Role Purpose

The Head, Technology Solutions is accountable for MCL’s technical strategy, solution architecture, presales quality, delivery assurance, service reliability and technical talent across Communication & Connectivity, Data Centre Infrastructure, Cybersecurity and Managed Services. Reporting to the Group Chief Operating Officer, the role must combine deep technical credibility with commercial judgement, disciplined operational leadership and the ability to build an enduring technical institution.

The mandate is to ensure that MCL wins the right opportunities with solutions that are differentiated, implementable, cost-accurate, secure and supportable—and then delivers those commitments to scope, time, quality, margin and service-level expectations. The role is expected to raise presales conversion, standardise reusable architectures, improve OEM technical leverage and build a stronger technical leadership bench.

Key Accountabilities

1. Technology Strategy and Portfolio Architecture

• Define MCL’s technical direction. Maintain a practical 24-month roadmap across networking, collaboration, data-centre infrastructure, cybersecurity, hybrid cloud and managed services.
• Create reusable architectures. Establish reference designs, standards, bills of material, assumptions, implementation patterns and quality checklists for priority offerings.
• Modernise the portfolio. Integrate automation, observability, SASE, zero-trust, cloud/hybrid patterns and secure-by-design principles where commercially relevant.
• Guide investment choices. Recommend which capabilities, labs, certifications and partnerships MCL should build, buy or partner for, based on market demand and expected return.

2. Presales Leadership and Solution Governance

• Own presales operating discipline. Set intake, prioritisation, qualification, design-review, costing and approval standards for material opportunities.
• Improve conversion. Lead or sponsor solution shaping for strategic pursuits and work with Sales to raise qualified-opportunity win rates toward 35–40%.
• Ensure implementability. Validate architecture, scope, effort, skills, timelines, dependencies, acceptance criteria, support model and transition requirements before commitment.
• Improve proposal quality. Ensure SOWs, solution narratives, compliance matrices, assumptions, exclusions and deliverables are clear and internally consistent.

3. Margin Engineering and Cost Accuracy

• Protect solution economics. Engineer solutions to achieve the approved gross-margin threshold through design optimisation, reusable assets, skills planning and OEM leverage.
• Validate total cost. Ensure BOMs and estimates capture licences, support, freight, taxes, exchange exposure, subcontractors, travel, implementation effort, warranty and lifecycle obligations.
• Control scope risk. Identify ambiguity, change exposure, integration risk and hidden delivery dependencies before pricing and contracting.
• Support deal governance. Provide an explicit technical risk rating and recommendation for major bids and exceptions.

4. Delivery Assurance and Programme Oversight

• Set delivery standards. Establish project quality gates from solution handover through design, implementation, testing, acceptance, documentation and support transition.
• Oversee strategic programmes. Sponsor complex, multi-site or high-risk engagements and intervene early when milestones, scope, cost or customer confidence are threatened.
• Strengthen handover. Ensure complete transfer of commercial and technical commitments to project and service teams before mobilisation.
• Drive lessons learned. Convert project outcomes, defects and customer feedback into improved architectures, estimates, runbooks and delivery methods.

5. Managed Services, ITSM and Service Reliability

• Own service-quality architecture. Define service catalogues, SLAs/OLAs, support models, escalation paths, capacity plans and service reporting standards.
• Mature ITSM practices. Improve incident, problem, change, configuration, knowledge and continual-improvement processes using pragmatic ITIL principles.
• Lead major-incident governance. Ensure timely technical command, stakeholder communication, root-cause analysis and corrective action for severity 1 and 2 incidents.
• Increase recurring value. Work with Sales and Operations to productise support and managed services that are repeatable, measurable and profitable.

6. Customer Advisory and Executive Thought Leadership

• Act as trusted technical adviser. Engage customer CIOs, CTOs, CISOs and infrastructure leaders on roadmaps, architecture choices, risk and investment priorities.
• Translate business needs. Connect business outcomes, operational constraints and regulatory requirements to practical technology decisions.
• Strengthen market credibility. Lead executive briefings, technical workshops, solution showcases and selected thought-leadership activities.
• Support customer recovery. Provide senior technical leadership where solution, delivery or service issues threaten strategic relationships.

7. OEM Technical Leadership

• Lead technical partner strategy. Own solution alignment, competency roadmaps, escalation channels and joint technical initiatives with priority OEMs.
• Improve technical leverage. Use OEM architects, labs, proofs of concept, competitive support and specialisation programmes to strengthen pursuits and delivery.
• Maintain partner readiness. Ensure certifications and specialisations required for market access, rebates and delivery credibility are achieved and sustained.
• Resolve escalations. Lead technical engagement with OEMs on product defects, interoperability, support and architecture exceptions.

8. Technology Organisation and Capability

• Build a strong leadership bench. Clarify accountabilities across Practice Leads, Architects, Presales Engineers, Delivery Leads and Service Leads.
• Develop critical skills. Create role-based capability plans, certification pathways, mentoring, succession and practical knowledge-sharing.
• Optimise capacity. Maintain visibility of skills, utilisation, workload, subcontractor dependence and upcoming demand.
• Set performance standards. Use measurable technical, delivery, customer and people KPIs; recognise strong performance and address gaps promptly.

9. Governance, Security and Risk

• Embed security and compliance. Ensure solutions meet contractual, regulatory, data-protection, resilience and customer control requirements.
• Maintain technical documentation. Set standards for architecture records, as-built documentation, configurations, runbooks, asset information, DR/BCP and knowledge artefacts.
• Manage technical risk. Maintain a visible register of material architecture, delivery, service and lifecycle risks with owners and remediation dates.
• Support audit and governance. Provide evidence and corrective action for technical, service and partner-compliance reviews.

10. Executive Collaboration and Reporting

• Partner with the GCOO. Translate MCL’s operating strategy into clear technology, delivery and capability priorities; provide transparent performance information, challenge unimplementable commitments and escalate material technical or service risks early.
• Partner with the Head of Sales. Shape strategic pursuits, agree presales priorities and ensure commitments remain both competitive and executable.
• Partner with the GCFO and Supply Chain. Improve cost accuracy, margin, vendor terms, asset planning and investment decisions.
• Represent Technology. Provide concise EMT and Board-level reporting on presales, delivery, service quality, capability, OEM status and material risk.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering or a related discipline; MSc, MBA or equivalent executive education is advantageous.
• Minimum 12 years’ experience delivering enterprise technology solutions, including at least five years in a senior technology, architecture, presales or delivery leadership role.
• Deep practical experience across at least two of MCL’s core domains—enterprise networking and collaboration, data-centre infrastructure, cybersecurity and managed services—with sufficient breadth to govern the full portfolio.
• Demonstrable leadership of architects, presales engineers, delivery leads and technical teams on complex multi-site enterprise programmes.
• Strong managed-services, ITSM/ITIL, SLA and major-incident experience.
• Credible C-level customer advisory experience and the ability to translate business requirements into technology roadmaps and executable designs.
• Strong OEM technical engagement with vendors such as Cisco, Fortinet, HPE, Huawei, Nutanix, Microsoft, VMware/Broadcom, NetApp or equivalent ecosystems.
• Relevant advanced certifications—such as CCIE/CCNP, Fortinet FCP/FCSS, CISSP, ITIL, cloud, virtualisation, storage or data-centre credentials—are strongly preferred; certification mix should reflect the candidate’s principal domains.