Director, Brand Strategy

Location: Hybrid or office-based, London, United Kingdom

Position Summary:

Key leadership role within the business, responsible for setting and executing the strategic direction of the Bentley Systems brand for its next stage of growth. This role will be integral in developing the Bentley System’s evolved brand identity, brand hub, governance model, and brand-led marcomms across all touchpoints, but also crucial in elevating the role and importance of brand across the wider organisation.

This role will essentially act as the ‘glue’ in driving Bentley Systems to become ‘one’ brand, overseeing all key workstreams and ensuring alignment across stakeholders.

Responsibilities:

• Set and execute the strategic direction of the Bentley Systems brand for its next stage of growth
• Work in partnership with the Executive Creative Director to develop, activate and govern the Bentley Systems brand
• Line manage, mentor and develop direct reports within the design team
• Help select, oversee and build the ‘right’ roster of agency relationships for the Bentley Systems brand
• Act as an advocate for the Bentley Systems brand across all stakeholders
• Strategic brand platform
  • Continue leading the development of the Bentley System’s strategic brand platform (Vision, Purpose, Positioning, Proof Points, Personality)
  • Facilitate and ensure alignment across Bentley System’s leadership team through whatever means necessary (e.g. additional collaborative workshops, additional playbacks, additional iterations, employee-wide survey)
  • Facilitate and ensure alignment across the strategic brand platform and existing projects (e.g. Product architecture, messaging platform, narrative, storytelling framework / initiatives / content themes) through further immersion and stakeholder engagement.
• Verbal brand identity
  • Develop the brand’s verbal identity (with selected copywriter), first addressing the TOV and corporate brand messaging
  • Translate that TOV and messaging across all touchpoints, first addressing Bentley Systems key website pages as its ‘shop window’ for customers, talent, and investors
  • Help rework existing projects and frameworks (e.g. messaging platform, narrative) for alignment, consistency and impact
  • Develop a messaging matrix across key audiences and agreed upon segmentation
• Visual brand identity
  • Work in partnership with the Executive Creative Director to evolve the brand’s visual identity based on the final strategic brand platform, first exploring high level visual concepts and then translating the final route across applications
  • Help sell in the new visual identity and ‘kit of parts’ to the leadership team, showing how it connects and drives the brand strategy forward
  • Develop the high-level design principles with the design team to guide the overall visual expression
  • Develop more detailed principles for key assets (e.g. photography, motion, etc)
  • Develop a central hub for all design assets and guidance
  • Establish a brand governance framework, utilising AI to quickly address questions and point colleagues in the right direction for guidance
• Marketing Communications
  • Work alongside the CMO and marketing teams to ensure marketing communications, activations and storytelling initiatives are ‘on-brand’
  • Develop brand-led campaigns to raise the awareness of Bentley Systems, emphasising key thought leadership pillars / content themes
  • Develop brand-led event messaging and collateral with the marketing and design teams
• Engagement
  • Launch and embed the evolved Bentley System’s brand across the wider organisation through three key stages:
    • ‘Get it’ (I understand the power of brand and how it can help us succeed)
    • ‘Own it’ (I’m an advocate for it and feel confident in explaining it)
    • ‘Use it’ (I can use it with my teams and clients as a business tool)
  • Work with the design team to develop key tactics and assets for each stage, bringing in additional resource / agency partners when necessary
• Architecture
  • Oversee the existing brand architecture project, ensuring it aligns with the corporate brand strategy and strategic ambitions of the business
  • Develop a ‘branded house’ / ‘becoming one’ migration plan for all products, working in collaboration with product leads and sales teams
  • Develop naming + nomenclature rules across products, services, features, NPD
  • Develop benefit-led product propositions and corresponding marketing / sales collateral
  • Develop elevator pitches across all Bentley products, laddering up and down from the corporate narrative
  • Facilitate training across sales teams, raising the importance of both corporate and product brands
• Employer brand
  • Strengthen and build Bentley Systems employer brand, ensuring greater awareness, attraction and retention
  • Collaborate with the Chief People Officer to establish a compelling EVP (Employee Value Proposition) born out of the corporate brand’s central idea and strategic brand platform
  • Facilitate, rework and ensure alignment across other key people initiatives (e.g. MAP)

Qualifications:

• At least 10+ years in brand strategy, with experience at an equivalent leadership level.
• A proven track record of leading a major brand evolution or transformation for a complex organization.
• Deep, hands-on experience with brand and product architecture projects, specifically managing a migration to a "Branded House" model.
• Experience overseeing the development of both verbal (Tone of Voice, Messaging) and visual identity systems.
• Extensive experience presenting to, collaborating with, and gaining alignment from executive leadership (C-Suite).
• Demonstrated success in launching a new or evolved brand internally to drive company-wide adoption and advocacy.
• Experience collaborating with HR/People teams to develop and launch a compelling Employee Value Proposition (EVP).
• Experience in line management, mentoring direct reports, and managing a roster of external agency partners.
• Strategic & Leadership Skills
  • Ability to set the high-level strategic vision for a global brand.
  • Exceptional influencing and presentation skills to gain buy-in from executives and stakeholders.
  • Adept at cross-functional collaboration, acting as the central "glue" between Marketing, Product, Sales, and HR.
  • Strong change management skills to embed a new brand identity and mindset across the organization.
• Technical & Functional Skills
  • Expertise in facilitating workshops to develop strategic brand platforms (e.g., positioning, purpose, personality).
  • Strong ability to develop corporate narratives and messaging matrices for various audiences.
  • A strong eye for design and the ability to partner effectively with creative leaders on visual identity.
  • Excellent project management skills to oversee numerous complex workstreams simultaneously.
  • Proficiency with Figma, Microsoft Suite, and ClickUp is required.

What We Offer:

• A great Team and culture – please see our colleague video. 
• An exciting career as an integral part of a world-leading software company providing solutions for architecture, engineering, and construction - watch this short documentary about how we got our start. 
• An attractive salary and benefits package. 
• A commitment to inclusion, belonging and colleague wellbeing through global initiatives and resource groups. 
• A company committed to making a real difference by advancing the world’s infrastructure for better quality of life, where your contributions help build a more sustainable, connected, and resilient world. Discover our latest user success stories for an insight into our global impact. 

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About Bentley Systems

Around the world, infrastructure professionals rely on software from Bentley Systems to help them design, build, and operate better and more resilient infrastructure for transportation, water, energy, cities, and more. Founded in 1984 by engineers for engineers, Bentley is the partner of choice for engineering firms and owner-operators worldwide, with software that spans engineering disciplines, industry sectors, and all phases of the infrastructure lifecycle. Through our digital twin solutions, we help infrastructure professionals unlock the value of their data to transform project delivery and asset performance. www.bentley.com 

Equal Opportunity Employer:

Bentley is proud to be an equal opportunity employer and considers for employment all qualified applicants without regard to race, color, gender/gender identity, sexual orientation, disability, marital status, religion/belief, national origin, caste, age, or any other characteristic protected by local law or unrelated to job qualifications.