Director, Business Development, Travel Partnerships (Africa)

About the role

The Retail & Commerce team develops Mastercard's strategic relationships across consumer commerce sectors, and the Travel Partnerships function drives growth with airlines, hotel groups, online travel agencies, travel management companies, travel loyalty programmes and travel technology providers. This client-facing role advances Mastercard's position across the African travel ecosystem, identifies strategic growth opportunities, builds executive relationships with key industry participants and connects partners to Mastercard's portfolio of payments, loyalty, data and analytics, cyber and intelligence solutions.

Key responsibilities

• Build and deepen strategic relationships with airlines, hotel groups, OTAs, TMCs, loyalty programmes and travel tech providers, and develop executive engagement strategies
• Identify emerging trends, growth opportunities and partnership models, and act as the voice of the travel industry internally and externally
• Represent Mastercard in industry forums and strategic customer engagements
• Deliver against volume, revenue, market share and growth objectives, and lead negotiations of strategic partnership agreements
• Develop business cases, financial models and commercial frameworks, and scale successful partnerships across Africa with country teams
• Lead complex cross-functional initiatives across product, services, loyalty, cyber and intelligence, acceptance, data and analytics and commercial payments teams

Required profile

• Significant experience in travel, payments, consulting, strategic partnerships or business development
• Deep understanding of the travel ecosystem and its stakeholders
• Demonstrated success building complex strategic partnerships and engaging C-suite stakeholders
• Experience in matrixed organisations and leading through influence
• Strong understanding of the African business landscape; experience across multiple African markets is highly desirable

Required skills

• Business case development, financial modelling and profitability analysis
• Negotiation, commercial acumen and relationship management
• Excellent communication and presentation skills