Sr Manager - Innovations

As a part of Tata Communications" Product Management And Development team under the Start-up Sandbox Initiative, you will be responsible for defining and maintaining the Inno8Cube sandbox environment. This includes establishing clear onboarding processes, evaluation criteria, and success metrics to ensure the smooth functioning of the sandbox environment. Your role will involve collaborating with internal product and technology teams to prioritize and execute pilot projects that align with broader product roadmaps. You will also be facilitating seamless integration for participating startups by managing technical hand-offs, aligning business models, and ensuring effective stakeholder communication. Capturing insights from pilots and platform users will be essential in driving continuous improvements to the sandbox framework and API/services portfolio. Additionally, you will co-create use cases in collaboration with customers and validate them through demos and proof-of-concepts (POCs). In the domain of Corporate Foresight, you will be expected to research emerging and disruptive technologies, develop concise data-driven Points of View, and identify high-potential use cases. Presenting recommendations to senior leadership and ensuring technology adoption aligns with Tata Communications" overall strategy will be a key aspect of your role. You will also lead end-to-end proof-of-concepts, define scopes, partner with business teams, develop rollout plans, and quantify outcomes to inform scale-up decisions. Your responsibilities will extend to Business Case Development & Strategy Execution, where you will track actual performance versus forecasts and recommend corrective actions. Supporting senior management with scenario analyses, market white-space identification, and strategic decision frameworks will be crucial. You will drive cross-functional corporate-strategy projects, balancing tactical needs with long-term goals. To excel in this role, you should be comfortable navigating ambiguity, self-starting, and leading through uncertainty. Being a structured problem solver who can break down complex challenges, prioritize effectively, and propose creative, data-backed solutions is essential. Cross-functional fluency across finance, marketing, product, sales, legal, and operations will be beneficial. Clear communication skills to articulate ideas succinctly in presentations, reports, and stakeholder discussions are key. Collaborative teamwork, building trust, fostering non-hierarchical collaboration, and conflict resolution are also important aspects of this role. An ideal candidate for this position would hold an MBA with an engineering background and have good exposure to technology with a knack for problem-solving. Prior experience in Product management or consulting/strategy roles, while not mandatory, would be considered a value add.,