Partner Sales Director

Job description

Are you ready to unlock intelligence? If you don’t think you meet all of the criteria below but are still interested in the job, please apply. Nobody checks every box - we’re looking for candidates that are particularly strong in a few areas, and have some interest and capabilities in others. A strong partner ecosystem is crucial to the success and growth of Kong's business. Partners are a strategic imperative for Kong's continued growth and market expansion. As customer requirements become more complex, we need partners with the capability and capacity to help customers implement, support and grow their usage of Kong. We work closely with cross-functional leadership to ensure partners are integrated throughout the sales cycle, both pre- and post-sale. The Partner Sales Director owns Kong's partner business within the DACH territory. That means recruiting the right partners, building a real go-to-market motion with them, and driving sourced incremental revenue, not slideware pipeline. The PSD is the single point of contact for anything partner-related: for field sellers who need partner help on a deal, for partners who need a path into Kong, and for leadership setting regional strategy. The ecosystem spans channel resellers, technology partners, GSIs, and hyperscalers (AWS, Azure, GCP), and the PSM works across all four. At the Intermediate level and above, this is a senior individual contributor role: the PSD runs their territory as their own business, in close partnership with the territory's sales leader. Responsibilities Own the partner revenue number for your assigned territory. Sell Kong's full portfolio (products, renewals, professional services, and support) through and with focus partners. Build the joint go-to-market plan with your territory's sales team. Identify and sign new partners where there are gaps. Drive partner-sourced pipeline: set targets, run the cadence, and hold partners (and yourself) accountable to them, favoring net-new sourced business over tagging partners onto deals you'd close anyway. Drive partner-sourced and partner-influenced pipeline by coordinating deal registration, lead sharing, and co-selling motions for Kong Gateway, Kong AI Gateway, Kong Mesh, and Konnect. Build joint assets with focus partners, such as reference architectures, blueprints, and solution briefs that field teams on both sides actually use. Run joint ma…