Sales Account Manager - US Federal and State Government markets

Thales is a leader in identity management and data protection solutions, serving both business and government sectors. They are seeking a Sales Account Manager for the US Federal and State Government markets to lead business initiatives, develop sales strategies, and ensure customer satisfaction while managing existing accounts and capturing new opportunities.

Responsibilities:

• Meet assigned quota and strategic objectives of the organization in the assigned territory
• Be the primary sales interface to the assigned accounts
• Establish high-level strategic and trusting relationships with each account. Identify main stakeholders and decision makers including the end-users, the CTO and CIO offices, and procurement
• Ensure overall customer satisfaction
• Interface with resources within the Business Units to fully address customer needs and that appropriate resources are allocated in timely manner to support the account
• Develop strategic capture plans detailing the win themes, identifying the customer pain points, and any gaps in products to meet client demands. Share the capture plan with rest of the internal stakeholders, gain consensus and work on implementation the plan
• Capture new opportunities by providing expertise through knowledge sharing and product demonstrations
• Attend industry trade show events as needed/required
• Must coordinate teams to present our solutions and deliverables, establish trust in this market space
• Must be able to speak clearly to all audience sizes detailing Thales’ offerings and our key differentiations
• Provide input on client and market needs; and collaborate with our field marketing, solution engineering and product management teams to influence the roadmap and in its development
• Lead the response to all RFI’s, RFP’s and any deliverable required to the customer
• Collaborate closely with Bid Manager and Solution Manager to set up tender response strategies and Bid process deliverables. Coordinate and manage the tender response when a Bid manager is not assigned
• Improve Thales’ offering by creating venues and information sharing processes for efficient exchange of information about customers, competitors, and industry
• Provide oversight and guidance on legislation that could impact the contracting process
• Must be able to provide critical input in the negotiation of contract terms and commitments specific to these programs

Requirements:

• A minimum of 8 years of experience in solutions selling and large account management, in the US Federal and State Government markets
• Prior experience with biometrics and law enforcement market in US or North American market
• Experience in large scale software platform within cloud infrastructure (SaaS) technologies particularly for biometrics use cases
• Sales experience operating at a senior level
• Self-starter –Need someone to drive all aspects of the business, attending to the needs of our existing clients and successfully seek new clients
• Creative thinking and problem solving –we need someone who can creatively navigate through issues and problems as they may arise
• Strong presentation skills – there are many opportunities to help promote our technology and this person should have a leadership role in this activity offering key differentiations and value propositions
• Strong negotiation skills – this person should be able to negotiate with customers and partners with little oversight to help rapidly position Thales within upcoming opportunities and help close deals
• Team player – even though the person should be a self-starter, it is important this person work well within a team as there are a lot of dependencies on others
• Demonstrated ability to close large, multi-million dollars contracts
• Knowledge and experience in US Federal account procurement
• Technical aptitude – ability to learn and present complex topics such as biometrics and identity management solutions
• Must have U.S. Citizenship in order to obtain the post-hire Criminal Justice Information Services (CJIS) Clearance from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and must be able to obtain post-hire clearance from the Committee on Foreign Investments in the U.S. (CFIUS) and Department of Justice