Principal Specialist: Technical Pre-Sales

At Cell C, we are not just a telecommunications company; we are a people-centric and consumer-focused organization committed to delivering exceptional experiences to our customers. In line with our dedication to customer-centricity, we are seeking a seasoned professional
Principal Specialist: Technical Pre- Sales
to join our dynamic team of #Unstoppables.

Purpose of the Job:

The Principal Specialist – Technical Pre-sales serves as both a senior consultant and solution architect that is responsible for driving the design and implementation of enterprise products within the enterprise sales process. This multifaceted role goes beyond conventional pre-sales responsibilities; it not only bridges the gap between the enterprise customer's technical teams and the company's product and engineering departments to ensure that complex solutions are accurately understood, scoped, designed, and presented to meet customer needs, but also takes ownership of developing and elevating the enterprise sales practice itself.

The Principal Specialist plays a critical role in shaping proposals, delivering technical presentations, proof of concepts (PoCs), and driving customer confidence in the company's telecom products and services.

Main Responsibilities:

Technical Pre-Sales

• Lead complex technical pre-sales engagements for telecom products, solutions, and services
• Collaborate with sales teams to understand customer requirements and translate business needs into technical solutions
• Develop and present solution designs, technical proposals, and product demonstrations tailored to customer environments
• Lead technical workshops, discovery sessions, and PoCs/proof of value (PoVs) to validate solutions and build customer confidence

Solution Design & Consulting

• Architect scalable, secure, and cost-effective telecom solutions aligned with customer use cases, industry best practices, and Cell C's enterprise product portfolio
• Document new solutions and changes to existing solutions, as requested by enterprise customers
• Work closely with product management and engineering to provide customer feedback, influence product roadmaps, and ensure solution feasibility
• Evaluate customer environments (networks, data centers, applications) to recommend optimal integration approaches
• Provide expert guidance on standards, protocols, and emerging technologies relevant to enterprise customer needs

Proposal Development & Bid Support

• Lead the technical response in RFPs, RFIs, and tender processes with detailed solution descriptions, architecture diagrams, and implementation plans
• Collaborate with pricing, legal, and delivery teams to ensure proposals are competitive, compliant, and realistic

Mentoring and Training

• Develop training material associated with technical products.
• Perform training and knowledge sharing on technical solutions
• Manage and mentor pre-sales engineers, solutions analysts, and solutions consultants in proposal development and solutioning
• Provide training and knowledge transfer to internal sales and technical teams

Customer & Stakeholder Engagement

• Build strong relationships with C-level and technical stakeholders within customers, service providers, and large enterprises
• Work with sales teams as part of pre-sales and post-sales service delivery
• Prepare and develop presentations covering solutions
• Prepare and develop presentations covering investigations
• Support product teams with insights for product innovation

Solution Architecture and Design

• Conduct and lead interviews, JAD sessions, and workshops to understand requirements and solutions
• Perform any necessary investigation and analysis requested as part of investigations that may result in subsequent customer solutions, or projects
• Confirm requirements using interviews, document analysis, requirements workshops, JAD sessions, surveys, site visits, business process descriptions, use cases, scenarios, technical analysis, tasks, information and workflow analysis and any other techniques required to document the functional requirements and solution designs
• Critically evaluate information gathered from multiple sources, reconcile conflicts, decompose high-level information into details, abstract up from low-level information to a general understanding, and distinguish user requests from underlying need
• Input needs to be given for the requirements when JAD sessions are performed
• Identify gaps between requirements and the proposed solutions

Qualification

Bachelor's or Master's degree in IT, Telecommunications, Computer Science, Engineering, or related field

Experience

• 10+ years in technical roles within the telecom industry, with at least 5 years in pre-sales and/or solutions consulting
• Proven track record of leading and driving technical pre-sales engagements and winning complex telecom deals
• Relevant experience in training and knowledge sharing and the development of necessary technical training material
• Experience with cloud platforms (AWS, Azure, GCP) and container orchestration (Kubernetes, Docker)
• Experience with network technologies and data center connectivity (IP, VRF, MPLS, APN, VLAN, ISP BGP routing, IP Network designs knowledge)

"Cell C is an equal opportunities employer, committed to fostering a diverse and inclusive workplace where all employees are treated fairly and with respect, regardless of race, gender, age, disability, or any other protected characteristic."