Senior Strategic Business Advisor
About Ellucian Ellucian powers innovation for higher education, partnering with approximately 3,000 customers across 50 countries, serving more than 21 million students. Ellucian's AI-powered platform, trained on the richest dataset available in higher education, drives efficiency, personalized experiences, and strengthened engagement for all students, faculty and staff. Fueled by decades of experience with a singular focus on the unique needs of learning institutions, the Ellucian platform features best-in-class SaaS capabilities and delivers insights needed now and into the future. These solutions and services span the entire student lifecycle, including data-rich tools for student recruitment, enrollment, and retention to workforce analytics, fundraising, and alumni engagement. Ellucian's innovative solutions, vast ecosystem of partners and user community of more than 45,000 provides best practices leading to greater institutional success and achieving better student outcomes. About the Opportunity At Ellucian, we’re transforming how higher education experiences technology, helping universities and colleges realise the full value of modernisation. As a Strategic Business Advisor (SBA) within the Solutions Sales Organisation, you will serve as a trusted advisor to higher education institutions across the UK, helping them translate strategic priorities into measurable business outcomes enabled by Ellucian’s SaaS and AI solutions. This is not a traditional presales role. It is a strategic, consultative role focused on connecting institutional ambition to operational and financial impact. You will help institutions define their transformation priorities, build the case for change, and articulate the value of modern technology in ways that resonate with executive and operational stakeholders. Working as part of a cross-functional team alongside Account Executives, Solutions Consultants, and Platform Architects, you will shape pursuit strategy, craft compelling value narratives, and help position Ellucian as a long-term strategic partner to the sector. Where You’ll Make an Impact Lead executive discovery conversations with institutional stakeholders to understand strategic priorities, sector pressures, operational challenges, and investment goals, translating these into measurable business outcomes. Develop value frameworks, business cases, and ROI models that help institutions quantify the impact of SaaS modernisation, process improvement, and AI-enabled innovation. Partner across roles to align Ellucian’s solutions with institutional priorities, ensuring conversations focus on outcomes, transformation, and long-term value rather than product features alone. Shape compelling narratives for executive audiences that connect technology investment to student experience, institutional agility, operational efficiency, and better decision-making. Support opportunity strategy with Account Executives, including qualification, tender support, executive presentation preparation, and customer-facing strategy sessions. Bring together commercial, strategic, and sector insight to help institutions navigate complex change programmes and build confidence in their transformation roadmap. Act as the voice of the customer by capturing market and institutional insight from the UK sector and feeding it back into Ellucian’s product, messaging, and services strategies. Represent Ellucian externally through sector events, conferences, customer forums, and regional user communities, helping position Ellucian as a thought partner in higher education transformation and value realisation. What You Will Bring Proven consultative sales or solution experience (7+ years) within enterprise SaaS, professional services, or higher education transformation. Strong understanding of higher education business operations, with knowledge of areas such as admissions, student records, enrolment, finance, HR/payroll, and alumni or advancement. Experience building ROI models, business cases, or value realisation frameworks for senior stakeholders and executive decision-makers. Strong communication and storytelling skills, with the ability to engage senior leaders such as Vice-Chancellors, Pro Vice-Chancellors, Registrars, Finance Directors, and CIOs. Ability to work effectively in cross-functional teams, bringing together strategic, commercial, business, and technical perspectives. Confidence discussing data, automation, and AI concepts, and translating technical capabilities into practical institutional impact. Experience navigating complex buying cycles, procurement processes, and multi-stakeholder decision-making environments. A genuine passion for education, innovation, and helping institutions deliver on their mission. What makes #Ellucianlife 25 days annual leave plus 8 public holidays Choice to opt in for private Medical and Dental cover. Competitive pension plan. Thrive Flex Lifestyle Account (LSA) that allows you to contribute towards your health, financial or learning interests 5 charitable days to support the community that supports us Wellness:Headspace (mental health) Wellbeats (virtual fitness classes) RethinkCare – caregiver support Diversity and inclusion programs that promote employee resource groups such as: Women in Technology, Pride and Go Green to name a few. Parental leave covering Maternity, Paternity and Adoption. Employee referral bonuses to encourage the addition of great new people to the team We Foster a learning culture with:Educational Assistance Program Professional development opportunities LinkedIn Learning #LI-CL1 #LI-REMOTE Apply To This Job