Director, Sales Development
Leads Okta’s Japan Sales Development organization, owning SDR strategy, outbound pipeline generation, operational performance, and cross-functional go-to-market alignment. The role requires 10–15+ years of sales development or GTM management experience, including leading managers, plus English and Japanese fluency.
About the job
Responsibilities
Strategic Leadership & Business Impact
- Own the end-to-end Sales Development strategy across Japan, including vision, operating model, and performance metrics.
- Establish operational rigor and a high-performance culture across the SDR organization.
- Translate market trends, customer insights, and competitive intelligence into targeted prospecting strategies.
- Partner with Sales, Marketing, Channel, and Revenue Operations on account coverage, persona focus, inbound/outbound prioritization, and SDR-to-AE handoffs.
Outbound Excellence
- Develop and execute an outbound strategy that generates high-quality new-business pipeline.
- Model effective outbound behaviors, including outreach, objection handling, and call preparation.
- Set standards for outbound quality, personalization, and consistency.
- Use prospecting tools, AI, intent data, and industry insights to create outbound plays, win-back motions, event-triggered outreach, and persona-based engagement strategies.
- Inspect outbound performance and drive corrective actions.
Operational Excellence
- Optimize tools, systems, and processes such as Outreach, CRM, data enrichment, and AI tools.
- Inspect workflows, prospecting motions, and productivity metrics to drive continuous improvement.
- Implement governance for productivity, quality, compliance, and forecasting accuracy.
- Build scalable pipeline-generation mechanisms, including playbooks, sequences, cadences, discovery frameworks, and qualification standards.
- Partner with Revenue Operations on capacity models, coverage plans, and forecasting based on ramp profiles and inbound supply.
Talent Development & Leadership
- Build, coach, and inspire a high-performing SDR leadership bench.
- Implement coaching frameworks covering prospecting, qualification, discovery, and opportunity creation.
- Provide actionable feedback through call reviews, performance inspections, and development plans.
- Develop career pathways supporting ramp, performance, tenure, and internal mobility into Account Executive and other go-to-market roles.
- Foster accountability, transparency, continuous improvement, and an inclusive team environment.
Cross-Functional Partnership
- Partner with Marketing on inbound demand, scoring, routing, and follow-up service-level agreements.
- Collaborate with Sales leaders on territory models, target personas, and qualification standards.
- Work with Enablement on onboarding, ramping, skills development, and coaching programs.
- Represent the SDR organization in leadership planning and go-to-market strategy.
Pipeline & Business Outcomes
- Ensure pipeline targets are consistently met or exceeded.
- Lead the creation of high-quality, well-qualified opportunities.
- Track and report on SDR performance, conversion rates, and pipeline health.
- Refine pipeline-generation strategy as market conditions and business priorities change.
Requirements
- 10–15+ years of experience in Sales Development, Inside Sales, or go-to-market people management, including leading managers.
- Experience building and scaling SDR teams and delivering consistent, high-quality pipeline.
- Success driving outbound strategy, messaging, ICP refinement, and persona-based plays.
- Strong track record partnering with Sales, Marketing, Revenue Operations, and Enablement.
- Experience with forecasting, capacity planning, segmentation, and SDR-to-Sales handoff models.
- Strong operational and analytical skills.
- Experience designing prospecting workflows, playbooks, coaching frameworks, and qualification standards.
- Experience building scalable onboarding, coaching, and talent-development programs.
- Excellent written and verbal communication in English and Japanese.
- Executive presence and strong influence skills.
Benefits
- People-first, diverse, and inclusive culture.
Skills
Salesforce, Outreach, Artificial Intelligence, CRM, Data Enrichment, Intent Data, Prospecting, Outbound Sales, Inbound Sales, Forecasting, Capacity Planning, Segmentation, Pipeline Management, Revenue Operations, Coaching
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