In the Small, Medium Enterprise & Channel (SME&C) organization, we have set out to empower our customers through the unique value of the Microsoft cloud by building a globally led, digital-first scale organization aligned with partners. As part of the Americas SME&C Corporate team, you will support a dedicated set of customers in identifying and achieving their business objectives through best-in-class digital engagement and partner co-selling. You will also be able to work cross-collaboratively while living our shared SME&C Corporate priorities: Diversity and Inclusivity, Well-being, Sustainability, and Learning. If you have been described as customer obsessed and have a passion for digital-first solutions, we invite you to learn more about the SME&C Corporate organization and the value we deliver to our customers, partners, and one another, every day. As an **Azure App Innovation Technology Specialist** , you are a business leader with technical expertise working with our most important managed customers. You will lead a virtual team of sales, technical, and services resources to help customers realize digital transformation through cloud computing achieve/exceed quarterly Azure App Innovation consumption targets for related workloads in your assigned accounts. You possess both a high EQ with executive presence, able to engage with senior decision makers to uncover digital transformation initiatives, and a passion to learning how Azure cloud services can deliver digital transformation. You will develop and maintain an Azure App Innovation expertise, able to identify projects, build a compelling business case, and drive the consumption project to production. You will build and maintain relationships with customers, influence long-term strategic direction and act as a trusted advisor driving engagement at the CXO level with technology decision makers. You will help customers evaluate their cloud strategy, determine approaches to application and data migration and modernization, and recommend solutions that meet their requirements. This opportunity will allow you to accelerate your career growth, honing your solution sales and collaboration skills, and deepening your cloud expertise. This role is flexible in that you can work up to 50% from home. Microsoft’s mission is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more. As employees we come together with a growth mindset, innovate to empower others and collaborate to realize our shared goals. Each day we build on our values of respect, integrity, and accountability to create a culture of inclusion where everyone can thrive at work and beyond. **Responsibilities** **Build Strategy** + Acts as the voice of the customer (VOC) by driving new feedback, blockers, insights, and resources (e.g., unified action tracker [UAT], technical feedback platform) across communities so they can be added and prioritized. + Provides recommendations based on Microsoft capability to contribute to strategy development. + Collaborates with team members to monitor and analyze customer usage of key/prioritized Microsoft solutions/products that support customer’s business outcomes. Identifies opportunities to promote usage. + Works with account teams to help shape customer win strategy and tailor unique Microsoft value messaging to audience. + Shares competitive insights from customer sessions with colleagues and escalates/resolves customer compete situations to influence compete strategies. **Scale Customer Engagements** + Assists in customer engagements through adherence of standards and best practices (e.g., managed service provider [MSP], managed certified professional [MCP]) in pre-sales activities. Utilizes common sales and delivery methodology for the Microsoft sales organization to help engage customers in new opportunities. Actively seeks feedback on customer impact to increase capabilities. + Engages with and reaches out to customer technical and business decision makers proactively and independently. + Uses knowledge of customer context and solution or portfolio expertise to build credibility with customers individually or at scale. + Engages other internal resources (e.g., roles, Microsoft Technology Center, demo sites, virtual sites), mapping out and leveraging foundational resource knowledge for key areas of technology as needed to overcome technical blockers on assigned technology set. + Engages other resources (e.g., product and engineering teams), and leverages programs and investments (e.g., Microsoft Technology Center [MTC], exec briefing center, partner workshops) to inspire and validate customer technical requirements. + Reactively supports maximizing the impact of customer engagements by executing on solutions to blockers. Engages other resources, leveraging basic resource knowledge, for key areas of technology as needed to overcome technical blockers on assigned technology set + Ensures customer needs are met by showcasing suitable Microsoft solutions anchored in insights and business value, and influences customer technical buy-in. Improves customer interactions through feedback and observation. **Scale Through Partners** + Engages in partner sell-with scenarios by collaborating with partners to carry out technical engagement activities. + Engages in partner sell-with scenarios by collaborating with partners to carry out technical engagement activities. Develops relationships with pre-sale team and partners. Engages with and self-identify the top 5 to 10 go-to partners to work with for applicable territory with support from manager. **Solution Design and Proof** + Expands awareness of and begins practicing digital transformation sales methodologies (e.g., challenger sales). + Identifies and applies existing demonstration assets. Demonstrates and oversees demonstrations (e.g., pre-built demos, architectural design sessions [ADS], proof of concept [POC] sessions with partners) of solutions based on specific Microsoft products through early stage engagements. Leverages partner/customer teams as needed to prove capabilities and integration into customer environment. Reviews partner demonstrations and provides feedback to ensure alignment with Microsoft standards independently. + Presents and applies reference architectures across technologies/solution areas to partners or customers for their technology sets. **Technical Leadership** + Ensures customer technical teams are aware of and leveraging available for-scale skilling programs. Supports group training or one-to-many events (e.g., workshops, Webinars) to present and train customers and colleagues on the capabilities and benefits of specific Microsoft solutions/products. + Participates as a member in and contributes to local Microsoft tech community, attends community calls, sessions, hackathon, etc., and acts as a resource for their technology area. Contributes and participates in Customer Executive Briefing Center sessions. Shares best practices internally on community calls and drives recognition of Microsoft cloud solutions through presentations and engagements with external audiences. + Consumes and leverages readiness materials to expand domain knowledge and practices expertise by communicating with customers, partners, and senior colleagues to expand knowledge of architecture. Provides input on their readiness plan. **Qualifications** **Required/minimum qualifications** + Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, Engineering or related field AND 2+ years technical pre-sales or technical consulting experience OR equivalent experience. + 2+ years experience with cloud and hybrid, or on premises infrastructures, architecture designs, migrations, industry standards, and/or technology management. + Expertise in cloud-native architecture, including microservices, containers, APIs, and serverless solutions. + Proficiency in Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), serverless computing, and other Azure-native tools to build new cloud-native applications or modernize existing ones. + Proficiency in software development with languages such as .Net, Java, Python, or others. + Experience with CI/CD and DevOps integration solutions such as Azure DevOps, GitHub, or Git. + Experience in AI development and integration, including vision, text, and language models. + Familiarity with integration services like API gateways (API Management, Apigee, MuleSoft, Kafka) and event handling. + Knowledge of GitHub and DevOps automation. + Advanced English level. + Demonstrated experience selling complex, cloud-based solutions to Enterprise customers. + Demonstrated experience in building strong partnerships and trust with clients at C-level. **Additional or preferred qualifications** + Bachelor's Degree in Computer Science, Information Technology, Engineering or related field AND+ years technical pre-sales or technical consulting experience OR equivalent experience. + Certification in relevant (Microsoft or industry) technologies or disciplines (e.g., Microsoft Office 365, Power BI, Azure Architect and Development exams, Cloud Platform Technologies, Information Security, Architecture). Microsoft is an equal opportunity employer. Consistent with applicable law, all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ancestry, citizenship, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, immigration status, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran or military status, race, ethnicity, religion, sex (including pregnancy), sexual orientation, or any other characteristic protected by applicable local laws, regulations and ordinances. If you need assistance and/or a reasonable accommodation due to a disability during the application process, read more about requesting accommodations (https://careers.microsoft.com/v2/global/en/accessibility.html) .