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We are working with Digital River in their search for a Chief Technology Officer, in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Digital River, founded in 1994, is a global leader in e-commerce outsourcing that builds and manages online businesses for more than 40,000 software publishers, manufacturers, distributors, and online retailers. Its multi-channel e-commerce solution, which supports both direct and indirect sales, is designed to help companies of all sizes maximize online revenues as well as reduce the costs and risks of running an e-commerce operation.
The comprehensive platform offers site development and hosting, order management, fraud prevention, export controls, tax management, physical and digital product fulfillment, multilingual customer service, advanced reporting and strategic marketing services.
Position Overview:
Reporting to the CEO, the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) is responsible for leading the conceptualization, research, and direction of the overall technology & architectural platform for Digital River. This individual is the top executive responsible for creating and communicating the company’s technical vision and strategy on a global basis.
Additionally, this role requires strong interfacing with both internal and external executive leadership as well as all business unit leaders to ensure that ongoing education, compliance, and oversight is met for all aspects of Digital River’s architectural and technology platforms. The CTO will often be a spokesperson with Digital River’s prospects, investors, and internal resources on a global level.
Essential Duties and Responsibilities
- Establishes the technology plan and vision to support and advance the strategic goals of the business by working with the CEO to create and implement the technology vision for Digital River.
- Manages, evaluates, assists in developing, and implements technical processes, disciplines, policies, and procedures in support of established product and business strategies.
- Responsible for identifying and interpreting trends in technology. Participates in business planning and communicates technical knowledge and vision of both current and future technology related to company’s competitive position.
- Responsible for the development and implementation of advanced development to create new and improved products and manages a team of people responsible for these activities.
- Oversee the design, development, testing, and documentation of software applications to meet business unit requirements and product development roadmap strategy.
- Lead research and prototyping efforts for new architectural innovations, frameworks, and techniques via close collaboration with Product Development and Product Management that optimally supports and fully aligns with the Company’s sales & marketing efforts.
- Identify, evaluate and select new and emerging technologies that can be assimilated within the company and significantly improve competitiveness.
- Author white papers, analysis of recent technology; contribute articles and presentations which position Digital River as a technology leader in the space. Present papers and support company speaking opportunities at tradeshows, customer events and other external facing events.
- Is the primary visionary for the development and deployment of architectural software solutions that are secure, scalable, extensible and maintainable
- Oversee external on-shore and off-shore contractor resources as needed and act as a technical liaison for communicating requirements for these teams
- Drives technology for global execution of product, platform and customer solution initiatives.
- Promote a culture of collaboration, accountability, innovation, entrepreneurship, and overall excellence within and around the research and development engineering and technology organizations.
- Work closely with key product stakeholders, especially the Vice President of Product, to align technology and product strategies and allocation of resources.
- Address tactical issues while able to maintain a strategic technology and organizational long-term vision for Digital River.
- Develops and manages a multi-year technology roadmap, working with the business leaders to link market opportunities and industry trends to specific development efforts.
- Establish an environment that stimulates innovation and creativity throughout Digital River.
- Participate in pre-sales prospect presentations and other external interactions to provide necessary architectural expertise as well as general support of closing prospect deals for the company.
- Ensure quality and consistency in all of Digital River’s technology efforts through design reviews and code inspections with Product Development engineers and managers when warranted.
- Monitor departmental compliance with software engineering procedures and working practices, and prepare corrective action plans for noncompliance situations.
- Mentor technical staff to ensure continual professional growth of associates and improvement and ensure that technical development resources support the technology vision of the company.
- Provide department staff with active management and leadership to include full administration of employee reviews, salary increases and professional development plans working with the CEO.
- Monitor industry market trends and competitors and providing intelligence on the competitive landscape and key trends occurring in the industry.
- Take personal responsibility for leading the intellectual process of researching, reviewing, analyzing and synthesizing information on new technologies and formulating insights and conclusions.
Position Requirements:
The successful candidate will have a proven success record of innovation and a passion for technology. They will be intelligent, driven and have the ability to build trust at all levels of the organization. He/she will be flexible and adaptable to changes in the business environment. The successful individual has proven his or her ability to work through conflict, build trust, and influence outcomes through outstanding interpersonal skills.
The candidate will have proven leadership and management experience and have previously operated a mission-critical technology team while maintaining a culture of innovation, entrepreneurship, and high levels of productivity and accountability. This executive should have experience managing multiple product and platform roadmaps and effectively communicating throughout a mid-to-large product and services organization ($300 million minimum).
Specifically, the ideal candidate’s background, experience, and skill set should include:
- BS degree in IT, math or related discipline with advanced degree desirable.
- Minimum of 15 years of technology leadership experience, 10 of which in a senior leadership role of a mid to large global internet technology business.
- Proven ability to set ambitious, yet achievable goals, effectively prioritizing them, clearly communicating them, and instilling the team with a deep sense of accountability for their attainment.
- Proven experience hiring, developing and inspiring teams of exceptionally talented technologists and creating an environment where the very best talent wants to be employed as part of the team.
- Proven experience establishing and maintaining practical engineering best practices (design process reviews, coding standards, testing standards, information management, deployment processes).
- Experience with and appreciation for enterprise-scale agile development methodologies and customer interfaces.
- Be a forward thinking industry leader in the technical space, with a high level of knowledge of Cloud Computing (hdoop), .NET, C#, SQL, Oracle, Java, etc.
- Be a dynamic leader with the ability to take stock of the current state of the development organization and quickly assess and implement the tools, technologies and leadership talent resources required to accomplish the goals of the organization.
- Proven ability to think strategically, creatively and demonstrated track record of innovation.
- Track record of influencing, motivating, coaching, developing others. Presents a compelling vision, provides clear direction and champions change.
- Excellent written and verbal language skills and strong presentation skills are essential.
Applications for this position are being coordinated by Harry Joiner. To apply, email your resume in WORD format to Harry Joiner@EcommerceRecruiter.com.
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