Principal Program Manager, Vendor Sales Growth & Excellence

Location: Bengaluru, KA, India
Department: Sales

Job Description

At LinkedIn, our approach to flexible work is centered on trust and optimized for culture, connection, clarity, and the evolving needs of our business. The work location of this role is hybrid, meaning it will be performed both from home and from a LinkedIn office on select days, as determined by the business needs of the team. 

The GTM Vendor Solutions team is searching for a Principal Program Manager to identify, create, and scale new vendor-supported sales opportunities across LinkedIn. This role will combine deep sales experience, business development, and program leadership to build new sales motions that generate measurable customer and business impact.

The Principal Program Manager will own vendor sales pilots from opportunity identification and business case development through launch, performance management, and scale recommendations. They will proactively build relationships across the company, identify business needs that could be addressed through vendor sales capabilities, and secure stakeholder support for new pilots.

The role will also serve as a Sales Excellence leader across the global vendor sales portfolio. They will establish scalable standards, share best practices, and advise Program Managers and business partners on sales performance, pipeline management, forecasting, and program design.

In addition to these horizontal responsibilities, the Principal Program Manager will directly manage at least one established vendor sales program. This will keep the role connected to seller, customer, partner, and operational realities while maintaining continuity across the existing portfolio.

Responsibilities: 

1. Vendor Sales Growth and Pilot Ownership

• Proactively identify and develop new opportunities where vendor sales teams can create incremental customer and business impact.
• Build relationships across Sales and cross-functional organizations to uncover unmet needs and originate new vendor-supported sales motions.
• Develop compelling pilot business cases, including customer opportunity, expected business impact, resource requirements, risks, and success measures.
• Own vendor sales pilots end to end, from initial concept and stakeholder alignment through design, launch, performance management, and final recommendation.
• Establish clear commercial and operational success criteria and maintain accountability for pilot performance.
• Use customer, seller, and performance insights to refine pilot strategy and execution.
• Recommend whether pilots should scale, iterate, or stop based on measurable evidence.
• Create repeatable frameworks that improve the speed, quality, and consistency of future pilot development.
• Help advance the team’s long-term ability to take greater accountability for vendor-driven sales outcomes.

2. Sales Excellence and Portfolio Leadership

• Serve as a horizontal Sales Excellence leader across the global vendor sales portfolio.
• Establish and champion standards for sales performance management, pipeline inspection, forecasting, governance, and vendor accountability.
• Identify effective practices across programs and translate them into scalable frameworks, tools, and operating rhythms.
• Advise Program Managers, Sales leaders, and cross-functional partners during program design, launch, and periods of performance risk.
• Diagnose systemic gaps and lead initiatives that improve execution across multiple vendor programs.
• Build greater consistency in how programs define, measure, report, and address performance.
• Strengthen knowledge sharing across the team so lessons and successful practices are applied beyond individual programs.
• Influence senior stakeholders and vendor leaders to align priorities, resolve barriers, and improve business outcomes.

3. Vendor Sales Program Leadership

• Maintain accountability for sales performance, operating health, vendor execution, and stakeholder alignment.
• Ensure vendor teams are appropriately staffed, enabled, governed, and measured against clear expectations.
• Lead performance reviews and ensure risks and gaps are addressed through clear corrective actions.
• Partner with Sales and cross-functional stakeholders to improve customer and business outcomes.
• Apply insights from direct program ownership to inform broader pilot and Sales Excellence strategies.

Qualifications

Basic Qualifications:

• 8+ years of experience in direct sales, business development, sales strategy, sales operations, management consulting, program management, or a related field.
• 1+ years of experience in vendor management and/or direct vendor partnership.
• Experience identifying and developing new sales or business opportunities.
• Experience building and launching new sales motions, pilots, or go-to-market programs.
• Experience using pipeline, forecasting, and performance data to manage sales outcomes.
• Experience influencing senior leaders and cross-functional stakeholders without direct authority.

Preferred Qualifications:

• 3+ years of experience in a quota-bearing sales, business development, or new-business role.
• Demonstrated ability to originate opportunities and convert ambiguous business needs into executable sales strategies.
• Strong commercial judgment and willingness to be accountable for measurable business outcomes.
• Experience building business cases using customer opportunity, revenue potential, cost, risk, and scalability considerations.
• Deep understanding of sales prospecting, pipeline development, forecasting, performance management, and seller execution.
• Experience operating in complex global or matrixed organizations.
• Experience managing vendor-supported or outsourced sales teams.
• Ability to operate strategically across a portfolio while remaining close to program execution.
• Strong executive communication, presentation, and storytelling skills.
• Demonstrated ability to build trusted relationships and influence stakeholders across organizational boundaries.
• Experience using Salesforce, Microsoft Dynamics, Tableau, or comparable CRM and analytics tools.
• Ability to use data to diagnose performance, prioritize interventions, and recommend action.
• Comfortable working through ambiguity and proactively creating structure, alignment, and momentum.
• Ability to travel domestically and internationally.

Suggested Skills:

• Business development
• Sales strategy
• New opportunity development
• Sales performance management
• Go-to-market strategy
• Program incubation and scaling
• Executive influence
• Vendor management

Additional Information

India Disability Policy 

LinkedIn is an equal employment opportunity employer offering opportunities to all job seekers, including individuals with disabilities. For more information on our equal opportunity policy, please visit https://legal.linkedin.com/content/dam/legal/Policy_India_EqualOppPWD_9-12-2023.pdf

Global Data Privacy Notice and Compliance Posters for Job Candidates 

Please use this link to access documents that provide information about how LinkedIn handles the personal data of employees and job applicants, as well as the E-Verify Participation Notice and the Department of Justice Immigrant and Employee Rights Section Right to Work posters: https://www.linkedin.com/legal/candidate-portal.

Company Description

LinkedIn is the world's largest professional network, built to create economic opportunity for every member of the global workforce. Our products help people make powerful connections, discover exciting opportunities, build necessary skills, and gain valuable insights every day. We're also committed to providing transformational opportunities for our own employees by investing in their growth. We aspire to create a culture that's built on trust, care, inclusion, and fun – where everyone can succeed.

Join us to transform the way the world works.