AHEAD builds platforms for digital business. By weaving together advances in cloud infrastructure, automation and analytics, and software delivery, we help enterprises deliver on the promise of digital transformation.
At AHEAD, we prioritize creating a culture of belonging, where all perspectives and voices are represented, valued, respected, and heard. We create spaces to empower everyone to speak up, make change, and drive the culture at AHEAD.
We are an equal opportunity employer, and do not discriminate based on an individual's race, national origin, color, gender, gender identity, gender expression, sexual orientation, religion, age, disability, marital status, or any other protected characteristic under applicable law, whether actual or perceived.
We embrace all candidates that will contribute to the diversification and enrichment of ideas and perspectives at AHEAD.
You will build and lead AHEAD’s combined Research, Insights & Design CoE — establishing the team’s operating model, research methodology, design standards, quality governance, and delivery engine. This is a player-coach role that combines hands-on research execution and design excellence with stakeholder partnership, practice-building, and people leadership. You will be both an intellectual anchor and creative authority for the team, and a credible thought partner for AHEAD’s senior consulting and sales leadership.
Your work will directly shape how AHEAD’s consulting teams understand markets, position against competitors, plan for accounts, win complex enterprise technology deals — and how sharply those ideas and insights are expressed to CXO audiences through consulting-grade visual storytelling.
KEY RESPONSIBILITIES:
Research Delivery & Insights
- Create and own end-to-end delivery accountability for AHEAD's full research product stack like Market Size & Outlook, Industry/Technology POVs, Account Intelligence Packs, Competitive Profiles & Battlecards, Buying Behaviour Analysis, Capability Heatmaps, Benchmark Reports etc
- Synthesize intelligence from primary research and secondary research via tier-1 analyst platforms (e.g. Gartner, Everest Group, Forrester, IDC, Avasant etc), business databases (e.g.Hoovers, AlphaSense etc), and proprietary sources into crisp, executive-ready insight narratives.
- Lead competitive intelligence strategy and translate findings into actionable pursuit positioning.
- Drive account-level intelligence to support strategic account planning, C-suite engagement personalization, and opportunity identification for AHEAD's consulting and sales teams.
- Conduct peer review of analyst-produced research; enforce quality standards and provide structured developmental feedback across all deliverables.
- Advisory Engagements: Support pursuit engagements by delivering market insights, competitive benchmarking, and strategic guidance based on proprietary research and market intelligence.
CoE Build-Out & Team Leadership
- Establish and operationalize the Research & Insights centre — defining intake processes, research methodology, turnaround benchmarks, quality review protocols, and governance frameworks from the ground up.
- Lead, coach, and develop a team of Research Analysts /Sr Research Analysts; build a high-performance culture grounded in intellectual rigour, delivery excellence, and continuous learning.
- Design competency frameworks, structured onboarding programs, and career progression pathways for the research team; actively mentor analysts in their professional growth.
- Establish innovative research processes, methodologies and frameworks for structuring and analysing the data to develop impactful insights at a quality that is repeatable and is continually improved
- Build and govern the team's knowledge repository: standardized research templates, source libraries, reusable intelligence assets, and a living research calendar aligned to consulting priorities.
- Manage team utilization, workload distribution, and delivery economics; provide regular performance reporting to senior leadership.
Stakeholder Partnership & Consulting Enablement
- Serve as the primary research interface for AHEAD's onsite consulting, sales, practice, and deal teams — translating strategic business questions and pursuit needs into structured, hypothesis-led research briefs.
- Proactively anticipate intelligence needs across the full pursuit lifecycle: from opportunity identification and qualification through to proposal development, deal shaping, and win/loss review.
- Present research findings and insight packages to senior internal stakeholders; provide strategic context and actionable recommendations, not just data.
- Manage the custom research request pipeline; balance recurring standard reports with bespoke, high-urgency consulting support while maintaining delivery quality.
- Partner with onsite consulting leaders during workshops to validate research priorities, align report formats to field requirements, and institutionalize feedback loops.
Methodology, Tools & Innovation
- Establish a rigorous secondary research methodology and evaluation framework - ensuring currency, credibility, and strategic relevance of all intelligence.
- Champion the integration of AI-powered research and knowledge management tools to accelerate insight generation and enhance analytical output quality.
- Evaluate and manage research data subscriptions; make prioritized recommendations to leadership on platform investments (e.g. IDC, Gartner, Everest, Avasant, Forrester etc).
- Lead development of reusable consulting assets — capability heatmaps, innovation accelerators, advisory frameworks, maturity models — that extend research output into IP value.
Consulting Storytelling & Visual Communication
- Drive narrative excellence across consulting outputs — translating research findings into executive-ready storylines, proposal narratives, and CxO-level communications that persuade rather than merely present.
- Oversee and contribute to the design of high-impact consulting presentations, executive proposals, and client-facing research publications — ensuring all outputs meet a consulting-grade visual and narrative standard.
- Transform unstructured inputs — raw data, whiteboard captures, fragmented research briefs — into cohesive, visually compelling narratives; partner with visual communication specialists to bring research to life in pursuit war rooms and strategic proposals.
- Lead development of AHEAD’s visual research IP — standardized presentation templates, brand-compliant data visualization frameworks, infographic libraries, and consulting-grade chart systems — ensuring research output is as visually sharp as it is analytically rigorous.
- Ensure visual consistency and brand compliance across all CoE outputs — research publications, CxO Guides, thought leadership, and webinar materials — establishing self-service design playbooks and standards that enable the broader consulting team to produce quality output independently.
Reporting, KPIs & Continuous Improvement
- Define and track CoE performance metrics: research delivery throughput, turnaround SLAs, stakeholder satisfaction scores, proposal support win-rate influence, and knowledge asset reuse rates.
- Conduct regular win/loss analysis on research-supported pursuits; distil lessons into improved intelligence products and research practices.
- Provide monthly and quarterly reporting to senior leadership on CoE productivity, pipeline coverage, and research impact on consulting outcomes.
QUALIFICATIONS & EXPERIENCE:
Essential
- Experience: 10–14 years of progressive experience in research, market intelligence, or strategy/management consulting, with at least 3 years leading a research team /design visual comms practice.
- Analytical Skills: Strong ability to analyze market trends, vendor strategies, and enterprise needs to deliver actionable insights.
- Communication: Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including experience publishing research and presenting to executive audiences.
- Educational Background: Master from a top university is preferred. Bachelor’s degree is a must
- Domain Expertise: Sound understanding of the IT services and enterprise technology landscape — cloud, infrastructure, digital transformation, AI, cybersecurity, and related domains.
- Demonstrated expertise across multiple research domains: competitive intelligence, market sizing, account research, buying behaviour analysis, and technology benchmarking.
- Exceptional written communication skills; ability to produce consulting-grade research documents, executive summaries, and presentations to the highest standards of clarity and rigour.
- Intellectual agility and curiosity — comfort with ambiguity, courage to push beyond surface-level data, and a drive to uncover insight that changes how decisions are made.
- Exceptional organizational rigour — ability to manage multiple concurrent deliverables with competing priorities, tight timelines, and high quality standards simultaneously.
- Collaborative, consultative mindset — builds trusted relationships across global, cross-functional teams and earns a reputation as a reliable thought partner.
- Familiarity with AI-powered research acceleration and knowledge management platforms.
- Proven track record of synthesizing complex, multi-source intelligence into executive-ready insight narratives for CXO-level audiences and consulting stakeholders.
- Proficiency in secondary research using tier-1 analyst platforms and business intelligence databases
- Strong working proficiency in PowerPoint and presentation design — able to translate research outputs and analytical findings into polished, consulting-grade decks, data visualizations, and executive-ready slide narratives.
- Demonstrated ability to develop and govern design and visual communication standards — including presentation templates, brand systems, and reusable visual frameworks — across an organization or practice.
- Experience with AI-powered design and productivity tools used in a professional services context; ability to evaluate and integrate automation capabilities that accelerate insight packaging, visual production, and content refinement cycles.
Preferred
- MBA or postgraduate degree with a focus on Strategy, Business, Finance, or a related discipline.
- Prior experience in a top-tier consulting firm /research and advisory firm (or the research/intelligence function of an enterprise technology organization.
- Exposure to RFP support, proposal intelligence, or pursuit enablement within a consulting or technology firm.
- Exposure to global markets and understanding of enterprise technology adoption trends.
Why AHEAD:
Through our daily work and internal groups like Moving Women AHEAD and RISE AHEAD, we value and benefit from diversity of people, ideas, experience, and everything in between.
We fuel growth by stacking our office with top-notch technologies in a multi-million-dollar lab, by encouraging cross department training and development, sponsoring certifications and credentials for continued learning.
India Employment Benefits include:
Comprehensive health insurance coverage for employees, with options to extend coverage to dependents
Paid time off and company holidays, along with additional leave benefits as per policy
Flexible work arrangements, supporting work-life balance
Learning and development opportunities to support continuous growth and upskilling
Employee wellness initiatives and programs focused on physical and mental well-being
Retirement and statutory benefits in line with India regulations
Inclusive and people-first culture, with a strong focus on collaboration and ownership