical thought leader for each of your clients. In this capacity, you will work to define strategy, compare and contrast alternative approaches, and build key relationships, as well as size and configure products. Positioning and leveraging Subject Matter Experts (Practice Directors, Solution Principals, Specialists, Client Services, etc.) is a necessity to scale your effectiveness within accounts. You will also be expected to provide insight and details regarding work effort and client engagement to enable tracking of key KPIs throughout the year through tools that will be provided to you.Education is critical to your success at AHEAD. You are expected to continually educate not only yourself, but also our clients and your team resources.Roles and ResponsibilitiesPossess deep data center expertise (multiple layers of the stack).Present at Technical Briefings and Lab Demonstrations with clients and partners to showcase AHEAD's value.Considered a Subject Matter Expert (SME) in one or many technologies for the team to leverage.Recognized by the partner community to own technical sales campaigns without their support.Qualify and position consulting engagements and services.Provide coaching and mentoring to team resources in order to enhance their solution knowledge, technical acumen, and pre-sales skill sets.Qualify sales opportunities in the terms of client technical requirements, decision making process and funding and decides if we should move forward with the campaign.Understand and articulate AHEAD's Enterprise Cloud Framework.Prioritize opportunities and efforts assigned to the geography based on maximizing total impact on team productivity and profit.Drive engagement conversions to additional services / solutions.Provide feedback to improve internal efficiencies.Work with Practice Directors to provide input and suggestions for new solutions and offerings.Present regularly at AHEAD events, user groups, conferences, and forums.Lead Solution Verification / BOM Review process for the geography.QualificationsBachelors degree in Computer Science, Engineering, or equivalent2+ years Pre Sales and Data Center experience is requiredProfessional communication, presentation, analytical, and problem-solving skillsExperience working as a technical lead in a pre-sales sales campaignExtensive knowledge of one or more of the following data center solutions: storage, networking, compute, virtualization, data center management / automation, and securityAbility to work under critical conditions and influence others to achieve resultsStrong interpersonal skills with excellent presentation skillsMust be independent, self motivated, a self starter and possess a good working attitudeAble to work well within a team and partner environmentCustomer focused and results drivenWhy AHEAD:Through our daily work and internal groups like Moving Women AHEAD and RISE AHEAD, we value and benefit from diversity of people, ideas, experience, and everything in between.We fuel growth by stacking our office with top-notch technologies in a multi-million-dollar lab, by encouraging cross department training and development, sponsoring certifications and credentials for continued learning.We understand that you have a life outside of work. That’s why we offer flexible paid time off, paid company holidays, and the ability for you to manage your work schedule as needed.Chicago, Illinois /Sales Engineering /Full Time