Toptal

Practice Director, Data

Toptal

full-time

Posted on:

Origin:  • 🇺🇸 United States

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Job Level

Lead

Tech Stack

Amazon RedshiftAzureBigQueryCloudETLGoSQL

About the role

  • Building and scaling Toptal’s Data practice.
  • Strategy: Identify target clients, their data challenges, and the market opportunities we can address.
  • Offering Development: Build scalable, innovative data services and solutions (e.g., enterprise data architecture, analytics transformation programs, BI dashboards, data governance frameworks).
  • Go-to-Market: Launch offerings, establish product–market fit with early clients, and scale through enablement of the sales organization and close collaboration with practice operations.
  • Marketing & Thought Leadership: Develop campaigns and publish insights to promote our expertise in data analytics, attract top talent, and generate qualified leads.
  • Sales Support: Equip the salesforce with tools and training to sell data services effectively; personally lead strategic client conversations.
  • P&L Ownership: Manage financial performance with a focus on revenue growth and profitability.
  • Talent Network Development: Ensure our network has the right data talent — engineers, architects, analysts — to deliver on client needs.
  • This role is highly collaborative and will work extremely closely with Toptal’s Marketing, Sales, and Talent Operations teams to fulfill the above responsibilities.
  • Accomplish work objectives through leading and supervising other Toptal team members within the Data Practice.
  • Establish objectives and initiatives for the team, recommend the team’s structure and jobs, and organize, assign, delegate, oversee, and monitor work.
  • Coach and mentor team members, provide feedback, conduct performance reviews, and implement performance improvement plans, if needed. In the first week, expect to:
  • Onboard and integrate into Toptal; meet your colleagues.
  • Learn about Toptal’s history, culture, and vision, with a focus on the state of our industry, the Future of Work, and the core messages important to Toptal.
  • Shadow critical teams throughout the organization to learn Toptal’s core operations and capabilities. In the first month, expect to:
  • Begin developing relationships with key leaders and stakeholders across the organization.
  • Dive deeper into the operations of key teams (e.g., Sales, Talent Operations) across the company.
  • Conduct a comprehensive review of the current demand in your practice area, the talent that exists already in the network, and any work we may already be doing or have done.
  • Articulate a hypothesis about where you want to take the practice (strategy) and design experiments and build execution approaches to get there. In the first three months, expect to:
  • Be a well-integrated member of the organization with positive relationships in Sales (Enterprise and SMB), Marketing, and Talent Operations.
  • Be in front of clients on a regular basis to hear from them firsthand, while exercising discretion and independent judgment.
  • Understand market demand, assess Toptal’s current data capabilities, review Data Practice’s current offerings, and finalize the Data Practice strategy. Build pipeline momentum. In the first six months, expect to:
  • Be the go-to expert for your practice within Toptal.
  • Establish initial traction with client wins and thought leadership presence.
  • See a commercial impact from your involvement in early initiatives. In the first year, expect to:
  • Grow the Data practice into a recognized leader for enterprise-grade data solutions.
  • Feel like you made the best decision of your career.
  • Increase the growth rate of Toptal materially. Qualifications and Job Requirements:
  • Bachelor’s degree is required.
  • MBA a plus.
  • 15+ years of experience focusing on data & analytics, with 5+ in a leadership capacity.
  • Strong knowledge of data governance, architecture, engineering, BI tools, and analytics frameworks.
  • P&L management experience in a services organization.
  • Familiarity with SQL, ETL tools, cloud data platforms (Snowflake, Databricks, BigQuery, Azure Synapse, Redshift), and modern BI tools.
  • Proven experience in packaging/pricing enterprise data solutions.
  • Exceptional leadership, communication, and relationship-building skills.
  • Outstanding written and verbal communication skills.
  • Ability to work in a fast-paced, rapidly growing company and handle a wide variety of challenges, deadlines, and a diverse array of contacts.
  • You must be a world-class individual contributor to thrive at Toptal. You will not be here just to tell other people what to do. Essential Job Functions
  • Regularly and reliably attend scheduled virtual team meetings on camera.
  • Work independently with minimal supervision.
  • Use all required digital collaboration tools.
  • Prioritize and self-manage workflows and deadlines. US FLSA Classification: Full-Time/Exempt

Requirements

  • Bachelor’s degree is required.
  • MBA a plus.
  • 15+ years of experience focusing on data & analytics, with 5+ in a leadership capacity.
  • Strong knowledge of data governance, architecture, engineering, BI tools, and analytics frameworks.
  • P&L management experience in a services organization.
  • Familiarity with SQL, ETL tools, cloud data platforms (Snowflake, Databricks, BigQuery, Azure Synapse, Redshift), and modern BI tools.
  • Proven experience in packaging/pricing enterprise data solutions.
  • Exceptional leadership, communication, and relationship-building skills.
  • Outstanding written and verbal communication skills.
  • Ability to work in a fast-paced, rapidly growing company and handle a wide variety of challenges, deadlines, and a diverse array of contacts.
  • You must be a world-class individual contributor to thrive at Toptal. You will not be here just to tell other people what to do.