Principal Partner Strategy EMEA

Your work days are brighter here.

We’re obsessed with making hard work pay off, for our people, our customers, and the world around us. As a Fortune 500 company and a leading AI platform for managing people, money, and agents, we’re shaping the future of work so teams can reach their potential and focus on what matters most. The minute you join, you’ll feel it. Not just in the products we build, but in how we show up for each other. Our culture is rooted in integrity, empathy, and shared enthusiasm. We’re in this together, tackling big challenges with bold ideas and genuine care. We look for curious minds and courageous collaborators who bring sun-drenched optimism and drive. Whether you're building smarter solutions, supporting customers, or creating a space where everyone belongs, you’ll do meaningful work with Workmates who’ve got your back. In return, we’ll give you the trust to take risks, the tools to grow, the skills to develop and the support of a company invested in you for the long haul. So, if you want to inspire a brighter work day for everyone, including yourself, you’ve found a match in Workday, and we hope to be a match for you too.

About the Team

This incredible opportunity is focused on creating the EMEA overall GPO-wide partner strategy. This role will focus on managing Accenture, Deloitte and PwC across EMEA, all new offerings as Workday adds products and companies to its portfolio, the GTM of VAR Resell and develop relationships with McKinsey and Korn Ferry.
This individual-contributor leadership role exemplifies working across a plethora of senior leaders at Workday, our Partners and our Prospects and Customers, building relationships, trust and understanding of the shared business agenda. Examples of relationships are the sales leadership team, the partner leadership team, and Workday’s Senior Management Team which includes functional leadership colleagues across marketing, customer experience, legal, products & technology, presales, HR, and revenue operations.
Collaboration with all the leadership in the Global Partners Organisation will also be critical to deliver a holistic global partners message to sales and the partner community. This leadership role is highly visible and requires demonstration of leadership beyond the immediate span of control at senior executive level.

About the Role

This role requires strong understanding of the partner ecosystem, how to monetise its sourcing capacity, both directly and indirectly (VAR) and how to benefit from its capabilities. The leader will develop solid executable plans across all EMEA regions, and work collaboratively across their peers, namely the Partner Directors, Partner Executives and Partner Managers.

The role requires understanding of how to continuously help the ecosystem evolve for the benefit of the stakeholders above, how to go to market with the right levers and incentives to encourage our partners to source, resell & progress new deals, and strongly influence deals in motion. 

The role requires understanding of Workday’s product and GTM strategy, as well as that of our competitors’.  At its core, this role’s objective is to leverage/activate the Workday ecosystem in order to develop significant pipeline contribution to the sales organisation through the VAR programme, and to ACV/target attainment through Workday’s ecosystem of partners.

The role, reporting to our Group Vice-President of International Ecosystem, is an essential part of the EMEA leadership team.  

Leadership:

• Proactively help, coach and support sales Group, Area, Regional VPs and Regional Sales Directors as well as account executives to get the best performance out of the partner ecosystem.
• Educate sales teams on VAR capabilities and how to get the best out of the VAR ecosystem. 
• Be the VAR go to person across EMEA for all sales leaders from a strategy perspective.  Work though the Partner Managers and Partner Executives to ensure smooth attainment of targets.
• Work across the Partners leadership team including Channels, Software/Innovation, Partner Management, Strategy and Partner Operations to ensure alignment and execution.
• Collaborate with our Customer Experience Organisation around partner primes, partner capacity, partner education and certification, and contracting when necessary.
• Mentor colleagues across the business.

Operational Results:

• Deliver target % VAR/resell ACV.
• Deliver target $ ACV sourced revenue
• Understand the Sales objectives across all GTM industries/verticals, and build a comprehensive VAR plan for each individual EMEA business
• Participate in weekly forecast calls, led by the SVP Sales for EMEA, and those forecast calls by their teams.

Business Development:

• Develop strategies to create new business opportunities and pipeline.
• Develop joint partner sales plays and sales campaigns alongside the sales organisation;
• Work with our Partner Innovations team to develop pipeline from key strategic innovation partnerships.
• Strongly drive new market entry for Workday organic and acquired products, including Financials.

About You

• Experience across EMEA, direct and indirect, and preferably in the space of HCM and/or ERP and business applications, working across enterprise and mid-market segments.
• Ecosystem, Alliance, and/or Channel leadership experience in Europe, delivering strong results in pipeline and bookings.
• Demonstrable results in working across matrixed organisations, within complex team-based sales environments, and able to influence sales organisations, and partner GTM motions.
• European experience working across different geographies/cultures, deploying challenging change programmes.
• Cloud Technology, Data, Analytics, API and platform experience and understanding.
• Experience in Analyst relationships and market facing activities.
• Proven ability in creating and executing complex plans with partners, sales, operations, start to finish, with a track record of successful revenue attainment.
• Understanding of GTM motions including selling through/to channel partners, co-selling/re-selling.

Our Approach to Flexible Work
 

With Flex Work, we’re combining the best of both worlds: in-person time and remote. Our approach enables our teams to deepen connections, maintain a strong community, and do their best work. We know that flexibility can take shape in many ways, so rather than a number of required days in-office each week, we simply spend at least half (50%) of our time each quarter in the office or in the field with our customers, prospects, and partners (depending on role). This means you'll have the freedom to create a flexible schedule that caters to your business, team, and personal needs, while being intentional to make the most of time spent together. Those in our remote "home office" roles also have the opportunity to come together in our offices for important moments that matter.

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