Guardian Jobs Near Me – Services Director

About the job

SIGNIUM UK

Signium UK Executive Search is proud to represent:

Cambridge International Education

A division of Cambridge University Press & Assessment

in a search for:

Product and Services Director

Location: Cambridge, UK

Reports to: Group Managing Director, Cambridge International Education

Package: Highly competitive salary, bonus scheme and benefits

“We’re looking for an exceptional leader who can set the product strategy for one of the world’s great education companies.

Our ultimate goal is to build the world’s most influential and respected teaching and learning community.

Come and be part of our exciting journey”.

About Us

On 1 August 2021 global academic and education research publisher Cambridge University Press and worldwide assessment and education experts Cambridge Assessment came together to form a single organisation: Cambridge University Press & Assessment, a global education powerhouse with revenues close to £ 1 billion pa.

With more than 6,000 people, around 60% in the UK and 40% internationally, we exist to further the mission of the University of Cambridge: “To contribute to society through the pursuit of education, learning and research at the highest international levels of excellence”. We are a not-for-profit organisation, and our financial success is reinvested in the mission, enabling us to invest in and expand on the good we do. Every year we help to unlock the potential of millions of people worldwide.

Cambridge International Education is the part of our organisation that focuses on schools’ markets outside the UK. We are market leader in our sector and have achieved sustained and substantial profitable growth across the last decade. We now generate revenues of circa £250 million and employ approximately 1,500 staff around the world. We currently deliver assessments to more than 8 million learners in more than 170 countries. Many of these learners are supported through our world-class range of teaching & learning resources. Our expertise gives vital support to teachers and schools, shaping curricula and education systems around the world. We also help teachers gain the skills and knowledge needed to design and develop effective assessments.

We are ambitious. As a newly merged organisation and as the education landscape evolves, we are focusing on supporting our customers beyond the pandemic and embracing new ways of working together to help our schools and systems move forward stronger. At the same time as tackling today’s challenges, we are innovating for tomorrow: looking to provide more inclusive and accessible products, modernising the curriculum and developing our digital learning and assessment capabilities.

Our ultimate goal is to build the world’s most influential and respected teaching and learning community.

Our full story can be found at Cambridge.org

Job purpose

We are looking for an exceptional leader to build a high performing and unified new team and to lead our product strategy for Cambridge International Education. You will be on the new International Education Board and will report directly in to the overall Group Managing Director.

In this role you will have accountability for bringing together and leading a number of existing teams from across the wider business. You will define and deliver a coherent and aligned product strategy that will deliver our ambition for growth and increased impact – and for the digital transformation of our product and service portfolio.

The role has responsibility for developing and leading our International digital product strategy, for success and sustainability and to deliver impact, usage and profitable revenue growth.

Key Accountabilities Of The Role

• To lead on the creation and maintenance of a powerful and aligned product vision and strategy for the new business
• To create links across our product teams to develop supportive working practices and behaviours and build new propositions that benefit from our wide range of skills, assets and capabilities
• To lead, shape and oversee the management of commissioning and development activity to ensure effective and efficient delivery
• To lead our product data strategy across the full range of our product types and services
• To lead our digital product and service strategy working closely with the UK counterparts to identify synergies and overlaps
• To lead the product strategy for our emerging “digital high stakes” offer and the portfolio simplification plan that needs to underpin our exams modernisation programme
• To liaise with the Cambridge Partnership for Education on IP that may be created or versioned for government opportunities
• To work with teams in marketing and our International network to bring customer insights in to the heart of our product development and go to market processes

Leading people

• Lead a team to ensure effective collaboration, joint working and decision making across the new business and wider Cambridge organisation
• Lead and oversee development of this new product team so that they become recognised and valued, and fulfil their potential in contributing to the development of the new organisation
• Develop, lead and inspire a team – building their profile and expertise and the impact they have on delivering our business strategy

About You

Mission focused – you’ll be excited by the opportunity to contribute to the University mission and the potential to make a real difference to the quality of International Education around the world

Strategic vision – to drive the development of a global proposition strategy to meet changing customer and organisational aspirations.

Leadership – a senior business leader with experience of developing customer focused product strategies, and bringing these to market. You will have achieved this through inspiring and supporting talented teams of specialists and thinking creatively about the best ways to focus and align that talent.

People skills – you’ll be an empathetic and professional people manager who has shown the ability to create and sustain high performing and motivated teams.

Consumer centricity – you will have a deep understanding of customer expectations and behaviour and of how sector and market trends are impacting these.

Commercial mindset – helping teams to build plans to deliver ambitious commercial objectives. Experience in having full budget accountability and ability to stay on target with high level financial understanding of levers to drive more profitable product investments and return on investment.

Open-minded, curious, and ready to learn. Proactive, collaborative, organised, and a natural problem solver, excited by opportunity to grow the business and self.

Please apply by emailing your CV and covering letter to our retained consultants Signium UK, at [email protected]

The closing date for applications is November 4th, and interviews are scheduled to take place during November and December.

Why join us?

Joining us is your opportunity to pursue potential. You’ll belong to a collaborative team that’s exploring new and better ways to serve students, teachers and researchers across the globe – for the benefit of individuals, society and the world. Sharing our mission will inspire your own growth, development and progress, in an environment which embraces difference, change and aspiration.

Cambridge University Press & Assessment is committed to being a place where anyone can enjoy a successful career, where everyone has a voice, and where we learn continuously to improve together. Ensuring that everyone feels they belong is essential to who we are, and to the contribution we make to society and our planet.

We believe better outcomes come through diversity of thought, background and approach. We welcome applications from people from all backgrounds and communities, actively seeking to employ people from a wide range of different communities.