Director, Corporate Strategy

Company

Compensation

Summary

The Director, Corporate Strategy, leads high-visibility strategy projects that help Cox Automotive and its business groups make better decisions about where to play, how to win, and what to do. This role partners with senior leaders to address complex, often ambiguous business questions, evaluate growth opportunities, and translate insights into clear strategic choices and executable recommendations.

Working across the Cox Automotive portfolio, the Director will support priority initiatives that extend beyond business as usual, including special projects in dealer software, consumer marketplaces, inventory & logistics solutions, and artificial intelligence. The role requires strong strategic judgment, moderate-to-advanced quantitative analysis, and the ability to lead cross-functional work through influence rather than direct authority. Priorities may shift quickly, so success requires adaptability, disciplined project leadership, and confidence operating with incomplete information.

What makes this role distinctive: You will own the strategic response to the organization’s most important emerging questions and lead visible, cross-functional initiatives from problem definition through recommendation and action planning.

Core Responsibilities

Enterprise and Business Strategy

• Lead high-visibility special projects across Cox Automotive, with an initial emphasis on dealer software, consumer marketplaces, inventory & logistics solutions, artificial intelligence, and other emerging enterprise priorities.

• Frame ambiguous business questions, define the strategic problem to solve, and establish the scope, workplan, success measures, and decision points for each engagement.

• Lead strategic assessments for Cox Automotive and its business groups using market, customer, competitor, portfolio, and profit-pool perspectives.

• Develop clear recommendations on where to play, how to win, and what to do, balancing enterprise-wide priorities with the needs of individual business groups.

• Help lead the strategic planning process across solution groups, connecting external market dynamics and internal capabilities to risks, opportunities, and strategic choices.

Growth, Portfolio, and Go-to-Market Strategy

• Evaluate growth opportunities and potential adjacencies, including whether a new market, capability, or business opportunity fits Cox Automotive’s strategy and portfolio.

• Assess the strategic rationale and portfolio fit of potential acquisitions or investments, while partnering with the appropriate teams on any formal due diligence.

• Develop strategies that position Cox Automotive to go to market more cohesively across businesses and reduce siloed approaches.

• Shape portfolio and go-to-market recommendations for new capabilities or companies, including how they complement the existing portfolio and create value across solution groups.

• Partner with business leaders to redefine or evolve established offerings in response to technology, customer, competitive, and industry change.

Analysis and Insight Development

• Use hypothesis-driven analysis to rapidly form perspectives, prioritize the most important questions, and identify the work required to reach a decision.

• Conduct quantitative and qualitative analysis using internal data, market research, strategic frameworks, and financial models.

• Build driver-based financial models and sensitivity analyses to evaluate strategic options, test critical assumptions, and clarify potential outcomes.

• Identify root causes, key drivers, dependencies, and risks, then synthesize complex findings into actionable insights and executive-ready recommendations.

• Exercise sound judgment and move work forward when data is incomplete, while clearly communicating assumptions and areas of uncertainty.

Project Leadership and Influence

• Lead multiple cross-functional strategy projects simultaneously, adjusting priorities as business needs and executive questions evolve.

• Partner with senior leaders, general managers, operational vice presidents, and functional teams as a trusted strategic advisor and thought partner.

• Influence stakeholders without direct authority, build alignment across different perspectives, and guide teams toward clear decisions and next steps.

• Represent the strategy team independently in senior-level business and staff meetings, presenting recommendations with credibility and responding effectively to challenge.

• Develop concise, compelling presentations and narratives that translate analysis into implications, choices, and action plans for executive audiences.

• Build and sustain effective relationships across the organization to accelerate collaboration, decision-making, and strategic execution.

Qualifications

• BA/BS Degree required with 10+ years of relevant strategic planning and/or management consulting experience required. Candidate can also have an MS degree and 8+ years of experience or 14+ years of experience in lieu of a degree.

• Strategic Planning and/or management consulting experience required.

• Automotive industry experience preferred.

• Strong analytical, modeling, and research skills. Excellent organization and project management skills. Concise and clear verbal and written communication skills.

• Comfort challenging, in a respectful manner, perspectives using both analysis and judgement.

• Utilize critical thinking to make recommendations and articulate next steps in ambiguous or emerging opportunities.

• Ability to establish credibility as an internal thought leader on strategic and business issues.

• Ability to work cross-functionally and collaboratively.

• Ability to interact with leadership at all levels of the organization.

• Ability to interpret complex data and distill it into concise relevant documents and presentations for an executive audience.

• Ability to think strategically, abstractly, in broad concepts and terms and apply to tangible business plans.

• Passion for storytelling, developing concepts for fresh ideas, and translating market insights into compelling pitches.

• Ability to thrive in a fast-paced growth-company environment (sense of urgency, adaptable, champion of change).

• Proficient in MS Office including Word, Excel, PowerPoint.

• Travel as needed (<20%).