Senior Director & Practice Lead - Data & Analytics

NOTE: NO AGENCIES OR THIRD PARTIES

NOTE THAT POSITION CAN ALSO BE FILLED IN IRVINE, CA REGION

* MUST HAVE Higher Education domain expertise *

We are seeking an accomplished Senior Director & Practice Leader – Data & Analytics with 15+ years of experience in cloud, data platforms, delivery, and customer engagement. This role requires a visionary leader to own the Data & Analytics practice end-to-end— including strategy, P&L, customer success, delivery governance, talent development, and partner ecosystem growth.
The Practice Leader will drive modernization and analytics adoption across Higher Education and Public Sector, ensuring scalable, secure, and cost-optimized solutions while growing the practice to meet business objectives.

• Define and own the strategy, roadmap, and growth plan for the Data & Analytics practice.
• Develop accelerators, reusable frameworks, and IP assets that scale adoption across industries.
• Ensure alignment with organizational strategy while driving innovation in data platforms, AI/ML, and analytics solutions.

• Own full P&L accountability for the Data & Analytics practice, with $2.5M+ annual revenue responsibility.
• Manage budgets, expenses, forecasts, and margins to ensure financial sustainability and growth.
• Partner with sales and business development teams to drive pipeline growth and portfolio expansion.

• Build and sustain trusted relationships with CIOs, CTOs, and business executives, influencing modernization roadmaps.
• Act as executive sponsor for key accounts, ensuring delivery outcomes align with business priorities.
• Lead architecture reviews and sign-off with AWS solution architect teams and customer authorities, ensuring trusted solutions.

• Oversee end-to-end delivery governance, ensuring projects are delivered on time, within budget, and to quality standards.
• Implement risk management, compliance, and cost-optimization frameworks across engagements.
• Drive adoption of automation, Dev Ops, and cloud-native best practices for efficient operations.

• Build and scale a global bench of data and analytics talent across US and India.
• Define career paths, upskilling programs, and certification roadmaps to strengthen practice capability.
• Mentor emerging leaders and create succession plans to ensure sustainable growth of the practice.
• Own strategic alliances with AWS, GCP, Azure, and Databricks, driving joint go-to-market solutions.
• Represent the practice at industry conferences, customer summits, and leadership forums, reinforcing thought leadership.
• Ensure the practice maintains the highest level of partner certifications and competencies.

• 15+ years of IT experience, with 5+ years in cloud, data, and analytics leadership roles.
• Proven expertise in AWS (S3, Redshift, Glue, Lambda, IAM, MWAA, etc.) and GCP (Big Query, Dataflow, Pub/Sub, Composer, IAM, etc.);
  Azure and Databricks experience strongly preferred.
• Strong track record in executive customer engagement, relationship management, and trust building.
• Demonstrated success in architecture validation and sign-off with AWS solution architect teams and customer authorities.
• Full P&L ownership experience with responsibility for revenue ($2.5M+), margins, budgets, and financial governance.
• Higher Education domain expertise is required, with successful delivery of analytics and modernization programs for universities and public institutions.
• Strong knowledge of security, compliance, governance, and cost optimization in cloud environments.
• Excellent executive communication and presentation skills, including experience delivering at CIO/CTO-level forums.

• Entrepreneurial mindset with ability to scale a practice from strategy to delivery.
• Strong focus on customer success, financial accountability, and innovation.
• Skilled at building global delivery organizations, balancing customer needs with operational efficiency.
• Recognized thought leader with the ability to influence markets and drive adoption.

Thought Focus partners with forward-looking companies and organizations in higher education & public services sector (HEPS) to drive innovation and achieve a better future faster
. Our cutting-edge technology solutions enhance user experiences, drive operational efficiencies and deploy new capabilities faster. We do this through executional excellence and mitigating the risk of change.

With over 22 years of expertise, we deliver innovative solutions ranging from Student Analytics and AI-powered platforms to People Soft Campus Solutions and IoT product engineering, helping organizations boost efficiency and drive success.

Headquartered in the U.S., Thought Focus has more than 3000 employees in locations spread across five countries.