Lead, Business Operations

*This role is based in the Santa Clara headquarters with a hybrid office schedule of at least 3 days/week in office *

Our Mission

At Palo Alto Networks® everything starts and ends with our mission:

Being the cybersecurity partner of choice, protecting our digital way of life.
Our vision is a world where each day is safer and more secure than the one before. We are a company built on the foundation of challenging and disrupting the way things are done, and we're looking for innovators who are as committed to shaping the future of cybersecurity as we are.

Who We Are

We take our mission of protecting the digital way of life seriously. We are relentless in protecting our customers and we believe that the unique ideas of every member of our team contributes to our collective success. Our values were crowdsourced by employees and are brought to life through each of us everyday - from disruptive innovation and collaboration, to execution. From showing up for each other with integrity to creating an environment where we all feel included.

As a member of our team, you will be shaping the future of cybersecurity. We work fast, value ongoing learning, and we respect each employee as a unique individual. Knowing we all have different needs, our development and personal wellbeing programs are designed to give you choice in how you are supported. This includes our FLEXBenefits wellbeing spending account with over 1,000 eligible items selected by employees, our mental and financial health resources, and our personalized learning opportunities - just to name a few!

At Palo Alto Networks, we believe in the power of collaboration and value in-person interactions. This is why our employees generally work full time from our office with flexibility offered where needed. This setup fosters casual conversations, problem-solving, and trusted relationships. Our goal is to create an environment where we all win with precision.

Your Career

Palo Alto Networks is scaling its world-class strategy & business operations' organization. As an organization, our focused teams work on our most mission-critical business challenges to drive and support our industry-leading growth. As a Lead, Business Operations, your efforts will directly impact the overall transformation and success of a world-leading cybersecurity business. You will collaborate on complex business/technology problems, including large-scale transformations within the Go-to-Market area, that are top-of-mind for our executives.

While an operator at heart possessing expertise in partnering with large, complex sales organizations, you also possess a unique blend of business strategy experience and big-picture thinking and are in expert in designing, advising, and delivering Go-to-Market business process, technology, and analytical/system/tooling changes for enterprise sellers.

Your Impact
The Lead, Business Operations ensures alignment between our GTM Sales Leaders, our Strategy and Business Operations leaders, and the various geographic and speedboat units. Specifically, the Lead, Business Operations will liaison across various Go-to-Market enterprise-wide projects to ensure impactful design, timely delivery, tailored communications, and realized value for our Sellers. This requires not only understanding, but also playing a key role in influencing and aggregating, what is to be delivered to the Field (in any one time period) to ensure field readiness, as well as clear delivery of impact and success metrics of the program(s). The role demands strong organizational, communication, and leadership skills, and the ability to influence and drive cross-functional collaboration. You're the right person if you are and/or excel at, and enjoy the following:

• Strategic Problem Solver: Structure and break down complex business problems, develop a hypothesis, drive analysis and deliver recommendations with a specific focus on readying the organization to maximize adoption for technology and process improvement transformations. Pressure test current processes and use first principles to design future state business processes to create operational efficiencies

• Operator at Heart: translate company strategies into actionable plans. Support the development, coordination, and execution of key initiatives that drive organizational goals including streamlining processes to improve operational efficiency. Oversee parts of daily operations, ensuring smooth coordination between teams and the execution of tasks that align with strategic objectives.

While no day will be the same, some key areas that you'll find yourself consumed by include:

• Working with cross-functional stakeholders to ensure intended business process design (and expected impact) is analyzed, communicated, and adopted: Ensure clear alignment across groups and functions, fostering collaboration and coordination on company-wide initiatives. Lead or support enterprise wide GTM initiatives, ensuring smooth transitions and effective adoption of new processes or structures. Partner with teams to manage resistance and promote engagement during times of change, ensuring we deliver intended impact (including increasing deal velocity and reducing field friction).
• Owning and/or advising on business operation processes: Serving as a business process owner (or advisor) recommending business trade-off decisions while leading or supporting cross-functional programs, ensuring they are completed on time, within scope, and with measurable outcomes.
• Solving complex cross-functional business operations' problems: Analyze performance data to identify areas of improvement/unexpected outcomes and recommend strategic adjustments. Implements best practices for performing and presenting results through various approaches to transform data to insights to actions. Scale, automate, and optimize all day, every day.
• Prepare and present materials to executives as you straddle between the small details up to the big picture: Act as a key advisor for Executives, managing priorities, and ensuring alignment of strategic objectives. Prepare briefings, reports, and presentations (i.e., PPT, word docs) for executive level consumption

Your Experience

• 12+ years relevant work experience in tech, ideally with at least 2 years in consulting (McKinsey, Bain, BCG, PwC, Deloitte, etc.), private equity, or top-tier tech strategy, sales operations, or sales finance functions
• Deep understanding of go-to-market function, with proven knowledge in how to test and optimize Seller experiences measured in real-world metrics that correlate to near term and longer-term sales success
• Strategic thinking with strong problem-solving skills and the ability to translate strategy into execution: operator at heart.
• High technical aptitude for understanding complex technologies, tools, systems, and issues to drive impact within the organization
• Ability to interpret data, identify trends, and use insights to inform business decisions leading to desired outcomes
• Strong organizational, planning, and project management skills, with the ability to own multiple commitments
• Demonstrated ability to manage complex projects and drive results in dynamic & ambiguous environments
• Excellent interpersonal and communication skills, with the ability to collaborate across the organization and lead design, execution, and measurement of GTM initiatives as well as influence without authority

The Team

Our Strategy and Business Operations is a focused team that works on our most critical business challenges to drive and support our industry-leading growth. Your efforts will directly impact the overall strategy and success of a world-leading cybersecurity business. You will collaborate on complex business and technology problems that are top-of-mind for our executives.

Compensation Disclosure

The compensation offered for this position will depend on qualifications, experience, and work location. For candidates who receive an offer at the posted level, the starting base salary (for non-sales roles) or base salary + commission target (for sales/commissioned roles) is expected to be between $151,000 - $222,000/YR. The offered compensation may also include restricted stock units and a bonus. A description of our employee benefits may be found here.

Our Commitment

We're problem solvers that take risks and challenge cybersecurity's status quo. It's simple: we can't accomplish our mission without diverse teams innovating, together.

We are committed to providing reasonable accommodations for all qualified individuals with a disability. If you require assistance or accommodation due to a disability or special need, please contact us at accommodations@paloaltonetworks.com.

Palo Alto Networks is an equal opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity in our workplace, and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran status, race, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or other legally protected characteristics.

All your information will be kept confidential according to EEO guidelines.

Is role eligible for Immigration Sponsorship? No. Please note that we will not sponsor applicants for work visas for this position.