Associate Director - Corporate Strategy & Development

Microsoft is on a mission to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more. Our CEO’s vision of Microsoft is the productivity and platform company for the intelligent cloud and intelligent edge world. The Microsoft Corporate Strategy Team is a small, specialized group that advises our CEO and executive leadership team on driving, assessing, and prioritizing the long-term strategic direction and growth for the company across its portfolio of existing and new offerings. The team has built a track record of spotting trends early and subsequently leading change throughout the company. The group broadly focuses on three sets of activities:  

• Thought leadership on the future state of the industry (e.g., economics of the cloud) and potential impact to Microsoft’s overall strategy  
• Counsel to senior executives on multi-billion dollar decisions (inclusive of “needle moving” growth drivers, large strategic acquisitions and partnerships, portfolio optimization, etc.)  
• Internal projects to ensure Microsoft’s processes and operations enable the company to grow and achieve our mission  

This role puts you in the middle of one of the world’s largest companies ($280B+ revenue) in the midst of several of the biggest disruptions the technology industry has ever seen. As a member of Microsoft’s Corporate Strategy Team, you will drive formal quantitative and qualitative analytical decision support on high-priority, cross-company strategic issues. Example project areas include: strategic acquisition evaluation, value chain assessment, white space opportunity sizing, business model analysis, new initiative ideation, and competitive analysis and game theory.  

Responsibilities

Project Leadership 

• Leads key strategy projects and orchestrate workstreams across the Corporate Strategy team; owns overall efforts (i.e., full accountability of projects), including project plans, recommendations, impact, and syndication across groups.
• Coaches and mentors team members. Provides professional development guidance and opportunities to project team members. 

Corporate Strategy 

• Develop and deliver divisional level analysis, options, execution plans, and recommendations based on analytical rigor, logic, and subject matter expertise
• Proactively spot strategic opportunities missed by others and plot insightful approaches to address them
• Investigates and provides an analysis of competitors, partners, business models, market sizing, and industry trends. Investigates and provides analysis of the merger and acquisition (M&A), venture funding, and public market environment and trends. Conducts market landscape analyses and reviews of companies of potential interest. Provides guidance to business partners to inform decision-making.
• Develops an understanding of Microsoft’s product portfolio, strategic priorities, competitive position, gaps, and potential opportunities. Investigates and provides an analysis of the merger and acquisition (M&A), venture funding and public market environment and trends. Supports and reviews product roadmap, go-to-market, integration plans, and related Issues. 

Research, Analysis, & Framing 

• Defines initial framing of strategic questions and analyses for project team to conduct.
• Leads project team and/or independently conducts market-based research, including identifying and gathering information (e.g., financial statements, reports, analyses, stakeholder feedback, expert calls); interprets information with guidance from senior colleagues as needed, including researching existing business and identifying new spaces for Microsoft; structures and conducts analyses (e.g., financial modeling) to validate proposed ideas and inform business decisions. 

Problem Solving & Insight 

• Guide project team problem solving through development of frameworks/methodologies to create insightful analysis and recommendations; identify the right question to frame the team’s work
• Synthesizes findings into insights within a project, including implications that inform business decisions; leverages insights to develop recommendations and provide thought leadership (e.g., trend identification, implications of competitor moves) around potential future growth opportunities and strategic issues for Microsoft.  

Communication 

• Communicates and advocates insights to executive business leaders (e.g., GM+) and conveys viewpoints through written documents (e.g., memos, reports) and influence models (e.g., meetings, presentations) through multiple iterations of feedback and vetting, building and executing end-to-end storylines.
• Delivers project findings, recommendations, and implications to senior executives and business partners clearly and succinctly to facilitate senior discussions and decision making.  

Business Partner Relationships 

• Establishes and maintains key points of contact with internal teams (e.g., Finance, Marketing, Engineering). Builds working relationships with executive stakeholders and business partners (e.g., GM+). Shares knowledge with business leaders (e.g., Senior Managers, Directors) on a particular area of expertise, leveraging and broadening deep technical/product knowledge and market awareness for a domain to inform strategic business decisions. 

This role is located in Redmond, Washington with a requirement of 3 days/week in office. 

Qualifications

Required Qualifications

• Masters Degree in Business Administration or related field AND 3+ years marketing, strategy, business planning, consulting, banking, finance, economics, and/or partner organization experience OR Bachelors Degree in Business, Finance, Economics, Liberal Arts, Computer Science, or related field AND 4+ years marketing, strategy, business planning, consulting, banking, finance, economics, and/or partner organization experience OR equivalent experience.

Preferred Qualifications

• Masters Degree in Business Administration or related field AND 6+ years marketing, strategy, business planning, consulting, banking, finance, economics, and/or partner organization experience OR Bachelors Degree in Business, Finance, Economics, Liberal Arts, Computer Science, or related field AND 8+ years marketing, strategy, business planning, consulting, banking, finance, economics, and/or partner organization experience OR equivalent experience.
• 6+ years experience in Strategy, Management Consulting, and/or Finance.
• 1+ years experience leading project teams in consulting, corporate strategy, or related function
• 1+ years experience in tech-related roles (e.g., tech corporate strategy, tech consulting, software engineering) or on tech-focused projects in consulting, banking, strategy, or related fields 

Business Strategy IC4 - The typical base pay range for this role across the U.S. is USD $106,400 - $203,600 per year. There is a different range applicable to specific work locations, within the San Francisco Bay area and New York City metropolitan area, and the base pay range for this role in those locations is USD $137,600 - $222,600 per year.