Senior Vice President, Head of Strategy, LAC

Job Description

The Position

The SVP, Head of Strategy for LAC is a key leadership position serving on the Latin America & Caribbean Leadership Team, being a strategic advisor to the LAC Regional President and a member of the global Strategy function, working closely with the Chief Strategy Officer. The role will be responsible for creating and executing Visa’s LAC strategy across three pillars:

Grow: Access, New Flows, Value Added Services and Clients & Partners

Fortify: Talent, Technology Platforms, Security and Brand

Execute: Go-to-market operating model, customer-centric solutions, and M&A

The role will focus on two main areas:

1. Strategy Setting – be a key strategic advisor to the Regional President and work closely with the Regional Leadership team to build and form a renewable, evergreen Multi-Year Plan that converts the company’s long-term strategic imperatives into prioritized, actionable, in-market and measurable initiatives. The role will require an engaging and proactive individual with the ability to build collaborative give and take relationships with leaders to develop and execute the strategic plan

2. High priority strategic initiatives – partnering closely with regional leadership on developing actionable plans in response to the highest priority strategic challenges in this market, frequently partnering with another Leadership team member(s) to support business case development and/or implementation.

• Lead a portfolio of strategic projects of varied durations related to Visa Inc.’s corporate strategy, or strategic initiatives in LAC.
• Collaborate with business line management across LAC and functional areas. Balance facilitation, influence, and content contribution to help business leaders design, advance and execute their strategies in support of the company’s and region’s priorities.
• Proactively identify, structure, and manage complex issues to quickly arrive at recommendations that drive business priorities and demonstrate results to business lines.
• Engage on pricing strategies for the LAC region and be accountable for IRF responsibilities.
• Maintain tight alignment and work closely with functional and market facing management teams, acting as a director on strategic or cross-regional projects, and bring timely insights, analytical support, and actionable recommendations.
• Communicate and generate support for recommendations among business leaders across the organization. Support business owner results, with a priority on collaborating and building broad support for recommendations.
• Enable and inspire strategy teams to structure and solve challenging business problems, collaborating and coordinating with a range of internal partners to make recommendations on a wide range of business issues.
• Provide inspirational leadership for professional development to attract, develop, motivate, and retain a team of high performing, high potential and diverse talent who are well positioned to become future leaders in the company. Provide continuous coaching and training to strategy teams.
• Develop frameworks that support the prioritization of strategic initiatives and evaluate investment opportunities for their strategic and financial value. Prioritize project activities and coordinate resources to achieve project goals.
• Maintain excellent commercial and business landscape knowledge, to provide solid foundational context for critical strategic projects.
• Comfortable working within a complex and often ambiguous environment, with the ability to drive rigorous, fact-based recommendations to senior management, other executives, functional, or regional management while supporting syndication with stakeholders across the organization.
• Support all functions in LAC and establish clear targets for the team with a framework for robust decision-making and analysis.
• Address the most pressing challenges and answer key business questions through strategy and solution development, being well versed in technology decisions and options for Visa and Visa’s clients.
• Lead compelling thought leadership on topics such as technology innovation, strategic transformation, and partnerships.
• Champion Visa values and innovative DNA across the organization.
• Recruit and develop exceptional and diverse talent, making the Strategy team a pipeline for bringing top external talent into the company.

Strategic / Functional Excellence

• A proven track record of delivering high impact results working on projects in the areas of corporate strategy, market expansion, growth initiatives and new market/segment/business strategies. Corporate M&A experience would be valuable.
• A strong track record of and commitment to continuous learning and development of talent throughout the corporate strategy function.
• Financially literate with strong analytical / decision-making skills. Consistent record of having met challenging financial and business targets.
• Superior critical thinking skills and focus on problem solving with intellectual rigor.

People Leadership and Stakeholder Management

• Strong track record of success in managing, leading, and motivating high performing teams. Strong leadership experience in leading cross-functional teams.
• Experience of leading a major transformation / change program within an organization or has been involved in an acquisition / integration. Has led a team on a journey of cultural and transformational change, leading people to deliver more and better every day.
• A demonstrated ability to be a trusted advisor by developing significant long-term, trust-based relationships with senior-level executives at large, complex organizations.
• Strong commercial acumen and ability to play a leading role with C-level clients that enables building deep and trusted relationships.
• Global mindset and thought leadership
• An appreciation and resonance around political, governmental, and regulatory environments within LAC
• Tremendous written and verbal communications skills proven in the senior-level corporate environment.
• Ability to multi-task in a fast-paced, deadline-driven, globally matrixed environment with the propensity to navigate complex structures and empower decision-making locally.

• An intellectually curious and humble leader with a high degree of compassion, able to engage, enable and inspire others
• A hands-on approach to all activities with real passion and high levels of energy. Agile and comfortable adapting to different environments.
• Courageous innovation: creative and resourceful in overcoming barriers and unexpected roadblocks
• An authentic leader who intuitively engenders an inclusive environment, enabling the business to reach its ambitious goals
• Diversity of thought and experience: continually seeks new perspectives and feedback, takes
  an inclusive approach
• High personal standards of ethics and integrity towards employees, stakeholders and customers
• High levels of learning-agility with a real interest in the Fintech ecosystem and a ‘technology / digital-first’ approach.
• Entrepreneurial and comfortable with ambiguous and change-led environments; self-confident with an authentic style that gravitates to championing change
• Eager to seek a challenge and expand frontiers; brings a visionary approach. Sets and meets a high bar of goals and principles.
• Servant leadership mentality: deeply committed to serving and listening to others. Natural ability to build strong relationships and enable collaboration through empathy and authenticity.
• Committed to building a community through Visa Leadership Principles.

Qualifications

15 years of work experience with a Bachelor’s Degree; 12 years of work experience with an Advanced degree (e.g. Masters/MBA/JD/MD) or a minimum of 10 years of work experience with a PhD.

• 20+ years of business experience with ten years in a Tier 1 management consulting firm. Enterprise leadership of a sales or major market / business function in a fast growing multi-national would be advantageous. Or, corporate experience leading a business function or organisation with a broad understanding of all stakeholders, including governments.
• Experience in driving rapid change transformation of business models for the digital age. Other sector experience including technology / digital, consumer, retail and fintech / financial services would be of interest.
• Strong knowledge of the payments industry landscape and passion for broader fintech ecosystem, trends, stakeholder dynamics and consumer preferences.
• Knowledge and experience encompassing more than one of the major LAC markets to provide plurality in understanding multiple markets and their dynamics is crucial
• Fluent in English and Spanish, Portuguese a plus.
• MBA or postgraduate degree preferred.

Additional Information

This position requires the incumbent to travel for work 25% of the time.

This position will be performed in an office setting. The position will require the incumbent to sit and stand at a desk, communicate in person and by telephone, frequently operate standard office equipment, such as telephones and computers, and reach with hands and arms.

Visa is an EEO Employer. Qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability or protected veteran status. Visa will also consider for employment qualified applicants with criminal histories in a manner consistent with EEOC guidelines and applicable local law.