Director of Luxury Strategic Partnerships

This is a senior strategic role based within a luxury membership group focused on shaping direction, building influential relationships and translating market intelligence into stronger programmes, insights and commercial opportunities within the luxury market.

The role sits at the intersection of market intelligence, strategic planning, thought leadership, international growth and senior stakeholder engagement. You will spend significant time in the market, developing trusted relationships with senior leaders and external partners, while bringing insight back into the organisation to influence strategy and decision-making.

You will also set the strategic direction across several major programmes, ensuring they have a clear purpose, ambition and commercial impact, while empowering wider teams to deliver effectively.

Key Responsibilities

Market Intelligence & Senior Relationships

• Build and maintain trusted relationships with senior business leaders, industry stakeholders and strategic partners.
• Develop a strong understanding of market trends, challenges, opportunities and emerging priorities.
• Build relationships with leading research, consulting and insight organisations to access high-quality intelligence.
• Translate external conversations and market intelligence into actionable insights for the wider organisation.
• Ensure senior leadership and relevant teams have a clear, current understanding of market developments.

Strategy & Thought Leadership

• Set the strategic direction and ambition for major research, insight and thought leadership programmes.
• Define key priorities, audiences, objectives and measures of success.
• Shape major research and insight projects, ensuring they answer the questions that matter most to stakeholders.
• Connect different research and thought leadership initiatives into a coherent strategic narrative.
• Use external intelligence and research to influence organisational priorities and strengthen market positioning.

International & Commercial Development

• Help define international market priorities and the strategic objectives for overseas activity.
• Identify opportunities for partnerships, market access, international programmes and business development.
• Develop senior relationships with international partners and stakeholders.
• Ensure international intelligence is shared internally and used to inform strategy and member/client conversations.
• Work closely with commercial and partnerships teams to maximise the value of strategic relationships.

Leadership & Collaboration

• Act as a trusted strategic partner to the CEO and senior leadership team.
• Provide clear, honest and commercially relevant insight to support decision-making.
• Work collaboratively with senior colleagues across communications, government relations, membership and partnerships.
• Set clear direction while giving capable teams the autonomy to deliver.
• Contribute to a highly collaborative, entrepreneurial and purpose-driven culture.

About You

You will bring significant senior experience combining strategic thinking, external relationship management and analytical or intellectual responsibility.

You may have worked within consulting, a think tank, professional services, a luxury or consumer brand, trade or sector body, or another complex, relationship-led organisation.

You'll ideally have:

• A strong track record of building trusted relationships with senior business leaders.
• Experience setting strategic direction across complex programmes or portfolios.
• Experience shaping research, thought leadership, market intelligence or insight programmes.
• Strong commercial and analytical judgement, with the ability to turn information into clear recommendations.
• Experience working across international markets, partnerships or business development.
• Strong understanding of the luxury, consumer or wider business landscape, or the ability to develop this quickly.
• Excellent communication and presentation skills, with credibility at senior level.