The Regional Design Strategy & Industry Portfolio Leader leads the India design solutioning team — the hub through which design pursuits, proposals, and pre-sales engagements are supported across all global geographies. This is a foundational role in the evolution of a global design solutioning model, with India serving as the primary center of gravity from which regional spokes in the Americas, EMEA, and beyond are supported.
This leader directly manages a team of Industry Design Solution Leaders based in India, overseeing how design is positioned, scoped, and sold across verticals in support of cross-regional pursuits. While the team is regionally based, the mandate is inherently global — partnering closely with regional design solutions leaders and sales leadership across geographies to drive consistent, high-quality design solutioning at scale.
The role requires executive client-facing presence — leading pitches, workshops, and strategic conversations — alongside the operational and people leadership needed to run a high-performing solutioning team. They must be credible across design craft, commercial strategy, and global stakeholder dynamics simultaneously.
Core Responsibilities
1. India Solutioning Team Leadership • Directly manage a team of Industry Design Solution Leaders in India, setting direction, managing performance, and developing their pre-sales and solutioning capability. • Oversee how the India team supports cross-regional pursuits — ensuring strong coverage, prioritization, and quality of design-led solutioning across all verticals. • Bring consistency to how the team pitches, scopes, and solutions across industries without flattening the vertical-specific nuance each lead brings. • Build and evolve the operating model for India-based design solutioning, establishing practices, standards, and ways of working.
2. Pre-Sales & Market Growth Leadership • Oversee cross-regional pipeline visibility and health — understanding coverage, prioritization, and risk across the India solutioning portfolio. • Step directly into high-value pursuits when they require senior design alignment or strategic escalation. • Own the design narrative in competitive RFP situations alongside sales, consulting, and engineering counterparts.
3. Client-Facing Leadership • Lead executive-level pitches, workshops, and strategic client conversations — able to lead the room, not just participate. • Facilitate design-led discovery and visioning sessions with senior client stakeholders across cultures and geographies. • Communicate design value in business terms — translating design strategy into commercial outcomes for executive audiences. • Represent the global design solutions function credibly in high-stakes client settings regardless of geography or industry.
4. Global Collaboration & Cross-Regional Alignment • Operate as a key node in the global design solutioning network — partnering with regional design solutions leaders in the Americas, EMEA, and other geographies as peers. • Share pipeline intelligence, coordinate on cross-regional pursuits, and align approaches on global accounts to avoid duplication or conflicting narratives. • Contribute to global solutions strategy in partnership with the Global Lead, Design Sales & Solutions.
5. Delivery Oversight & Quality Governance • Serve as a senior escalation point for design solutioning and delivery challenges across industries. • Ensure the team has the right delivery models, staffing strategies, and capability readiness for upcoming engagements across all regions they support.
6. Cross-Functional Collaboration • Act as the design liaison for global and regional executives — participating in planning, forecasting, financial reviews, and portfolio performance discussions. • Ensure strong alignment between design, consulting, engineering, and digital teams across the engagements the India team supports. • Collaborate with marketing and GTM teams to shape industry-specific assets, case studies, and capability narratives.
Skills:
Design Solutioning & Pre-Sales Leadership
• Proven experience owning the design narrative across complex, multi-vertical enterprise pursuits. • Ability to scope, price, and staff design engagements across different delivery models. • Comfort working in competitive RFP situations alongside sales, consulting, and engineering counterparts. • Experience building and reviewing capability decks, case studies, and pursuit responses at an executive level.
Client-Facing Presence
• Executive-level presence in pitches, workshops, and strategic client conversations — able to lead the room, not just participate. • Ability to facilitate design-led discovery and visioning sessions with senior client stakeholders. • Strong visual and verbal storytelling — communicating design value in business terms, not design terms. • Comfortable operating across cultures and geographies in a global client-facing capacity.
Portfolio & Pipeline Oversight
Ability to manage a portfolio of active pursuits across verticals and geographies simultaneously — understanding coverage, prioritization, and risk. • Experience partnering with sales and account leadership to influence early pursuit shaping. • Comfort escalating into or leading high-value deals that require senior design alignment.
Design Fluency
• Sufficient depth across UX, product design, service design, and creative production to evaluate quality, challenge approaches, and set direction. • Understanding of how modern design teams are structured and how design integrates with engineering and consulting delivery. • Awareness of AI-native design workflows and how they are changing what is sellable and deliverable.
People Leadership & Model Building
• Direct management experience overseeing senior design leaders — setting direction, managing performance, and developing their sales and solutioning capability. • Ability to build and operationalize a solutioning model, not just manage within one — comfortable establishing practices, standards, and ways of working from the ground up. • Strong coaching instincts at the leadership level — developing commercial and client-facing capability in others. • Operates with a high degree of independence — able to own the solutioning function without requiring heavy direction.
Global Stakeholder Navigation
• Ability to operate as a peer to regional design solutions leaders across geographies — sharing pipeline intelligence, aligning on cross-regional pursuits, and coordinating on global accounts. • Comfortable contributing to global solutions strategy while managing a regionally based team. • Sufficient presence and credibility to hold their own alongside experienced regional leaders across the Americas, EMEA, and beyond.
Commercial & Strategic Acumen
• Understanding of how design contributes to revenue — as a growth driver, not just a delivery function. • Ability to participate in pipeline reviews, forecast conversations, and business planning at a global level. • Able to identify emerging solution patterns and sharpen vertical narratives accordingly.
Qualifications
• 15+ years of experience in design, with at least 5–7 years in a client-facing, commercial, or solutioning capacity within a consulting, professional services, or agency environment.
• 3–5 years of direct management experience overseeing senior designers or design leaders — with a demonstrated ability to develop commercial and client-facing capability in others, not just design craft.
• Proven track record of leading executive-level pitches, workshops, and client presentations independently — not in a supporting capacity.
• Experience working across at least two to three industry verticals, with the breadth to credibly engage across a multi-vertical portfolio.
• Background in competitive RFP and pursuit environments, including scoping, pricing, and staffing design engagements of varying scale and delivery model.
• Cross-geographic work experience, including direct collaboration with or in support of teams and clients across multiple regions — Americas, EMEA, or equivalent.
• Bachelor's degree in Design. Advanced degree or MBA is a plus but not a requirement — commercial acumen should be demonstrated through track record.
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Cognizant (Nasdaq: CTSH) is an AI Builder and technology services provider, building the bridge between AI investment and enterprise value by building full-stack AI solutions for our clients. Our deep industry, process and engineering expertise enables us to build an organization’s unique context into technology systems that amplify human potential, realize tangible returns and keep global enterprises ahead in a fast-changing world. See how at www.cognizant.com or @cognizant.
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