Director, PreSales Operations

Amplify Education is building a new function at the intersection of Product, Marketing, and Supply Chain - and this role sits at its heart. The Director, PreSales Operations is a newly created position within the Inbound team, established to address the absence of a formal cross-functional planning function between Product and Supply Chain, resulting in misaligned forecasts, late-stage product changes, and avoidable inventory fulfillment risk. This role is scoped to build the governance structures, planning infrastructure, and cross-functional operating rhythms that ensure product decisions and supply chain realities stay connected from the start, preventing operational losses across the organization.

This Director will own the cross-functional planning architecture that connects product decisions to supply chain realities - before those decisions become costly commitments. They will design and institutionalize governance processes and serve as a key partner to Product, Marketing, and Supply Chain leadership in ensuring that programs are planned, launched, and transitioned with operational discipline.

This is a process architecture and strategic planning role that is primarily focused on designing and scaling cross-functional operating systems, with ongoing responsibility for governance, coordination and execution oversight of those systems.

Reporting to the Vice President of Inbound Operations, this Director will own the end-to-end pre-sales planning architecture - governing product launch readiness, change control, lifecycle management, and cross-functional alignment across all physical materials for Amplify Education, Inc.

Essential Responsibilities:

Cross-Functional Process Design & Governance - 35%

• Design and implement an operational readiness model, and own ongoing governance once operationalized, ensuring no program advances without supply chain sign-off at defined development milestones.
• Establish and manage a change control framework that ensures all product changes - errata, version revisions, and scope adjustments - are evaluated for operational and financial impact before execution.
• Continuously improve the processes and governance structures that connect Product, Marketing, and Supply Chain decision-making, replacing informal communication with repeatable, accountable operating rhythms.
• Define escalation paths and decision ownership across Product, Marketing, and Supply Chain so that issues surface and are resolved at the right level before they become costly commitments.

Launch Readiness & Commercialization Planning - 20%

• Lead end-to-end launch readiness planning for new programs and editions, coordinating across Product, Marketing, Supply Chain, and Go-To-Market to ensure all operational criteria are met prior to commercialization.
• Drive a launch readiness framework that synchronizes product timelines, demand forecasts, manufacturing capacity, inventory build, and distribution readiness for every release.
• Ensure all product launches meet defined operational readiness criteria, including supply chain capacity, inventory availability, and distribution alignment, before customer commitments are made.

Product Lifecycle & Obsolescence Strategy - 20%

• Own the product lifecycle register and govern formal version transition and end-of-life planning for all active programs, ensuring transitions are planned with enough lead time to prevent avoidable write-offs and customer disruption.
• Partner with Finance and Supply Chain to support tracking and reduction targets, with progress reported quarterly to executive leadership.
• Manage inventory drawdown strategies for sunsetting programs, coordinating customer migration timing with supply chain positioning to minimize excess and shortage risk.
• Identify and flag lifecycle risks early - including version overlap, demand uncertainty during transitions, and end-of-life timing misalignment - and drive cross-functional resolution before exposure accumulates.

Data Architecture & Operational Alignment - 10%

• Define business requirements for operational product data - including item hierarchies, BOM structures, launch planning attributes, demand driver logic, and lifecycle designations - and partner with Technology and BizSys teams to implement within ERP systems.
• Champion data standards that enable accurate demand planning, sourcing strategies, and fulfillment execution, reducing manual reconciliation and assumption-driven decisions across teams.
• Collaborate with BizSys and Technology Management to ensure data requirements are correctly implemented in ERP and planning systems, and that system configurations support modular product architectures.
• Produce and maintain a monthly data quality report surfacing gaps, error rates, and trends, reviewed at the cross-functional planning sync.

Stakeholder Management - 10%

• Serve as the central point of accountability for cross-functional operational alignment.
• Facilitate monthly tactical syncs and contribute to quarterly strategic reviews, ensuring active program gate status, open change control requests, and escalating risks are visible to the right stakeholders.
• Translate complex operational risk into clear, decision-ready language for senior leadership - from coordinator-level execution to EVP-level visibility.
• Build and sustain trusted partnerships across Product, Marketing, Finance, and Supply Chain so that cross-functional alignment is the default, not the exception.

Required Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree or equivalent professional experience
• 8+ years of experience in supply chain operations, product operations, program management, or a closely related field
• Demonstrated experience designing or significantly improving cross-functional business processes
• Strong track record of building governance frameworks, change control systems, and structured planning cadences in complex organizations
• Experience working across Product, Marketing, and Operations teams - able to translate between strategic intent and operational execution
• Excellent communication and facilitation skills - comfortable running senior leadership meetings and presenting structured recommendations
• Intermediate financial acumen: able to frame cost/benefit trade-offs, quantify operational risk, and communicate impact in business terms

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience in education technology, publishing, or curriculum/materials-based businesses
• Familiarity with ERP systems (NetSuite preferred) and CRM platforms (Salesforce) in a supply chain or operations context
• Background in inventory planning, demand forecasting, or product lifecycle management
• Experience with modular or configurable product architectures - understanding how product design decisions impact fulfillment complexity
• PMP, APICS CPIM, or equivalent certification
• A track record of leading small, high-accountability teams in a matrixed organization.

You Will Excel in This Role If You

• Think in systems - you see how decisions in one function create downstream consequences in another, and you build processes that account for that
• Are a disciplined process builder who can create structure without creating bureaucracy
• Operate with urgency and precision - you can hold a big-picture view while managing the details that determine whether a program launches successfully
• Communicate with clarity and conviction across all levels - from coordinator to EVP - and can translate complex operational risk into language that drives decisions
• Are genuinely collaborative but comfortable holding a line when governance requires it
• Are energized by ambiguity in the short term and motivated by building something durable