Strategic Account Manager, Sama

• Bachelor's degree or equivalent work experience
• 10+ years of customer-facing experience in account management or customer success roles, at least 5+ for Fortune 200 accounts
• Experience leading change management and process improvement initiatives
• Thrives in a highly dynamic environment, comfortable prioritizing competing priorities
• You see obstacles as opportunities and are highly motivated by difficult challenges
• Passionate about providing a world-class customer experience
• Deep commitment to building an ethical, world-class company with technology at its core - supporting Sama’s mission
• Proven experience leading critical and sometimes complex customer engagements with excellent negotiation, influencing, collaboration, communication, and presentation skills required
• Experience working in consulting or professional services as the core offering
• Experience working in tech environments and familiar with technical concepts
• Outstanding organizational & time management skills, able to effectively prioritize and problem-solve in a fast-paced, global environment
• Ability to adapt information & style to different cultures, explain difficult concepts concisely, establish consensus, and ultimately gain agreement
• Available outside of standard business hours to provide additional support to our team in East Africa as needed
• Highly curious and willing to stretch, learn, develop, and (at times) be uncomfortable and manage through ambiguity
• Experienced at setting KPI’s and OKR’s that drive desired customer and organizational outcomes
• Self-driven and self-motivated leader - likes to have fun, and can motivate others with their positive attitude

Desirable

• As the Strategic Account Manager - North America, you will own a portfolio of strategic, dynamic, and complex customers ranging from multiple sizable accounts to smaller but strategically significant and directly related, ensuring their successful outcomes
• Actively manage high-value accounts and be responsible for associated client retention, account growth, and value-based metrics
• Own the scoping, contracting, and negotiation of commercial terms for renewals and new SOWs, at times paired with a member of the Sales team
• Drive the strategy, plan, and execution of the account with the goal of retention through operational excellence, organic expansion of current solutions, and create net new growth as part of your core responsibilities and KPIs
• Be the main point of contact for high-level client contacts and the main point of contact for escalations
• Improve customer engagement and showcase Sama’s platform and services to key client personnel responsible for starting new projects
• Actively consult with and coach internal teams in client engagement strategy, operational maturity, and organizational development, working with an array of internal functional teams
• Provide consultative guidance to customers, product managers, applied research scientists, etc around best practices on how to leverage the client’s technology as well as Sama’s suite of services - this may include anything from business case development to solution approaches
• Deeply understand the customer’s organizational structure, goals, culture, blockers, and priorities. Drive Sama’s account strategy to align with the customer’s needs to achieve mutual success
• Drive ongoing engagement with customers including active participation in weekly check-ins, driving value-driven conversations and facilitating/presenting in QBRs, etc
• Cultivate and nurture relationships and generate new leads within current accounts to expand Sama’s scope of engagement into new business
• Work with the customer to identify/resolve all issues that could impact customer satisfaction
• Drive effective collaboration with internal sales, product, engineering, global delivery, solutions engineering, and other teams to resolve cross-functional issues and seize opportunities
• Identify Sama process deficiencies and recommend how they can be improved in a positive, constructive fashion
• Proactively network with key contacts outside own area of expertise
• Coordinate Sama resources as they pertain to the support of assigned customers
• When needed, analyze project and performance data to support Global Delivery teams
• Actively coach Sama team members to master the necessary skills to become the best-in-class