Fast Facts

Savvas Learning Company is seeking a Manager for Professional Learning in the Central Region, responsible for leading a team of Curriculum Specialists, driving strategic sales initiatives, and ensuring effective training and coaching to meet ambitious sales goals.

Responsibilities: Manage and develop Curriculum Specialist team, support sales campaigns and training, organize events, optimize resource utilization, and control team expenses while maintaining professional knowledge and fostering a positive team culture.

Skills: Strong leadership, strategic sales expertise, excellent communication skills, proficiency in educational sales processes, and team management.

Qualifications: B.S. or B.A. degree required, M.A. preferred, with a minimum of 8+ years of relevant experience in the education industry and proven success in managing sales and services.

Location: Wisconsin, USA

Compensation: Not provided by employer. Typical compensation ranges for this position are between $90,000 - $130,000.

The Manager, Professional Learning, is primarily responsible for implementing the market strategy for the Curriculum Specialist team in the Central region, collaborating with the Director, Professional Learning. This role provides strategic support to both the Director, Professional Learning and the market-based sales and services teams. A critical aspect of the role involves hiring, managing, and developing the Curriculum Specialist team, particularly within the Central Region. The incumbent is accountable for managing these business needs to achieve and exceed Savvas Learning Company sales and services objectives. Work is performed under the management of the Director, Professional Learning, with responsibilities including overseeing capacity, organizing events, and controlling expenses, while also having the responsibility to develop and coach direct reports.

Primary Responsibilities

• Manage and Develop Curriculum Specialist Supervisor and Team: Oversee the hiring, management, and development of direct reports, including creating personal growth plans and coaching opportunities.
• Strategic Campaign Support: Contribute to sales campaign planning, training, and delivery needs, encompassing workshops, pilots, campaigns, presentations, and activation services. This includes preparing for product, platform, and sales activities, and providing coaching and mentoring.
• Organize Sales and Services Events: Organize the delivery of various sales and services events, including individual, remote, and multi-specialist events. Actively engage in staffing sales events, services events, pilots, exhibits, and conferences.
• Optimize Resource Utilization: Collaborate with the Supervisor, Professional Learning and Resource Deployment team to troubleshoot scheduling conflicts and challenges, ensuring resources are committed in the most effective and efficient manner.
• Communication and Policy Adherence: Support the communication strategy for sales and program activation planning and customer support for sales teams. Reinforce company policies and guidelines with direct reports.
• Control Team Expenses: Enforce Savvas Learning Company's established travel and entertainment policies and promote the use of internal cost-saving applications like Certify, Amazon Business, etc. Maintain a geographically based team with the correct balance of content expertise to minimize travel within market clusters, under the Director’s guidance.
• Maintain Professional Knowledge: Continuously enhance professional knowledge by attending educational workshops, reviewing professional publications, and reviewing current Savvas sales presentations and program activations.
• Foster Positive Team Culture: Contribute to a creative, positive, and respectful team culture in collaboration with the Supervisor, Professional Learning.

Skills/Knowledge/Abilities:

• Industry Expertise: Possess strong knowledge and experience in the Educational Sales and Services industry, particularly as it applies to customer-facing teams. Be able to quickly gain knowledge of Savvas Learning Company product lines, platforms, and the competitive landscape.
• Interpersonal and Collaborative Skills: Demonstrate excellent interpersonal skills with the ability to interact effectively with internal and external customers from entry-level to executive levels. Must also possess skills that inspire collaboration among all team members.
• Strategic Sales and Team Leadership: Exhibit a proven track record in strategy to achieve established sales/services objectives and the ability to build, manage, and motivate teams. Experience partnering with customers and coaching to close deals and deliver successful services (including customer exhibits, conferences, pilots, sales presentations, and program introductory services) is essential.
• Pilot Strategy and Customer Experience: Possess knowledge in customer pilot strategy, including best practices for support, communication, training, data analysis, and competitive advantages. Understand how to provide a customer experience that encourages adoptions and partnerships with Savvas Learning Company.
• Results Orientation and Prioritization: Be a proactive, results-oriented self-starter. Be detail-oriented with the ability to prioritize and manage the differing needs of sales and services business goals. Demonstrate established success as a strategic sales thinker with a record of executing sales and services plans.
• Communication and Presentation Excellence: Show superior messaging and presentation delivery skills. Possess excellent communication skills—written, verbal, in-person, and in remote/virtual presentation environments, utilizing industry-standard technology tools and platforms. Be an expert at leveraging and coaching others in these skills.
• Technology Proficiency: Possess broad experience with industry-standard business applications and productivity tools used to manage and mitigate risk. This includes applications like Salesforce, Zoom, Learning Management Systems, Google Drive/Calendar/Meet.

Additional Job Requirements

• This person must reside in the Central Region: Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Missouri, Minnesota, Ohio, or Wisconsin.
• To perform this job successfully, an individual must be able to satisfactorily perform each essential duty. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform essential functions.
• This person must be able to sit or stand at a personal computer for a reasonable length of time, typing and reading, as well as when presenting.
• The ability to handle a high volume of work in a short period, handle multiple priorities simultaneously, and operate in a demanding work environment is important.
• Reliable attendance and punctuality are critical to successful performance in this role.
• Ability to lift 50 lbs.
• Must be able to travel at least 60-70% of time, mainly by airline, but at times long distance in cars. Certain times of year require more travel than others, and flexibility and availability to travel at any time of year are required. Less travel may be required during pandemic travel restrictions.

Scope and Impact:

• Responsible for implementing the market strategy for the Curriculum Specialist team, established in collaboration with the Manager, and defined in the scope and impact of this job.
• Accountable for managing business needs in efforts to achieve and exceed Savvas Learning Company sales and services objectives.
• Responsible for the hiring, management, and development of direct reports. This includes working with the Director to manage capacity based on forecasting, gaps, trends, campaigns, and product releases.
• Manages expenses by enforcing Savvas Learning Company established travel and entertainment policies and reinforcing the use of internal cost-saving applications.

Education and Experience:

• B.S. or B.A. degree, M.A. preferred.
• Minimum of 8+ years of relevant experience in the education industry, including sales processes, services delivery, and implementation plans.
• Experience with customer service skills at a leadership level and in driving customer relationships to execute overall strategy.
• Experience in the management of strategic plans in sales and/or services roles, particularly those that sell and service multiple products/platforms/services.
• Proven success in sales management to achieve goals.
• Ability to coach, mentor, develop, and performance manage sales and services resources.

Other Duties Assigned by Management

• This job will have direct report management responsibilities. These reports will be in the Central Region geographical area, and the number of reports will be determined by the Director, Professional Learning.
• Assist with special projects as they are assigned.

Disclaimer

This job description is meant to describe the general nature of the job to be performed and is not intended to be an all-inclusive listing of job duties or responsibilities that are required of the employee for this job. Job duties, responsibilities, and activities may change or new ones may be assigned at any time with or without notice as requested by managers or as required by business needs.

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