Engagement Manager

Senior Professional Services, Engagement Manager - - MEA, Dubai

An overview of this role

As a Senior Professional Services Engagement Manager focused on the Middle East and Africa, you will play a critical role in driving GitLab’s growth in the region by structuring services engagements that create true partnership and shared success with our customers. You will lead efforts to design, position, and close outcome-oriented professional services engagements that translate complex DevSecOps and digital transformation initiatives into clear, measurable mission-critical outcomes. 

Reporting to the Senior Manager of Engagement Management, EMEA, you will work at the intersection of technical solutioning and customer requirements, aligning each engagement to their unique needs and objectives.  In your first year, you will build trusted advisor relationships with technical leaders and partners to help integrate professional services into account strategies from early discovery through successful delivery. This is a unique opportunity to shape large-scale implementations that improve how customers plan, build, secure, and operate software using GitLab.

Some examples of our projects

• Designing and structuring outcome-based professional services engagements that align GitLab capabilities to customers needs
• Partnering with account executives, solutions architects, and delivery leaders to turn complex DevSecOps transformations into clear, actionable implementation roadmaps and statements of work

What you'll do

• Build trusted advisor relationships with division chiefs, program managers, and technical leaders 
• Conduct discovery sessions with with prospects and Systems Integrators to understand current-state capabilities, requirements and desired business outcomes
• Design outcome-oriented services proposals that align GitLab capabilities with customer success metrics and objectives
• Structure engagements and commercial proposals to clear outcomes maintaining flexibility for staff augmentation and packaged offerings when needed
• Develop custom-scoped SOWs and staffing plans for complex implementations, engaging with technical architects and delivery leadership to ensure deliverability
• Articulate GitLab's services value proposition, catalog offerings, and implementation methodologies in the context of customer requirements 
• Gain agreement on scope and price while guiding customers through commercial terms, procurement processes, and contracting structures
• Manage project- and account-level escalations, ensuring rapid resolution and maintaining customer confidence
• Position consulting, training, success tiers, and additional solutions proactively to ensure successful outcomes and long-term customer retention
• Facilitate solutioning sessions including implementation roadmapping, enterprise strategy discussions, and executive-level requirements gathering
• Drive measurable outcomes by structuring services that support customer success metrics, accurately forecasting services bookings, and tracking key performance indicators related to bookings, margin, and attachment to strategic opportunities.
• Own the engagement lifecycle from initial discovery and pre-sales solutioning through scoping, SOW development, staffing alignment, and transition to delivery, ensuring engagements are deliverable, clearly defined, and outcome-oriented.
• Influence cross-functional teams by articulating GitLab’s professional services value proposition in the context of federal requirements and compliance frameworks, and by feeding customer insights back into sales, delivery, and practice management.
• Partner with regional sales and engagement leadership to prioritize and manage services opportunities that support critical deals and strategic initiatives, providing clear recommendations on risk management, negotiation strategies, and commercial structures.
• Foster a culture of enablement and continuous improvement by training field teams on how to position and sell professional services by sharing trends, feedback, and suggestions that improve go-to-market content and operational processes.

What you'll bring

• Demonstrated progressive experience structuring, scoping, and selling professional services engagements in the region
• Proven success operating in a pre-sales context, conducting discovery, designing outcome-oriented proposals, and developing custom statements of work (SOWs) and staffing plans for large, complex implementation projects.
• Solid understanding of software development lifecycle (SDLC), DevOps practices, and cloud transformation initiatives, with the ability to connect technical solutions to mission objectives and measurable business outcomes.
• Effective communication and interpersonal skills with executive presence, able to build trusted advisor relationships with division chiefs, program managers, contracting stakeholders, and senior technical leaders.
• Highly developed facilitation, negotiation, and problem-solving skills, including the ability to guide customers through acquisition processes, commercial structures, and risk mitigation strategies.
• Comfort working cross-functionally with sales, solutions architecture, delivery, and operations teams to align on deal strategy, staffing, and successful execution in a fast-paced environment.
• Capacity to work autonomously and asynchronously in a fully remote setting, managing multiple complex opportunities while maintaining accurate forecasting and consistent alignment with GitLab values and goals.

The Professional Services Engagement Management team at GitLab is dedicated to designing and structuring services engagements that set our customers up for successful, long-term adoption of our DevSecOps platform. We build and manage strategic relationships with customers to understand their goals, surface their services needs, and translate complex transformation initiatives into clear, outcome-oriented engagement plans. Composed of experienced services, consulting, and delivery professionals distributed across multiple regions, we operate asynchronously to support field teams, shape implementation strategies, and guide customers through their services journey. We focus on creating scalable engagement models, fostering open communication with internal stakeholders, and adapting our services offerings to the evolving needs of a rapidly maturing organization and its customers. For more on how our team works, see the Professional Services Engagement Management handbook page.