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Head of Vendor Alliances & Marketing Strategy

A Rare Senior Leadership Opportunity at the Intersection of Technology, Partnerships, Marketing & Growth

We are proud to be representing one of our key clients, an established and highly respected technology services organisation with a strong footprint across South Africa and the Middle East, in the search for an exceptional Head of Vendor Alliances & Marketing Strategy.

This is not a traditional marketing role.

We are looking for a commercially astute, strategically minded leader who understands how global technology partnerships, vendor ecosystems, channel economics and marketing strategy come together to create measurable business growth.

Reporting directly to the CEO, this person will become a key commercial architect within the business — owning two interconnected disciplines at the heart of the company’s growth engine:

The successful leader will take ownership of strategic relationships with major global technology vendors, including Red Hat, AWS, Confluent and Elastic, while strengthening distributor ecosystems across South Africa and the Middle East.

The mandate is significant: capture more commercial value from the vendor ecosystem, strengthen market positioning, drive measurable pipeline contribution, and ensure every partnership investment and every marketing rand spent connects back to tangible commercial outcomes.

The Opportunity

You will sit at the heart of the organisation’s growth strategy, working closely with the CEO, Sales leadership, Delivery and Cloud leadership.

You’ll be responsible for how the organisation:

This is a role for someone who understands that partnerships are not about collecting logos — and marketing is not about activity for activity’s sake.

It is about commercial outcomes.

What You’ll Own

Strategic Vendor Alliances

You’ll own and develop high-value relationships with leading global technology vendors, including:

A key part of your mandate will be driving deeper partner status, expanding specialisations and ensuring vendor relationships translate into stronger deal economics, credibility, co-sell opportunities and market access.

You’ll help drive ambitions including:

MDF, Rebates & Commercial Value Capture

This is a major commercial component of the role.

You’ll take ownership of underutilised vendor funding and incentive opportunities, ensuring the organisation captures the full value available through its partnerships.

You will:

We’re looking for someone who understands the difference between partnership spend that compounds — and spend that simply disappears.

Distributor Relationship Leadership

You’ll build and maintain strong operational relationships with key distributors across South Africa and the Middle East.

Your responsibilities will include:

The goal is simple: distributor relationships should be actively managed, commercially optimised and aligned to growth.

Marketing Strategy That Creates Pipeline

You’ll set the marketing strategy that turns strategic positioning into measurable demand.

You’ll own how the business engages the market across South Africa and the Middle East, including:

This role requires someone who constantly asks:

Brand & Market Positioning

You’ll help establish the organisation as the partner of choice in carefully selected technology niches.

The positioning story includes:

You’ll build the market presence that earns a seat at the table with the customers, partners and industry influencers that matter.

This includes:

Team Leadership

You’ll lead and develop the marketing capability as the organisation scales.

You’ll:

Commercial Alignment Across Sales, Delivery & Cloud

This role works closely with Sales leadership, Innovation, Cloud leadership and Delivery teams.

You’ll ensure:

You will lead through influence across the organisation.

South Africa & Middle East Integration

You’ll act as a strategic bridge between operations across South Africa and the Middle East.

You’ll ensure:

Who We’re Looking For

We are searching for a senior commercial, alliances, partnerships or technology marketing leader with approximately 10–15+ years of experience.

You understand enterprise technology ecosystems and know how vendor programmes actually work behind the scenes.

You bring a powerful combination of:

You should be comfortable reading a P&L, understanding deal-level economics and connecting partnership investment to operating margin and growth.

Your Vendor Ecosystem Knowledge

You understand areas such as:

Experience across at least two major technology ecosystems such as Red Hat, AWS, Microsoft, IBM, Google Cloud or Oracle would be highly valuable.

AI Fluency Matters

We are looking for a leader who sees AI as part of how modern work gets done.

You should be comfortable using AI tools to accelerate:

You understand both the power and limitations of AI — using it to enhance judgement rather than replace it.

Helpful Qualifications

Practical commercial experience matters most, but the following would be advantageous:

How Success Will Be Measured

This is a high-impact role with clear commercial accountability across four core areas:

Success will include:

More Than Just a Career Move

Our client understands that exceptional performance is strongest when people are supported to do their best work.

The broader employee offering includes:

The Package

R120,000 – R180,000 per month

The final package will be determined based on the successful candidate’s depth of experience, commercial leadership capability, vendor ecosystem expertise and overall fit for this strategic mandate.

Interested in a Confidential Conversation?

This is a rare opportunity for a senior leader who can operate confidently at the intersection of:

Technology. Partnerships. Commercial Strategy. Marketing. Brand. Pipeline. Growth.

If you understand how to turn global vendor relationships into real commercial advantage — and how to turn strong market positioning into measurable pipeline — we would love to hear from you.

We are representing our client exclusively in this senior leadership search.

All suitable applications and conversations will be handled with complete discretion and confidentiality.