Executive Director, Customer Relationship Management (CRM)

The George Mason University Information Technology Services department-located on the Fairfax, Va., campus- invites applications for an Executive Director, CRM Platform within Information Technology Services. This is a new role at the university, created to lead the university’s Salesforce program in support of student experience initiatives. George Mason University has a strong institutional commitment to the achievement of excellence and diversity among its faculty and staff, and strongly encourages candidates to apply who will enrich Mason’s academic and culturally inclusive environment.

About the Position:

The Executive Director, CRM Platform, will lead the establishment of a Salesforce-first program at the university in support of the university’s strategic goals regarding the student experience. The executive director reports to Information Technology Services while being accountable to the Salesforce Executive Committee, requiring both leadership and management responsibilities.

The Executive Director is responsible for strategic and tactical planning, delivery and operation of IT systems that enable and support the business objectives of the university including enrollment, admissions, coaching and advising, and the student experience. This is a strategic and highly impactful role, helping the organization use technology to increase response to the mission.

The role will be responsible for building strong partnerships with business leaders, developing a deep understanding of the university and technology needs, and working closely with university leaders to develop technology plans and roadmaps, and to deliver and operate solutions that meet university objectives. This role will lead a combination of managed services vendors, internal IT teams and consulting vendors to deliver programs in this area.

This role will collaborate with IT leaders and business process owners and organizations to deliver integrated solutions that are cost-effective to operate and maintain, meet the needs of the university, and that adhere to IT standards, policies, and processes.

Responsibilities:

This position provides oversight and direction to the Salesforce operations and development staff within Information Technology Services organization.

• Initiate, build and maintain excellent working relationships with business leaders, including key senior management;
• Partner with business leaders and senior management to understand strategic business plans and roadmaps and develop supporting information technology plans and roadmaps;
• Act as the executive leader of Mason’s Center of Excellence (CoE) Salesforce governance structure to ensure a streamlined and collaborative approach to Salesforce utilization and expansion;
• Develop IT execution and delivery strategies, including in-house vs. outsourcing approaches;
• Develop and oversee development of program and project plans, milestones, deliverables; timelines, resources and budgets;
• Provide oversight, guidance, and contributions to help ensure project success;
• Ability to be hands on when needed and be able to function across the spectrum – from strategic and tactical;
• Weigh in as necessary on requirements, architecture, security, engineering, infrastructure and other aspects of solution delivery or system maintenance to represent the business objectives and priorities. Ensure non-functional and technical requirements are included in all project plans;
• Provide Salesforce subject matter thought leadership and expertise to steer the technical direction of workstreams based on sound technical basis and Salesforce best practices;
• Comprehension of architectural decisions and ability to convey those decisions to stakeholders to explain how business strategy alignment is satisfied;
• Monitoring key Salesforce technology trends and recommend the right additions that will make us more efficient and lower our total cost of ownership;
• Manage vendor performance and relationships to effectively and efficiently meet business objectives;
• Responsible for IT human capital management to include staffing, employee training and career development, establishing performance standards and conducting reviews, and succession planning;
• Ensure 24/7/365 staffing for mission critical systems; and
• Accountable for system redundancy and technical continuity of operations.

Required Qualifications:

• Extensive experience (generally 10+ years) to include management/supervisory experience (generally 5-7 years) and proven experience managing large Salesforce projects and systems (case management experience preferable);
• Master’s degree in Business Management, Information Technology, Software Engineering, Computer Science, or related discipline, or, equivalent combination of education and related experience;
• Extensive experience with the Salesforce platform across its various offerings (firm understanding of the underlying technology framework and tools);
• Experience with Salesforce Education and Service Cloud implementations and support is required;
• Strong Program/Project management experience, and experience with Agile, Scrum, DevOps practices required;
• Experience of working with cloud platforms AWS/Azure/Google Cloud or equivalent;
• Knowledge of ITIL framework required;
• High level of knowledge/expertise in case management process design and implementations desirable;
• Strong understanding of data management technologies (MDM, Business Intelligence, Data Warehousing, Data Science);
• Strong understanding of Integration technologies including ESB, iPaaS, API Management and Service Governance experience;
• Strong desire to keep up with emerging technologies to act as a thought leader to help guide technology innovation;
• Strong knowledge of systems security, data protection, and data privacy as it pertains to delivering enterprise grade Salesforce solutions;
• Experience working with clients with significant and complex IT needs;
• Experience working in large, complex IT project environments;
• Highly intelligent, conceptual, excellent judgment, and capable of analyzing business and management problems. Must possess the ability to arrive at sound and effective business solutions;
• Excellent communication skills; able to present a solid business case, form business partnerships, and frame issues for a wide variety of stakeholders including executive management;
• Able to work both autonomously and with appropriate collaboration among other team members and senior management across a matrixed organization;
• Excellent oral and written communication, presenting, meeting facilitation, negotiation, decision making, and problem-solving skills; and
• Experience defining business requirements, writing user stories, and providing a detailed system and functional designs.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Project Management Institute (PMI) Project Management Professional (PMP) certification; and
• Strong preference to candidates with experience working within the public sector, specifically education focused.

Salary is commensurate with education and experience.

George Mason University is a great place to work where employees are given an opportunity to develop skills and expand horizons. We have tuition waivers; telecommuting (typically one day a week) and flextime schedules; facilities that will meet your physical fitness needs; and the campus environment is dynamic and ethnically and culturally diverse.

Special Instructions to Applicants

For full consideration, applicants must apply for position number FA28KZ at https://jobs.gmu.edubyJanuary 10, 2023; complete and submit the online application; and upload a resume and letter of interest and a list of three professional references with contact information.

George Mason University is an equal opportunity/affirmative action employer, committed to promoting inclusion and equity in its community. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, disability or veteran status, or any characteristic protected by law.