Senior Manager, Partner Marketing – Security Partners

Job Description

AHEAD builds platforms for digital business. By weaving together advances in cloud infrastructure, automation and analytics, and software delivery, we help enterprises deliver on the promise of digital transformation.

At AHEAD, we prioritize creating a culture of belonging, where all perspectives and voices are represented, valued, respected, and heard. We create spaces to empower everyone to speak up, make change, and drive the culture at AHEAD.

We embrace all candidates that will contribute to the diversification and enrichment of ideas and perspectives at AHEAD.

The Senior Manager, Partner Marketing – Security Partners, MOU & MDF Strategy is responsible for leading the marketing strategy, investment framework, and performance management for AHEAD's security partner ecosystem. This role develops and oversees annual partner marketing plans, manages MOU commitments, optimizes Marketing Development Funds (MDF), and ensures partner investments are aligned to AHEAD's go-to-market priorities and deliver measurable business impact.

Serving as a strategic bridge between Marketing, Alliances, Sales, Finance, and partner organizations, the Director establishes the structure, governance, and accountability required to maximize the value of partner marketing investments. This leader also manages and develops a team of Partner Marketing Managers responsible for executing partner-specific strategies and programs.

Duties & Responsibilities:

Security Partner Strategy & Leadership

• Own the overall marketing strategy and operating model for AHEAD's portfolio of security partners.
• Develop annual and quarterly partner marketing strategies aligned to AHEAD business priorities, sales objectives, solution areas, and partner growth opportunities.
• Establish segmentation and investment strategies that determine how marketing resources are allocated across strategic partners.
• Partner with Alliances and Sales leadership to identify joint growth priorities and translate them into actionable partner marketing plans.
• Ensure partner marketing activity supports AHEAD's broader field, campaign, event, and demand-generation strategies rather than operating as isolated partner programs.
• Serve as a senior marketing advisor to internal partner leaders and key partner stakeholders.

MOU Strategy & Management

• Lead the marketing component of annual partner MOU planning, negotiation, activation, and performance management.
• Translate MOU commitments into measurable annual marketing plans, investment priorities, and execution roadmaps.
• Maintain visibility into partner commitments, AHEAD commitments, funding levels, utilization, performance, and outstanding obligations.
• Partner with Alliances, Finance, Sales, and Marketing leadership to ensure MOU commitments are achievable, strategically aligned, and appropriately resourced.
• Establish quarterly business reviews to evaluate MOU performance and recommend adjustments based on business priorities and results.
• Identify gaps, risks, and opportunities within partner MOUs and proactively develop plans to address them.

MDF Strategy, Governance & Optimization

• Own AHEAD's MDF strategy and governance framework across the security partner portfolio.
• Develop standardized processes for MDF planning, requests, approvals, utilization, tracking, reimbursement, and reporting.
• Ensure MDF investments are directed toward programs with clear objectives, target audiences, expected outcomes, and measurable return.
• Monitor MDF utilization and proactively identify unused, underutilized, or at-risk funding.
• Establish investment guidelines and prioritization criteria to ensure funding is allocated to the highest-impact opportunities.
• Partner with Finance and Operations to ensure accurate tracking, reconciliation, documentation, and reimbursement of partner funds.
• Identify opportunities to increase available partner funding and maximize AHEAD's return on partner marketing investments.

Integrated Partner Marketing Planning

• Lead the development of annual and quarterly integrated marketing plans for priority security partners.
• Connect partner investments to AHEAD campaigns, field programs, executive experiences, industry events, AHEAD Summits, digital programs, and solution-focused initiatives.
• Identify opportunities for multi-partner and ecosystem campaigns that support AHEAD solutions and customer priorities.
• Balance partner objectives with AHEAD priorities to ensure programs create value for both organizations.
• Drive greater consistency and scalability across partner marketing programs while allowing for differentiated strategies for priority partners.

Performance Measurement & Executive Reporting

• Establish KPIs and reporting standards for partner marketing performance.
• Measure investment utilization, pipeline influence, sourced pipeline, engagement, target-account penetration, net-new logos, and ROI where appropriate.
• Develop executive-level dashboards and quarterly partner marketing business reviews.
• Provide leadership with visibility into partner investments, commitments, performance, risks, and opportunities.
• Use performance insights to recommend where AHEAD should increase, reduce, or redirect partner marketing investments.
• Demonstrate the contribution of partner marketing to AHEAD's broader revenue and growth objectives.

Team Leadership & Development

• Establish clear expectations for partner planning, stakeholder management, execution, reporting, and financial stewardship.
• Create repeatable playbooks, processes, and best practices that enable the team to operate consistently and efficiently.
• Develop the team's ability to move beyond tactical execution and operate as strategic marketing advisors to partner and sales stakeholders.
• Foster strong collaboration across Partner Marketing, Field Marketing, Events, Campaigns, Digital, Alliances, Sales, Finance, and Marketing Operations.

Key Performance Indicators

• Percentage of available MDF successfully utilized and reimbursed.
• MOU marketing commitment attainment.
• Partner-influenced and partner-sourced pipeline.
• ROI and pipeline-to-investment ratios.
• Percentage of partner investments aligned to strategic AHEAD priorities.
• Quarterly and annual partner plan execution.
• Target-account and net-new-logo engagement.
• MDF reimbursement accuracy and cycle time.
• Partner and internal stakeholder satisfaction.
• Identification and capture of incremental partner funding.
• Team performance and development.
• *Other job duties as assigned

Education & Experience:

• Minimum Required – 10+ years of B2B marketing experience, including significant experience in security, cybersecurity, or IT infrastructure partner, channel, alliance, or ecosystem marketing; experience managing MDF, co-marketing funds, partner investments, or similar funding programs.
• Preferred – Cybersecurity industry and complex security partner-ecosystem experience (e.g., Palo Alto Networks, Cisco, CrowdStrike, Fortinet, Zscaler, or similar security vendors); prior experience with AHEAD's go-to-market (GTM) strategy, security partner ecosystem, and key competitors.

Knowledge, Skills & Abilities:

• Strong understanding of partner business planning, joint marketing plans, and MOU or contractual marketing commitments.
• Demonstrated ability to manage significant marketing investments with strong financial discipline and accountability.
• Experience developing integrated marketing strategies across events, field marketing, campaigns, digital, and demand generation.
• Strong analytical skills with the ability to translate marketing performance into executive-level insights and recommendations.
• Excellent executive communication, negotiation, and stakeholder-management skills.
• Ability to operate effectively across Marketing, Sales, Alliances, Finance, Operations, and external partner organizations.
• Strategic operator who combines partner relationship expertise with financial discipline and strong marketing judgment; comfortable moving between executive-level partner conversations, investment decisions, team leadership, and performance analysis.
• Understands that MDF is not simply funding to be spent, but an investment portfolio to be intentionally allocated, activated, measured, and optimized to accelerate AHEAD's growth.

Physical Requirements:

The physical demands described below are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this position.

• Performance of Essential Functions: Ability to safely and effectively perform all essential job functions listed herein while meeting established productivity and quality standards.
• Attendance: Ability to maintain regular and predictable attendance, consistent with ADA, FMLA, and other applicable requirements. Includes ability to safely and reliability travel to and from an office and/or client work site, as required.
• Work Environment: Ability to perform job duties at customer sites or in data center environments which may include:
• Standing, walking, bending, and lifting or moving equipment weight up to fifty (50) pounds.
• Working in areas with fluctuating temperatures, including warm and cold environments, both indoors and outdoors.
• Exposure to production environments that may include higher noise levels, bright lighting, and varying airflow.
• Manual Dexterity: Ability to use hands and fingers to handle, feel, or operate objects, tools, or controls, and reach with hands and arms, as needed.
• Communication Skills: Ability to hear, listen, and communicate clearly while performing job duties.

The compensation range indicated in this posting reflects the On-Target Earnings (“OTE”) for this role, which includes a base salary and any applicable target bonus amount. This OTE range may vary based on the candidate’s relevant experience, qualifications, and geographic location.

Why AHEAD:

Through our daily work and internal groups like Moving Women AHEAD and RISE AHEAD, we value and benefit from diversity of people, ideas, experience, and everything in between.

We fuel growth by stacking our office with top-notch technologies in a multi-million-dollar lab, by encouraging cross department training and development, sponsoring certifications and credentials for continued learning.

USA Employment Benefits include:

- Paid company holidays

- Paid time off

- Paid parental and caregiver leave

- Plus more! See benefits https://www.aheadbenefits.com/ for additional details.

Use of AI:

We may use artificial intelligence (AI) tools to support parts of the hiring process, such as reviewing applications, analyzing resumes, assessing responses, or to capture recordings and create transcriptions or summaries during interviews. These tools assist our recruitment team but do not replace human judgment. Final hiring decisions are ultimately made by humans.