Head of Data Strategy

Robert Walters are exclusively partnering with a market leading brand based in Northampton, as the UK business continues its aggressive growth plan one of the blockers to this delivery is the data finesse – in particular the obvious absence of a coherent strategy around data management including BI and MI spanning all areas of the business. This Head of Data Strategy is an entirely new role, complimenting expansion in other areas of the business.

The Head of Data Strategy indicates the importance the ambitious business are placing upon data sources. As a business they are rich in multiple sources of business data, but do not extract maximum value from them.

With a strong core Finance, IT and Marketing team who consult with the various stakeholders and produce data on the performance of the wider business. The business need a commercially minded, data focussed individual to design, implement and continually improve a new data strategy.

The ability to partner with the various business leaders is critical. Individuals accustomed to remaining in the shadows will not suit this role. To some extent it is expected this individual will create their own world, informing the business what the key components of the data strategy will be, satisfying their needs, not only today, but also in the future.

The successful individual will be required to work with the department heads to help identify data needs and then interpret the data to drive activity which will generate additional sales, improved customer service and efficiencies across the business.

The succesful Head of Data Strategy will have the following attributes:

• A logically minded and commercially focussed individual who can span the multiple disciplines of Finance, IT and Marketing and drawing upon their previous experience of designing and delivering robust data strategies from the ground upwards including BI/MI strategy.
• Previous experience of delivering a data strategy from scratch is highly desirable.
• An individual that has a proven track record of working in a challenging environment, this role will have huge potential for development – along with it immediate exposure to the UK Senior Management Team and UK Board.
• Able to work at a fierce rate of knots, not only is the business evolving quickly, the entire industry is shifting and changing and we need to be ahead of the trends, leveraging our unique market position as one of the only true specialist in a market dominated by generalists.

The day to day:

To understand the various data sources which are currently used (with a view to the future for other potential sources), establish common sources and correlation between the sources and design a coherent, overlapping strategy to maximise the use of these.

The intention is that you will create a ‘Data Team’, consisting of this role as lead, a DevOps Engineer to build and develop our BI / MI tools and also an IT professional to help with the infrastructure and data centre connectivity issues.

The primary focus of this role is singular – the commercial desire to leverage the maximum benefit from the data sources – delivering increased sales volumes.

If you are ambitious and want a blank canvas in a high performing business then this is the role for you, please contact:

James.taylor@robertwalters.com

01908 044000