GPFS Presales Technical Specialist (FTSS, SE) - Inside Sales

Job ID STG-0623977 Job type Full-time Regular Work country USA Position type Professional Work city - Any Posted 09-Dec-2013 Travel 25% travel annually Job area Sales Business group IBM Systems & Technology Group Job category Sales Business unit SYSSW Job role General Other Technical Sales Specialist Job role skillset General Commissionable/Sales-Incentive jobs only Yes

Job description

Technical computing is no longer just about high-end supercomputers. The kind of computing power that was once used predominantly by government agencies and universities is driving revolutionary advances across a wide range of organizations. Businesses in industries as diverse as financial services, life sciences, the automotive supply chain, energy and utilities, consumer electronics and even retailing recognize that they can exploit technical computing power to stay competitive. The North American Technical Computing team is looking a seasoned pre-sales technical leader to help drive client adoption of a cornerstone product: IBM GPFS (General Parallel File System). Sales competency of concepts like: global namespaces, information lifecycle management, file system caching and replication, as well as data locality optimization are expected. The ideal candidate is a technical pre-sales specialist with experience identifying specific client pain points, mapping the associated requirements to the most appropriate GPFS features emphasizing the highest value to the client. This will challenge the candidate to develop pre-sales proof-of-concept demonstrations, and manage the entire software sales process to a successful conclusion. Comfort with writing SOW statements for GPFS delivery is a skill which must be developed. In addition to being well versed in all GPFS aspects, the ideal candidate must have the communication skills to broadly articulate IO and clustered file systems in a manner which can be understood by client technical experts up through business line leaders. The GPFS Pre-Sales Technical Specialist position emphasizes a team working role, requiring IT system infrastructure and domain/application knowledge also be applied when narrower brand/product specialists as well as Business Partners engaged in an opportunity need a comprehensive design of performance storage systems. The successful candidate will: Work closely with IBM Brand Sales Specialists, Client Executives, and Technical Computing geographic leaders to develop business opportunities, analyze customer requirements, and provide customer facing selling skills in complex technical environments. Establish working relationships with key Business Managers and IT Managers and staff in the customers’ organizations, assisting them to deploy and leverage GPFS and related products (GPFS Storage Server, IBM SONAS, IBM STG Systems and Software) effectively into their various IT environments as part of their evaluation of the product suite. Maintain an understanding of competitive products and HPC industry/market trends. Expand and grow the technical aspects of the product in customer account relationships and ongoing management. Have the ability to link GPFS product features with broader software stacks and operations to meet or exceed customer business needs. Be able to scope file system related projects, able to codify project phases and write out a sophisticated implementation plan. Demonstrate customer management and communication skills, be able to describe GPFS and associated solutions to customer in business terms. Demonstrate high level Project Management skills, with ability to define and describe major project implementation phases. Responsibilities: Team with Brand Sales and Technical Sales owners to create RFP/RFI responses which describe a solution to client business problems. This solution is a combination of HW/SW products and services. Discuss potential sales opportunities with Account Manager, and perform technical analysis and qualification of potential customer projects, often on-site with the customer. Design and conduct GPFS and related product presentations and demonstrations as well as question & answer discussions with the customer’s technical staff at increasing levels of complexity. Participate in a similar fashion in trade shows, seminars, and training events.

Required Bachelor's Degree At least 1 year experience in Familiarity with GPFS, General Parallel File System or similar products At least 3 years experience in Technical Computing / High Performance Computing At least 3 years experience in selling IBM or competitors High Performance Storage Solutions At least 1 year experience in customer facing technical roles At least 2 years experience in System level programming skills, up-to date "hands on" practical skills Readiness to travel 25% travel annually English: Fluent

Preferred Master's Degree At least 5 years experience in Familiarity with GPFS, General Parallel File System or similar products At least 5 years experience in Technical Computing / High Performance Computing At least 5 years experience in selling IBM or competitors High Performance Storage Solutions At least 5 years experience in customer facing technical roles At least 5 years experience in System level programming skills, up-to date "hands on" practical skills At least 1 year experience in Applications of Grid/HPC Computing in Financial Services industry

Additional information Understanding business and technical processes in target verticals; broad understanding of relevant applications High level project management and customer management skills Exposure to product marketing, sales process and ability to identify sales opportunities Understanding of following areas will be considered an asset: -High Performance Computing / Supercomputing -Grid Computing -Parallel File systems -Cloud Computing -Virtualization -Enterprise Data Center automation tools -Infrastructure architecture to support Enterprise Analytics application -Parallel File systems

IBM is committed to creating a diverse environment and is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, genetics, disability, age, or veteran status. IBM is also committed to compliance with all fair employment practices regarding citizenship and immigration status.