Sr Director - Marketing Intelligence & Strategy

At Early Warning, we’ve powered and protected the U.S. financial system for over thirty years with cutting-edge solutions like Zelle®, Paze℠, and so much more. As a trusted name in payments, we partner with thousands of institutions to increase access to financial services and protect transactions for hundreds of millions of consumers and small businesses.

Positions located in Scottsdale, San Francisco, Chicago, or New York follow a hybrid work model to allow for a more collaborative working environment.

Candidates responding to this posting must independently possess the eligibility to work in the United States, for any employer, at the date of hire. This position is ineligible for employment Visa sponsorship.

Overall Purpose

Lead the development of enterprise intelligence, strategic insight, and organizational learning capabilities to improve marketing and business decisions across Early Warning Services and its portfolio of brands.

As part of a newly evolving Marketing Intelligence & Insights function, this role helps shape the development of a modern enterprise intelligence capability that connects customer, market, competitive, brand, and performance intelligence to business strategy and decision-making. The position partners across marketing, analytics, product, strategy, and leadership teams to establish scalable approaches for intelligence generation, synthesis, and enterprise learning.

Drive enterprise marketing intelligence, research, strategic synthesis, and decision support that strengthen understanding of customers, markets, competitive dynamics, brand performance, and emerging trends. This role shapes enterprise learning agendas and translates intelligence into actionable guidance, strategic narratives, and decision frameworks for executive and cross-functional stakeholders, helping influence how the organization learns, prioritizes, and makes decisions over time.

Essential Functions

• Develop enterprise marketing intelligence and research strategy and oversee the design and execution of programs, processes, and operating rhythms to deliver actionable intelligence, strategic insight, and decision support.

• Provide leadership to direct and indirect resources in achieving objectives; lead and develop a high-performing team across insights, research, thought leadership, and strategic intelligence.

• Extract, analyze, and synthesize qualitative and quantitative intelligence from a variety of sources to identify meaningful patterns, opportunities, risks, and strategic implications.

• Manage and implement analytics and research project lifecycles, including defining deliverables based on requirements.

• Analyze brand, marketing, customer, market, and communications activities to identify trends, emerging opportunities, competitive dynamics, and strategic implications.

• Define and guide enterprise learning agendas to strengthen understanding of customers, markets, competitive dynamics, brand perception, and emerging trends.

• Translate intelligence into clear implications, recommendations, and executive-ready strategic narratives decision frameworks that influence planning, prioritization, investment decisions, and enterprise strategy

• Create a more holistic view of the business by connecting customer, brand, market, performance, merchant, and operational inputs across a complex B2B2C ecosystem.

• Guide development of thought leadership, enterprise perspectives, and commercial narratives informed by customer, market, competitive, and performance intelligence.

• Explore practical AI-enabled approaches to intelligence synthesis, knowledge management, insight distribution, and decision support, while balancing innovation with governance and organizational readiness.

• Partner across marketing, product, analytics, strategy, and leadership teams to align intelligence efforts with enterprise priorities and scalable ways of working.

• Design and evolve a modern enterprise intelligence capability, including methodologies, operating models, tools, partnerships, and scalable ways of working

• Support the company’s commitment to risk management and protecting the integrity and confidentiality of systems and data.

Minimum Qualifications

• Education and/or experience typically obtained through completion of a bachelor’s degree in marketing, business, communications, research, strategy, or a related field.

• Demonstrated experience in strategy, intelligence, insights, research, consulting, market intelligence, competitive intelligence, marketing intelligence, or related disciplines.

• Typically, a minimum of 15 years of progressive experience or demonstrated portfolio consistent with experience required of the role.

• Experience working in a matrixed environment.

• Demonstrated entrepreneurial mindset with the ability to operate effectively in evolving environments and build new capabilities.

• Experience synthesizing customer, market, brand, performance, and business intelligence into strategic recommendations and executive-level guidance.

• Strong executive communication, storytelling, and presentation skills, with demonstrated ability to influence senior stakeholders and drive alignment across functions.

• Experience leading and developing high-performing teams.

• Demonstrated curiosity and understanding of how AI and emerging technologies are reshaping intelligence, strategy, organizational learning, and decision-making.

• Background and drug screen.

Preferred Qualifications

• Master’s degree in business, marketing, strategy, communications, research, analytics, or a related field.

• Experience in insights, research, consulting, brand strategy, marketing intelligence, or related disciplines.

• Experience building or significantly evolving an intelligence, insights, or strategy capability in a complex organization.

• Experience supporting a multi-brand, B2B2C, payments, financial services, or highly regulated environment.

• Experience translating customer, market, competitive, and business intelligence into executive-level strategic recommendations, thought leadership, or enterprise decision support.

Physical Requirements and Standard Language

Working conditions consist of a normal office environment. Work is primarily sedentary and requires extensive use of a computer and involves sitting for periods of approximately four hours. Work may require occasional standing, walking, kneeling and reaching. Must be able to lift 10 pounds occasionally and/or negligible amount of force frequently. Requires visual acuity and dexterity to view, prepare, and manipulate documents and office equipment including personal computers. Requires the ability to communicate with internal and/or external customers.

Employee must be able to perform essential functions and physical requirements of position with or without reasonable accommodation.

Candidates responding to this posting must independently possess the eligibility to work in the United States at the date of hire.

The above job description is not intended to be an all-inclusive list of duties and standards of the position.

Early Warning Services is an affirmative action and equal opportunity employer.

Some of the Ways We Prioritize Your Health and Happiness 

•  Healthcare Coverage – Competitive medical (PPO/HDHP), dental, and vision plans as well as company contributions to your Health Savings Account (HSA) or pre-tax savings through flexible spending accounts (FSA) for commuting, health & dependent care expenses.

• 401(k) Retirement Plan – Featuring a 100% Company Safe Harbor Match on your first 6% deferral immediately upon eligibility.

• Paid Time Off – Flexible Time Off for Exempt (salaried) employees, as well as generous PTO for Non-Exempt (hourly) employees, plus 11 paid company holidays and a paid volunteer day.

• 12 weeks of Paid Parental Leave

• Maven Family Planning – provides support through your Parenting journey including egg freezing, fertility, adoption, surrogacy, pregnancy, postpartum, early pediatrics, and returning to work.

And SO much more! We continue to enhance our program, so be sure to check our Benefits page here for the latest. Our team can share more during the interview process!

Early Warning Services, LLC (“Early Warning”) considers for employment, hires, retains and promotes qualified candidates on the basis of ability, potential, and valid qualifications without regard to race, religious creed, religion, color, sex, sexual orientation, genetic information, gender, gender identity, gender expression, age, national origin, ancestry, citizenship, protected veteran or disability status or any factor prohibited by law, and as such affirms in policy and practice to support and promote equal employment opportunity and affirmative action, in accordance with all applicable federal, state, and municipal laws. The company also prohibits discrimination on other bases such as medical condition, marital status or any other factor that is irrelevant to the performance of our employees. 

Early Warning Services LLC is a proud participant in E-Verify, a federal program to help ensure a legal and authorized workforce. As part of our hiring process, we electronically verify the employment eligibility of all new hires through E-Verify. For more information on your rights and responsibilities under E-Verify please visit Home | E-Verify.