The VP, Corporate Partnerships will strategically generate growth in annual revenue by building and maintaining exceptional business relationships with current and prospective partnerships across Canada. The successful candidate will be a dynamic, innovative, results-oriented individual with proven abilities as a respected and motivating leader and colleague, exceptional communication skills and achieving targets while balancing the people needs of the department.

Role Responsibilities:

• Lead all business activity across the Corporate Partnerships portfolio: managing team performance and partner engagement, uncovering new growth opportunities, working closely with the Chief Commercial Officer to set and implement annual team goals, strategies, milestones, and timelines for reaching department revenue goals
• Establish strong working relationships with local business communities as well as regional and national companies to understand individual marketing and business goals and initiatives
• Analyze partner performance data to identify trends, gaps and opportunities, using these insights to develop strategies and partner-specific initiatives resulting in revenue growth
• Establish and oversee employee performance and development, assign goals, key performance indicators and conduct annual performance reviews
• Provide direction, coaching and mentoring to engage team members and ensure achievement of targets:
  • Partnerships sales team to develop pitch presentations and business strategies to prospect and secure prospect sales growth
  • Partnerships operations team to facilitate business operations, analytics of the department
  • Partnerships marketing teams to manage existing partners relationships in order to meet or exceed renewal targets
• Effectively communicate and collaborate with cross-functional teams to develop new initiatives and ensure operational efficiency, including Finance, Marketing, Legal, Business Intelligence, Tickets/Member Services, Community & Social Impact, People & Culture, and Facilities/Administration
• Review and update processes and procedures in order to facilitate more efficient partner accounts, proposal development, stewardship, and reporting compliance
• Collaborate and review agreements with external consultants, vendors and suppliers as required
• Create, review, and update budgets tracking profit and loss to reach financial revenue goals and provide accurate reporting

Qualifications/Experience:

In addition to bringing a commitment to Vancouver Whitecaps FC vision and values, the ideal candidate will require a broad base of demonstrated experience as follows:

• 10+ Years experience in business development, partnerships, or strategic sales and marketing
• Strategic thinker with strong execution skills as well as the ability to adapt quickly as needed
• Proven ability to grow revenue and effectively lead and engage a multi-functional team
• The ability to build and maintain strong corporate relationships to consistently maximize growth, and meet/exceed revenue targets
• Exceptional communicator who can engage, influence and build trust across all levels of an organization
• Strong understanding of industry trends to enable the effective position of partnership opportunities
• Ability to assess opportunities and risks to make sound decisions
• Post-secondary education in Marketing, Business, or related disciplines is required
• Must be legally entitled to work in Canada
• Experience with Salesforce is an asset
• Experience within the Canadian sporting industry is an asset

The Club

Vancouver Whitecaps FC is the longest-running professional soccer club in Canada and the United States. Since its inaugural season in 1974, the club has united generations of loyal fans in British Columbia and beyond. We are also strongly committed to providing opportunities to Canadian athletes, both male and female, with the largest soccer development structure in Canada. With academies in eight out of ten provinces, a network of partner clubs, and hundreds of camps and clinics every year, Whitecaps FC provide a foundation for Canadas soccer future.

In addition to building a winning team on and off the pitch, the Club places great importance in giving back to our community, harnessing the power of sport to create a stronger, more equitable & inclusive society through three key community goals: helping meet critical needs, using soccer to build life skills and creating soccer participation opportunities in Indigenous communities.

Vancouver Whitecaps FC believes that diversity and inclusion is critical to our success, and we seek to recruit, develop, and retain the most talented people from a diverse candidate pool. This includes but is not limited to people of colour, Indigenous people, persons with disabilities, and persons of any sexual orientation or gender identity. Should you require any accommodation throughout the recruitment process, please do not hesitate to contact our People & Culture department.

We thank all applicants for their interest, however, only those selected for further consideration will be contacted. No recruiters or agencies, please.