Senior Director

Summary

As a Senior Director, Professional Services (ANZ), you’ll lead the Professional Services Business in ANZ for Guidewire. Your role is key in ensuring that our services consistently deliver value, meet customer expectations, and contribute to Guidewire’s growth in the ANZ markets.
This is a strategic role and hence will have the following scope;
Commercial Management: Manage the profitability of the business in the market, working closely with counterparts in APAC and globally.
Co-innovation: Work with customers and the Guidewire product organisation to accelerate our customers’ ambitions through innovative commercial models and delivery structures.
Delivery Excellence: Build a culture of delivery excellence within Guidewire and consult with Customers to ensure all Guidewire implementations, whether led by Guidewire or a Systems Integration (SI) Partner, are executed on-time, on budget, and on value in the market. With an ability to transform on a regional scale while partnering globally.
Leadership: Build a team of market-relevant resources who scale to meet market demand across engagement leadership, business and technical domains. Drive high utilisation of the organisation with appropriate leverage of the Guidewire Global Delivery Centre as well as System Integration Partners.
You’ll work closely with ANZ customers, SI Partners, internal product and delivery teams, and cross-functional stakeholders to ensure the above outcomes are achieved. You’ll also support the development of our delivery talent and help scale best practices across the market.

Job Description

As a Senior Director, Professional Services (ANZ), you’ll lead the Professional Services Business in ANZ for Guidewire. Your role is key in ensuring that our services consistently deliver value, meet customer expectations, and contribute to Guidewire’s growth in the ANZ markets.

This is a strategic role and hence will have the following scope;

• Commercial Management: Manage the profitability of the business in the market, working closely with counterparts in APAC and globally.
• Co-innovation: Work with customers and the Guidewire product organisation to accelerate our customers’ ambitions through innovative commercial models and delivery structures.
• Delivery Excellence: Build a culture of delivery excellence within Guidewire and consult with Customers to ensure all Guidewire implementations, whether led by Guidewire or a Systems Integration (SI) Partner, are executed on-time, on budget, and on value in the market. With an ability to transform on a regional scale while partnering globally.
• Leadership: Build a team of market-relevant resources who scale to meet market demand across engagement leadership, business and technical domains. Drive high utilisation of the organisation with appropriate leverage of the Guidewire Global Delivery Centre as well as System Integration Partners. 

You’ll work closely with ANZ customers, SI Partners, internal product and delivery teams, and cross-functional stakeholders to ensure the above outcomes are achieved. You’ll also support the development of our delivery talent and help scale best practices across the market.

Key Responsibilities

• Delivery Excellence & Capacity Management:
  • Build out delivery excellence for Guidewire-led outcome-based engagements across Fixed Price and Time & Material commercial models, ensuring projects are delivered on-time and on-budget.
  • Work with the Guidewire Global Resourcing model to ensure adequate capacity and capability are maintained in line with customer demands in the region
  • Consult with customers (leveraging Guidewire's global Delivery Assurance function) on best practices to ensure all their Guidewire project outcomes delivered by SI’s are delivered on-time and on-budget.
  • Provide guidance and governance to ensure consistent delivery across multiple programs
  • Act as the senior delivery lead and escalation point for at-risk or high-impact engagements
  • Align regional delivery to Guidewire’s global standards, methodologies, and customer success goals
  • Build and maintain strong relationships with customer executives and stakeholders
  • Participate in executive governance (e.g., QBRs, steering committees, and roadmap planning)
  • Team Development and Coaching: Lead and support a team of engagement directors, senior managers, and project leads
• Commercial Management
  • Own financial performance for your regional portfolio—forecasting, margin, and profitability
  • Support SOW creation/review, deal structuring, and commercial alignment with customer needs
  • Identify and manage risks across the portfolio to protect both delivery outcomes and financials
  • Collaborate with Sales, Finance, and Operations to drive commercial clarity and efficiency
• Co-innovation
  • Identify opportunities to work with customers to co-innovate and accelerate the Guidewire roadmap to achieve customer ambitions
  • Define commercial models that balances need for speed with long term Guidewire objectives.
  • Define and implement strategies and commercial models to partner with Guidewire Product Management and Development organisation to deliver on accelerated customer outcomes.

KPIs & Success Metrics

On-Time & On-Budget Delivery Rate: % of projects delivered on-time AND within budget Project Margin Performance: Average gross margin across regional portfolio vs. target Customer Satisfaction Score (NPS or CSAT): Net Promoter Score or Customer Satisfaction rating. Revenue Attainment: Actual revenue vs. forecasted revenue for the regional portfolio Billable Utilisation Rate: % of available delivery team hours that are billable At-Risk Project Resolution Rate: % of escalated/at-risk projects successfully recovered Employee Engagement & Retention: Team engagement score and voluntary attrition rate Methodology Compliance Score: % adherence to Guidewire global delivery standards and governance Forecast Accuracy: Variance between quarterly forecast and actual financial results Co-Innovation Impact: Number of active co-innovation partnerships and revenue generated

Preferred Skills & Experience

10+ years in professional services delivery with 5+ years in senior leadership roles managing teams of 20+ people across multiple geographies and leading high-performing delivery organisations within a Product Company, Professional Services Organisation or System Integrator

Proven track record delivering complex, multi-million dollar enterprise software programs on time and on budget using various methodologies (Waterfall, Agile, Hybrid) with expertise in project recovery and crisis management

P&L ownership experience with revenue accountability of $10M+, including financial modelling, forecasting, margin optimisation, and budget management

Deep expertise in both Fixed Price and Time & Material commercial models with experience in SOW development, contract negotiation, deal structuring, and pricing strategy

Executive presence and C-level relationship management skills with proven ability to build strategic customer relationships, lead governance forums, and manage executive escalations effectively

Strong coaching and people development capabilities with a track record of attracting talent, developing future leaders, managing organisational change, and maintaining high employee engagement and retention

Expertise in workforce planning, demand forecasting, and global resource management, including capacity modelling, utilisation optimisation, and skills/competency framework development E

xperience with co-innovation, strategic partnerships, and outcome-based commercial models, with the ability to design innovative service offerings and align delivery to product roadmaps

Deep understanding of enterprise software delivery lifecycle and implementation best practices, preferably with Guidewire products or comparable platforms within the Insurance domain, and insurance industry knowledge

Exceptional communication, presentation, and influence skills across all organisational levels with the ability to negotiate, persuade, and influence across matrixed organisations

Data-driven decision making and analytical problem-solving abilities with experience developing KPIs, performance dashboards, and synthesising complex information for strategic insights

Process excellence and methodology implementation experience, including governance frameworks, quality assurance standards, and continuous improvement initiatives across delivery organisations

Risk management expertise across a portfolio of engagements with the ability to assess commercial risks, implement mitigation strategies, and protect both delivery outcomes and financial performance

Cultural awareness and global collaboration skills, with the ability to work effectively across diverse, distributed teams and navigate complex stakeholder environments with emotional intelligence and great skills in working with ANZ customers

Bachelor's degree (Master's preferred) with relevant professional certifications such as PMP, SAFe, or industry-specific credentials, combined with an entrepreneurial mindset and customer-centric orientation

About Guidewire

Guidewire is the platform P&C insurers trust to engage, innovate, and grow efficiently. We combine digital, core, analytics, and AI to deliver our platform as a cloud service. More than 540+ insurers in 40 countries, from new ventures to the largest and most complex in the world, run on Guidewire.

As a partner to our customers, we continually evolve to enable their success. We are proud of our unparalleled implementation track record with 1600+ successful projects, supported by the largest R&D team and partner ecosystem in the industry. Our Marketplace provides hundreds of applications that accelerate integration, localization, and innovation.

For more information, please visit www.guidewire.com and follow us on Twitter: @Guidewire_PandC.

Guidewire Software, Inc. is proud to be an equal opportunity and affirmative action employer. We are committed to an inclusive workplace, and believe that a diversity of perspectives, abilities, and cultures is a key to our success. Qualified applicants will receive consideration without regard to race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, citizenship, marital status, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, veteran status, or disability. All offers are contingent upon passing a criminal history and other background checks where it's applicable to the position.