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New Search Announcement! Sales Director, West Coast for Year Up!

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Pillar's New Search

Pillar Search is pleased to have been selected by Year Up to manage their search for the Sales Director, Western Region.  For more information on this excited opportunity, or for immediate consideration, please contact Pillar Search’s Founder, Cindy Joyce, at cjoyce@pillarsearch.com.

 

ORGANIZATION DESCRIPTION:

Year Up is an award-winning national 501(c)3 organization striving to close the Opportunity Divide by providing urban young adults with the skills, experience and support that will empower them to reach their potential through professional careers and higher education. Through a one-year intensive training program, Year Up provides urban young adults ages 18-24 with a unique combination of hands-on technical and professional skills, college credit, and corporate internships.

 

Year Up is an Equal Opportunity Employer.

 

Voted one of the Best NonProfits to Work For in the country by the NonProfit Times, Year Up is a rewarding place to work. The Year Up staff is passionate, supportive, mission-driven, and committed to positive change and continuous learning. Year Up sets high standards for both themselves and their students, and live by a set of core values that reflect an unshakable belief in the talent and full potential of young people. The work they do is life-changing, and Year Up knows that their team is the greatest asset in achieving their mission.

 

Please visit http://www.yearup.org to learn more about Year Up.

 

Year Up photo for website

 

POSITION OVERVIEW:  

Year Up seeks an experienced and dynamic Sales Director, Western Region to lead its Corporate Engagement and Internships initiatives for several national accounts. Reporting to the National Director of Corporate Engagement, this individual will lead the effort to expand and broaden our relationships and internship placements in select accounts on a national basis. The Sales Director, Western Region will work with major Fortune 500 corporations in need of entry-level talent to provide trained, high-potential urban young adults with high-quality internships, and will ensure a program of support and professional development for these young adults on their internships. The ideal candidate should desire to leverage his or her demonstrated experience in sales, strategy, and for-profit management practices within our mission-driven social enterprise.

 

To be successful in this role, you will develop and implement a strategic internship sales plan to achieve revenue targets, manage client accounts and relationships, and design robust engagement strategies. You should have the ability to adjust strategies and priorities in response to organizational growth and needs, as well as the demands of the evolving market. In addition, as an ideal candidate you’ll be able to remain flexible within your work, and seek out areas for collaboration across the organization.

 

In keeping with Year Up’s values, the Sales Director, Western Region will also have the opportunity to interact with colleagues and students regularly to help create and sustain a positive educational environment.

 

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES:  

 

Leadership and Direction Setting

  • Provide strategic direction in response to market and scaling needs
  • Design plans, set milestones, and oversee implementation and follow through of team projects
  • Leverage influence skills to work effectively within the team and across departments to obtain input, move groups to consensus, and build buy-in
  • Collaborate with colleagues at the National and Site levels, as well as across the Year Up network

 

Revenue Generation

  • Develop and implement annual business goals; analyze trends and outcomes against revenue goals
  • Drive new business acquisition plans in response to market trends and relevancy to Year Up
  • Lead internship sales forecasting activities for existing and prospective accounts
  • Review and deliver effective proposals that feature Year Up’s innovative model and past successes for solving corporate entry-level talent needs
  • Regularly prepare reports showing internship volume, potential internship sales, and areas of proposed expansion
  • Utilize Salesforce.com to maintain accurate records of all sales and prospecting activities including sales calls, presentations, closed sales, and follow-up activities

 

Internship Program Management

  • Sustain a strong internship program that meets the business needs of corporate partners and affords Year Up interns the opportunity to apply their learning in a supportive, professional environment
  • Promote internship retention strategies that result in increased completion and satisfaction levels for both partners and young adults
  • Drive cross-functionality with dexterity and flexibility in support of the internship program
  • Ensure knowledge transfer and management over internship program for data capture and quality assurance, including internship readiness assessments, matching processes, on-boarding, announcements, etc.
  • Set benchmarks for increased internship to hire rates across network of corporate partners

 

Relationship Management

  • Design and implement effective strategies for driving engagement with your assigned accounts
  • Set and meet targets for increasing corporate partner status from partner to advocate and advocate to champion  Lead the team to effectively manage all aspects of corporate relationships, interfacing with partners, students, and staff members as needed
  • Establish and maintain relationships with industry influencers and key strategic partners
  • Engage with C-level executives and decision makers in a variety of formal and informal settings
  • Serve as a lead on high-level and/or critically sensitive corporate engagement situations that arise

 

 

Community Member

  • Demonstrate genuine commitment to the mission, vision, values and culture of Year Up
  • Ensure collaboration across departments
  • Work closely with Program, Academic, and Career and Alumni Success leadership to ensure that student learning and development strategically aligns to corporate partners needs

 

year up 2

 

QUALIFICATIONS:

  • At least 7+ years professional experience in strategic account management and/or sales to enterprise level accounts (e.g. sales, client service, development)
  • Consultative sales approach and background in technology or technology enabled solutions preferred 
  • Demonstrated ability to generate leads, close business, and manage annual sales targets of $5M+
  • Proven ability to influence, develop, manage, support and empower employees to achieve objectives within a team
  • Documented strengths in meaningful relationship building, management and growth to scale
  • Demonstrated ability to set direction and manage complex teams, projects, and processes
  • Strong organizational and time management skills with exceptional attention to detail
  • A professional and resourceful style with the ability to work independently and as a team player, to take initiative, and to manage multiple tasks and projects at a time
  • Ability to collaborate across teams, facilitate difficult conversations, and resolve issues
  • Ability to lead, willingness to be led, and comfort with situational leadership
  • Consummate networking skills with an ability to move comfortably and credibly in the community
  • Proficiency with Microsoft Office and development databases; Salesforce.com experience preferred
  • A commitment to diversity and inclusion
  • A willingness to travel at least 50% of the time, as needed
  • A passion for working with urban young adults, an unshakable belief in their potential and a strong commitment to the mission of Year Up
  • Understanding of the Opportunity Divide and its drivers
  • Commitment to diversity and inclusion

 

COMPENSATION & BENEFITS:

Salary: Competitive and commensurate with education and experience

Benefits:

  • Competitive package including 100% healthcare coverage, dental, and 401(k) match
  • Vacation: Three weeks paid vacation in first year of employment; four weeks after initial year
  • Professional development: Funds available to support staff in achieving career objectives

 

TO APPLY:

Please submit a thoughtful cover letter and resume to Cindy Joyce at cindy@pillarsearch.com. Note that applications without a cover letter will not be considered.

 

Year Up photo

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Two Exciting Recruiting Roles in Boston With Year Up!

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Year Up, a valued client of Pillar Search, is seeking talented recruiting professionals to join their Boston team. The positions currently available are:

ORGANIZATION DESCRIPTION:

Year Up is an award-winning national 501(c)3 organization striving to close the Opportunity Divide by providing urban young adults ages 18-24 with the skills, experience, and support that will empower them to reach their potential through professional careers and higher education. Through a one-year intensive training program, these young adults complete a unique combination of rigorous, hands-on technical and professional skills training, college credit. and corporate internships. With an annual operating budget of $90 million, Year Up will serve over 2,700 students in 2015 nationwide.

Year Up takes three approaches to closing the Opportunity Divide. Our core sites are based on our founding program model – direct service programming where facilities, staff, infrastructure, academics, and all other aspects of the program are managed by Year Up staff. The Professional Training Corps (PTC) is a community college based model that provides an opportunity for students to engage in meaningful workforce training. In this model, students are dual-enrolled in the community college and Year Up; technical skills are taught by college faculty, while Year Up staff provide professional skills and other wrap-around services. Lastly, our Employer Based Solutions are created in collaboration with employer partners; custom solutions are developed to meet critical business needs and solve for skills gap challenges in the marketplace.

Consistently voted one of the Best NonProfits to Work For by the NonProfit Times, Year Up is a rewarding place to work. Our staff is passionate, supportive, mission-driven, and committed to positive change and continuous learning. We set high standards for both ourselves and our students, and live by a set of core values that reflect an unshakable belief in the talent and full potential of our young adults. The work we do is life-changing, and we know that our team is the greatest asset in achieving our mission.

Please visit http://www.yearup.org/careers to learn more about working at Year Up.

TO APPLY FOR EITHER POSITION:

Please submit a thoughtful cover letter and resume through the Year Up website.

Note that applications without a cover letter will not be considered. Year Up respectfully request no phone calls.

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Onboard or Onward: Ensuring the Success of Your New Executive Hire

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“About 40% of executives who change jobs or get promoted fail in the first 18 months.”

Fortune Magazine

Where does it all go wrong? Too often, the onboarding process is where things fall apart. I am not talking about “orientation”, which often is done day one and generally involves the basics of assigning a building pass, conducting a benefits overviews, meeting the team and reading a few policies. Onboarding is a longer process, and if done well (typically in partnership with Human Resources and managed by the new executive’s manager, or the Board Chair if they report to the Board of Directors) can almost guarantee fit. It is holistic and gradual. It is also very deliberate, and will require constant check-ins and open communication.  Here are five key activities that will help to ensure that your new executive will be successful in their new role:

Start to Onboard Before They are Actually ON BOARD!

The time between an offer being accepted and the executive starting is sensitive. They may be dealing with a counteroffer, having to say goodbye to much-loved colleagues, and are nervous about this new venture. Keep in touch. Reiterate your excitement to have them joining the team, and have a few people in the organization reach out. If there are organizational overviews, annual reports, strategic plans or other things that that they can read up on ahead of time, get those to them during this time so that they start to feel like part of the team.

Send an announcement out to the staff and the board a few days before their start date explaining their background and the job they are filling. This will help make them seem more familiar to the team when they come through the door, and as an added benefit they will not have to review their resume and background with absolutely everyone in their first week or so.

Relationship Before Task 

Ideally, new executives will meet with their team and people across the organization. One-on-one meetings are great, but remind those who will be meeting with the executive to get to know them before delving into the inner workings of their role or the issues they face. Building rapport with new colleagues and direct reports is critical in the early days.

Learn By Doing 

Too often, in an effort to get all the information to a new hire as soon as possible, they are introduced to processes way too soon. Guess what? They will not remember how to do an expense report or change their password or complete a sales report 30 to 60 days in when they actually need to do it if they are taught how to do it their first week. Have the right people meet with them at the start to review the process at a high level, and then have them set up a time to do it later when they can sit down with real data and learn from it real-time.

The Buddy System 

What we learned in grade school still applies: the buddy system works when the new kid starts. This should not be the executive’s manager, but a peer or high-performing direct report who has longevity and the personality to be an effective buddy. The buddy can manage the nicety of taking them to lunch on day one and being available to explain the intricacies of culture, relationship dynamics, and certain pitfalls to avoid, which are things that the executive may not be comfortable asking of higher-ups.

Check In Early & Often

I too often hear that executives join, get a ton of attention the first day or two, and then are largely left on their own. It does not feel welcoming, and it runs the risk of them going in a direction that is difficult to course-correct later on. Meet with them daily, even for 10-15 minutes, in the first few weeks. Move on to twice weekly, weekly….you get the point. Let them know where they are doing a great job. Let them know where they need to take a different approach. But LET THEM KNOW. Being clear on what is a success will lead to more success.

While by no means a complete onboarding process, following the steps above will help to ensure that your new executive hire is one of the 60% who will be a success in the first 18 months.

Cindy Joyce is an Executive Recruiter and the Founder of Pillar Search, an Executive Search and HR Consulting firm located in Boston that works with clients nationwide. She can be reached here.