Strategy and Operations Director

Job description / Role

About PAD:
PAD is building the world’s first cognitive city platform that will be at the core of NEOM: a $500bn smart city being built on the Red Sea at the nexus of Saudi, Israel, Egypt, and Jordan. By the end of 2021, PAD will have invested $100m USD and have a team of 300 FTEs, contractors, and consultants.

Job Summary
The Director of Strategy & Operations role is to be the strategic advisor to PAD’s leadership in their day-to-day tasks. The main responsibilities entail setting strategic priorities, providing recommendations, supporting on the decision-making, and preparing the leadership for any endeavor.

Objectives:
• Assist leadership with daily decision-making, which involves working with multiple data sources and stakeholders on a regular basis
• Provide directions to ensure the leadership invests its time and efforts in the most important and relevant tasks
• Ensure the leadership is ready and up to date with any upcoming commitment, therefore communication and coordination with other stakeholders is key
• Suggest recommendations to continuously improve the efficiency of the leadership’s role, tasks, and responsibilities.

Responsibilities:
• Working with leaders to set strategic priorities: Help identify areas where leaders should direct their efforts, and collaborate with them to determine and prioritize business strategies
• Acting as gatekeepers: Ensure the leaders' involvement in projects or decision-making processes takes place at key times, where their input and authority are most needed
• Providing recommendations: Assist the leadership team with consultation to improve performance and enhance the quality of the output
• Preparing for and follow up on meetings: Prepare leaders for upcoming meetings by ensuring they have all the information necessary to be productive and engaged
• Managing internal and external communications: Act as the liaison with other executives, clients, and stakeholders to ensure consistent communication and involvement
• In addition to the day-to-day tasks, the Director of Strategy and Operations should lead one or more agile transformational projects that enable/support the development of a cognitive city.

Additionally, he/she will be in charge of overseeing the development of the vision, strategy, implementation plan, technical requirements, budget and roadmap to ensure the project is properly scoped and developed.

Requirements

Requirements:
• Time management and task prioritization skills
• Experience organizing and directing multiple departments and teams
• Excellent communicator in written and verbal form
• Excellent in strategic thinking and problem-solving analysis
• Experience in planning and implementing strategic initiatives/projects
• Leadership skills and ability to analyse, predict and influence people
• Experience in GCC region a plus; willingness to relocate to NEOM’s base camp a must

About the Company

NEOM is a bold and audacious dream. It is a vision of what a New Future might look like. It’s an attempt to do something that’s never been done before and it comes at a time when the world needs fresh thinking and new solutions. NEOM is being built on the Red Sea in northwest Saudi Arabia as a living laboratory – a place where entrepreneurship and innovation will chart the course for this New Future. NEOM will be a destination, a home for people who dream big and want to be part of building a new model for sustainable living, working and prospering.

NEOM will include towns and cities, ports and enterprise zones, research centers, sports and entertainment venues, and tourist destinations. It will be the home and workplace for more than a million citizens from around the world.