Director, Customer Intelligence R&D

Job Locations

US-NC-Cary HQ | US

Are you a problem solver, explorer, and knowledge seeker - always asking, "What if?"

If so, you may be the new team member we're looking for. Because at SAS, your curiosity matters - whether you're developing algorithms, creating customer experiences, or answering critical questions. Curiosity is our code, and the opportunities here are endless.

What we do

We're the leader in analytics. Through our software and services, we inspire customers around the world to transform data into intelligence. Our curiosity fuels innovation, pushing boundaries, challenging the status quo, and changing the way we live.

What you'll do

As a Director, Customer Intelligence in the R&D division at SAS, you are a person that possesses a deep Software as a Services (SaaS) knowledge. You are passionate about applying leadership and collaboration with the discipline of execution for all phases of development and test.

As we continue our journey toward becoming cloud native, a critical business driver is the ability to increase delivery of SAS' existing software portfolio in a SaaS business model. This role will report to the Senior Director of Customer Intelligence. This role will also include promoting, teaching, fostering, and facilitating a SaaS mindset among Customer Intelligence and all of R&D.

We are looking for a leader to approach this role with vision, perspective, a sense of urgency, alignment to the CTO vision, and most importantly the drive to succeed, with a proven ability to deliver.

You will:

Create and reinforce a goal-oriented, collaborative culture amongst and across the technical business units.
• Direct activities within an R&D department with several functional areas or products ensuring alignment with division goals.


• Provide product direction leadership through collaboration with Product Management, Marketing, Sales, customers, and others within and outside of SAS.


• Adeptly manage a matrixed environment with a focus on collaboration and prioritization.


• Create and support a culture that is focused on critical thinking; prioritize the development of business acumen and its applicability to help customers achieve business value.


• Monitor and ensure products/projects adhere to established R&D practices, procedures, and schedules.


• Provide technical leadership as appropriate to the division/department.


• Initiate and enable cross-divisional collaboration to improve overall effectiveness of the R&D organization.


• Represent the company and provide product presentations within or outside the company.


• Proactively identify and navigate potential issues to meet deadlines and schedules.


• Become a trusted ally to Quality Engineering, Product, and Operational leaders and work collaboratively to advance the quality of the Customer Intelligence product suite.


• Establish a culture of innovation within the Customer Intelligence (CI 360) division and across all of SAS R&D.


• Work hand in hand with your leadership team to establish a metrics driven approach to Quality Engineering and Continuous Release management.

What we're looking for

• You're curious, passionate, authentic, and accountable. These are our values and influence everything we do.


• You have a bachelor's degree in Computer Science or a related quantitative field.


• 12+ years of related programming or testing experience.


• 5+ years of experience managing technical staff at all levels.


• Extensive and hands-on experience with cloud providers (Azure, AWS, GCP).


• Strong understanding of SaaS.


• Demonstrated success in developing and executing products and tools.


• Demonstrated leadership, especially a matrix environment and change agent skill sets.


• Proven ability to interface, influence and manage with all levels of organization.


• Understanding of SAS products, tools, platform, and infrastructure would be a plus.

Other knowledge, skills, and abilities

• Ability to bring form and structure to the ambiguous.


• Advanced abilities in business modeling.


• Strong analytical, presentation, and communication skills.


• High degree of leadership, independent negotiation, and decision-making skills.


• A leader of strong intellect and personal presence who inspires confidence in people at all levels.


• Self-directed; able to spearhead initiatives, translate plans into specific actions across a team, and execute with urgency.


• Entrepreneurial with a can-do / hands-on mentality.


• Attentive listener who absorbs and respects the opinions of others but is decisive and able to influence.


• Collaborative leader who empowers others.


• One who is accountable and in turn, holds people accountable.


• A change agent - leading the Team to the desired state through understanding.


• A coach and developer of people.


• Leads by example and can generate respect and loyalty from peers, superiors, and subordinates, as well as external links.


• Emotionally intelligent, resilient, and mature.


• Impeccable ethics and a high-level of integrity.

Why SAS

• We love living the #SASlife and believe that happy, healthy people have a passion for life, and bring that energy to work. No matter what your specialty or where you are in the world, your unique contributions will make a difference.


• Our multi-dimensional culture blends our different backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives. Here, it isn't about fitting into our culture, it's about adding to it - and we can't wait to see what you'll bring.

This position will be seated out of SAS Headquarters in Cary, North Carolina

#LI-TP1

SAS looks not only for the right skills, but also a fit to our core values. We seek colleagues who will contribute to the unique values that makes SAS such a great place to work. We look for the total candidate: technical skills, values fit, relationship skills, problem solvers, good communicators and, of course, innovators. Candidates must be ready to make an impact.

Additional Information:

To qualify, applicants must be legally authorized to work in the United States, and should not require, now or in the future, sponsorship for employment visa status. SAS is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants are considered for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, age, national origin, disability status, protected veteran status or any other characteristic protected by law. Read more:Equal Employment Opportunity is the Law. Also view the supplementEEO is the Law, and the Pay Transparency notice.

Equivalent combination of education, training and experience may be considered in place of the above qualifications. The level of this position will be determined based on the applicant's education, skills and experience.Resumes may be considered in the order they are received.SAS employees performing certain job functions may require access to technology or software subject to export or import regulations. To comply with these regulations, SAS may obtain nationality or citizenship information from applicants for employment. SAS collects this information solely for trade law compliance purposes and does not use it to discriminate unfairly in the hiring process.

All valid SAS job openings are located on the Careers page at www.sas.com. SAS only sends emails from verified "sas.com" email addresses and never asks for sensitive, personal information or money. Should you have any doubts about the authenticity of any type of communication from, for, or on behalf of SAS, please contact us at Recruitingsupport@sas.com before taking any further action.