Director, Global SME Product Management – Construction Industry Lead

Location: Europe (preference: Dublin / Lisbon / UK)

Position Overview

Mastercard is a technology company in the global payments space. We connect consumers, financial institutions, merchants, governments, and businesses worldwide, enabling them to use electronic forms of payment instead of cash and checks. We use technology and data-driven insights to make electronic payments more convenient, secure, and efficient for people everywhere. Our business has a global reach—extending to more than 210 countries and territories—and continues to experience growth in a world where 85% of retail transactions are still made in cash and checks.

Micro, Small, and Medium Businesses (SMEs) are a critical driver of global economic growth and represent 75% of the worldwide workforce and about 50% of the global GDP. SMEs foster inclusion, as minorities own 45% of small businesses, and 1/3 of small businesses are women-owned. Mastercard's segment strategy focuses on growing core products and expanding product distribution in selected industries – Construction being one of them. The successful candidate should understand the Construction industry to customize our SME value proposition and collaborate with Mastercard regional and global stakeholders, banks, acquirers, fintechs, and other SME service providers to identify strategic growth opportunities for serving all SMEs in the Construction industry through multiple distribution channels.

Key Responsibilities

• Develop and execute a Global strategy, focused on small and medium-sized companies, to capture the cardable payment opportunity in the Construction vertical – including issuing and acceptance.
• Identify and define key partners such as ISVs, marketplaces, and financial institutions, with a targeted approach to the Construction vertical, and enable them as distribution partners for Mastercard solutions.
• Engage directly with key channel partners to gather feedback, drive program adoption, and act as a trusted advisor, ensuring our operational framework directly contributes to their success.
• Assess and partner with global/regional/local players, focused on the Construction industry, to enhance Mastercard SME payment offer for SMEs.
• Accelerate efforts to drive incremental volumes and revenues across the regions, on the Construction vertical.
• Develop a dedicated value proposition to SMEs operating in the Construction industry, including domestic and cross-border flows and focusing on enabling SME card acceptance.
• Provide trends, insights, and changes to the SME landscape to support our industry/segment strategy beyond card.
• Collaborate with global and regional SME segment product teams to ensure SME products and solutions are developed with inputs from SME and non-bank distribution partners, according to SME product distribution standards.
• Map the Construction ecosystem globally and identify key regions and markets to develop a pipeline to penetrate further on SME B2B payment flows, leveraging Mastercard and partners' solutions for issuing, acceptance, and cross-border flows.
• Partner with global government, fintech, digital partnerships and GPS teams to identify potential SME Construction use cases.
• Map SME distribution partners’ capabilities, product offerings, needs, and gaps to identify product synergies.
• Develop the right distribution model and commercial terms, negotiate, and lead the contractual efforts with prospective partners.
• Develop industry-specific use cases, playbooks, and distribution model archetypes for scaling efforts.
• Collaborate with colleagues to capture more SME Flows in the Construction industry.
• Provide support for the sales teams in pre- and after-sales partner meetings with a detailed understanding of product features to identify and implement solutions (in partnership with the Customer Solutions Centre and the local product team).
• Draft, keep and customize the SME narrative of current go-to-market materials to support new and enhanced products in the SME Central Hub that drive the SME Construction strategy.
• Maintain distribution partners' pipeline and track performance and value of efforts.
• Distribute and share Thought Leadership/Best Practice in the Construction and embedded finance space.
• Identify SME Construction flows and industries to drive increased revenue and win new deals.
• Provide GTM/Rollout support for all new construction-related solutions, partnerships and initiatives.

All About You

• Experience and knowledge of the Construction sector, in particular SME players, is needed.
• Experience in financial services and payments with understanding of competitive offerings and industry trends; international market knowledge/experience; SME banking or SME payment experience is a plus.
• Experience at a top-tier management consulting firm is a strong plus.
• A results-oriented mindset with a focus on driving measurable outcomes and ROI from channel partnerships.
• Able to navigate conversations that are both technical and business-oriented.
• Excellent writing skills and experience creating training materials, product guides, etc.
• Strong B2B and embedded payments experience and understanding of SME B2B flows, such as accounts payable, embedded finance, and trade use cases.
• Able to work independently and with minimal guidance.
• Self-motivated and thrives in a fast-paced environment; ready to take on stretch goals.
• Flexible and creative, able to adapt and thrive in a changing environment, with the ability to multitask and adjust responsibilities.
• Ability to storyboard and develop visually compelling presentations with clear logic and structure.
• Ability to lead initiatives from start to finish, with excellent time management and organizational skills.
• Build cross-functional relationships and establish an internal network to execute strategy successfully.
• Strong customer relationship-building and management skills for internal and external customers.
• Fluent in English.

Corporate Security Responsibility

All activities involving access to Mastercard assets, information, and networks come with inherent risk. Employees are responsible for information security and must: Abide by Mastercard’s security policies and practices; ensure the confidentiality and integrity of the information being accessed; report any suspected information security violation or breach; complete all periodic mandatory security trainings.

Seniority level

• Director

Employment type

• Full-time

Job function

• Product Management and Marketing

Industries

• Financial Services, IT Services and IT Consulting, and Technology, Information and Internet