This is an opportunity for a commercially led Partner, Alliances or Channel Manager to drive forward an existing strategic relationship with a leading technology vendor, while also shaping the wider Partner strategy and developing the Partner ecosystem. This position is central to the continued growth and success of Datasparq, and will form a key part of the Go To Market / Sales team.

The successful candidate will be a self-starter, clear communicator and have a knack for building relationships and credibility quickly. They will need to be consultative and curious by nature, adept at communicating, and have strong influencing skills and a passion for solving problems with data. Prior knowledge of AI, Data Science and Data Engineering is a plus, but an interest is a must.

The Partner Development Manager will be responsible for managing existing partners, primarily our partnership with Microsoft, maximising the leads and opportunities that are generated with and through them. They will also work closely with the Chief Commercial Officer to define the wider partner strategy and develop Datasparq’s Partner ecosystem. The objective is to work with the wider Datasparq team (Marketing, Sales and Delivery) to consistently manage and coordinate Datasparq’s interaction with partners, raising brand awareness of Datasparq, uncovering new leads and helping to identify opportunities.

SPECIFIC RESPONSIBILITIES INCLUDE:

• Developing and owning the strategic partner relationship with Microsoft, including developing annual partner growth plans, managing our partner portal and developing our network and relationships within Microsoft and their partner ecosystem
• Leading on partner related marketing initiatives including representing the company at trade shows and partner events
• Working with the wider Datasparq team to define messaging, offerings and solutions specific to the partner and promoting them within the partner
• Facilitating and coordinating introductions to key partner stakeholders for wider Datasparq team members to broaden and deepen our relationships
• Documenting and ensuring all partner conversations / interactions are captured so we have a history and record of key discussions
• Working with partners to define go-to-market campaigns that position the possibilities of cloud-based data and artificial intelligence solutions

The successful candidate will have experience managing partners or working within a partner ecosystem, and ideally be able to evidence how they have grown and developed a partner based relationship to establish a successful business relationship, ideally one that drives inbound leads.

• Prior business to business experience
• Experience working in a relationship based role with a focus on developing new and existing relationships to help achieve business success
• Experience holding and leading meetings, building rapport, facilitating consultative discussions, and managing follow up actions to maintain momentum
• Ability to work as part of a team to achieve a common goal, recognising when to lead and when to step back
• Ability to build strong relationships, navigate matrixed organisations and manage broader stakeholder relationships
• Creating simple, clear and concise emails and presentation decks to facilitate delivery of key messages
• Accurate record keeping to facilitate knowledge sharing.

REQUIRED ATTRIBUTES INCLUDE:

• Pro-active / go-getter, we need someone with energy and a desire to make things happen, we need someone who can operate with autonomy and who is comfortable setting the agenda and proposing new ideas
• Team player, we need someone who can work collaboratively with the wider Datasparq team to maximise partner development efforts and increase the chances of successfully growing partnerships
• Creative, we need someone who can think differently, someone who is comfortable operating in an entrepreneurial environment, and who can identify different ways to encourage clients to engage and open up

• Prior partner, channel or alliances management experience gained within a vendor, consulting or systems integration environment, and a good understanding of partner eco-systems and the dynamics of working in partnership with other organisations to drive business opportunities
• A track record of successful target-based sales execution in a professional services environment, ideally selling data and AI solutions.
• Experience growing technology partners into strategic partnerships and managing ongoing commercial and growth interactions
• A good understanding of sales, and in particular how to manage a complex sale
• Knowledge of and experience in Partner Development

Datasparq is a boutique AI & data firm that solves complex business challenges.

We build bespoke AI and data science tools—and turn them into robust, reliable services for our clients.

We start with research and iterate—using lean startup principles—to quickly uncover impactful solutions to high-value challenges. Our product team ensure that we build the right solution in the right way. Our data science team ensure that the AI and data science solutions we build are best-in-class. And, our engineering team ensure that solutions are robust and ready to be deployed in the real world.

But—what’s special about Datasparq is the way our teams work together.

Just as no business challenge fits neatly into a box, neither do our people. Rather than simply hiring a data scientist or a data engineer, we seek out passionate experts who can bring a range of overlapping skills to any team. That gives us the ability to build the perfect team to solve any challenge. We believe in bespoke over one-size-fits-all.

We don’t just build ML models—we take our science from the broad spectrum of mathematics, statistics, operations research and computer science. We work with academic partners and Centres for Doctoral Training (CDTs) across the UK to ensure that what we do is founded on high-quality, up-to-date science.

When it comes to operationalising solutions, we can run data science products in the cloud as services for our clients—or deploy to their infrastructure as needed.

Diversity & ethics

As a company, we don’t just value diversity—we place it at the heart of what we do. To create solutions that serve our users—and our clients' users—diversity is a must, not a nice to have. Likewise, we place ethics at the heart of what we do. Our team are passionate about working on projects that drive positive results for people and the planet. We routinely undertake ethics reviews and champion a culture of openness, honesty and integrity.