Head of Technical Innovation APAC

7-9 Years

SGD 18,000 - 21,000 per month

Posted 11 hours ago
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Job Description

Our Purpose
At Xero, weʼre here to make running a business beautiful. By making small business more efficient every day, connecting them with big business technology and empowering a community behind them, their potential is limitless. When that happens, weʼre not only helping small business, weʼll be building a stronger economy that can change the world.

How youʼll make an impact
The Head of Technical Innovation, is a critical role within Xero APAC, joining us at a pivotal phase in our journey. Reporting to the Regional Director and forming part of the APAC Leadership Team (ALT), you will be instrumental in ensuring the commercial success of our strategic and innovative Partner and Customer Dream Suite.

Owning the external product delivery space end to end, youʼll play a key role in deeply understanding our accounting partners and customers, using these insights to develop a clear product strategy and execution plan, aligned with our business strategy and operational priorities. Youʼll then manage external development partners and internal cross functional stakeholders to deliver products and functionality which our customers and partners will love. Leaving no stone unturned, youʼll ensure the success of every launch or release, with superior internal and customer documentation and enablement, so everyone understands the value proposition, and their role responsibilities in the plan for success.

You will have strong technical fluency, gaining a deep understanding of Xeroʼs APIs and internal product capabilities, harnessing AI and creating prototypes/POC, youʼll identify and engage external development partners to work with Xeroʼs technology stack. Your mission will be to deliver product features and functionality that solve real problems and create meaningful value for our partners and customers, across APAC.

This is a highly collaborative role where you will work in lockstep with the Regional Director, the ALT, and our appointed development partners to design, build, and deliver a commercially viable, beautiful practice and customer experience. Youʼll bring to life a roadmap that reflects both market opportunity and partner/customer need, often driven by regulatory tailwinds and government initiatives, ensuring we deliver on our 12-month performance objectives from a product perspective and remain competitive in market.

Youʼll be an authentic, individual contributor with a leadership mindset, someone who loves working with people, thrives in cross-functional environments, and is passionate about achieving results by empowering and aligning talented experts from across the business.

What youʼll do

. Identify the most impactful, innovative, and commercially viable solutions for accounting practices and small businesses, prioritising those with strong alignment to regional needs and Xeroʼs strategic direction.

. Collaborate with strategic development and ecosystem partners, to design, build, and deliver a commercially viable, beautiful experience for accounting partners and customers, across APAC.

. Maintain deep knowledge of Xeroʼs APIs and stay across their ongoing evolution, ensuring partner and customer solutions are built with technical alignment and future scalability in mind.

. Build clear, data-led insights, prototypes and POCʼs, to inspire and inform cross-functional teams responsible for execution, customer enablement, and go-to-market success.

. Develop compelling business cases that support investment decisions, guide delivery, and include measurable goals and KPIs.

. Play a key role in shaping regional product and partner strategy by contributing market intelligence, customer needs, and commercial considerations.

. Maintain and regularly update a comprehensive competitive landscape overview for practice tools and small business solutions across APAC.

. Provide regular technical updates, app insights, and development progress to internal teams including Sales, Education, Consulting, Partnerships and Marketing, to ensure alignment and readiness.

. Prepare and update all internal product and customer documentation, to ensure all functions are adequately enabled to go to market with developed products and functionality.

Success looks like
. Building, maintaining, and managing a comprehensive roadmap for the development of the Practice Dream Suite for accounting partners, and product suite for SME customers, across APAC.

. Finding, engaging, managing and growing relationships with strategic development partners, to deliver high-impact, regionally relevant solutions.
. Leading the design, execution, and analysis of pilot and trial programs for practice and customer-facing features, functionality and tools.

. Developing prototypes and POCʼs to support internal Xero functions and external contractors with their role.

. Keeping an eye on changes to tax, compliance, and accounting legislation across APACʼs primary, secondary and tertiary markets, with a focus on impact to product and customers, and keeping relevant stakeholders informed.

. Clearly articulating market dynamics, target segments, and the propositions required to win in each market.

. Establishing a robust, data-driven fact base to support product performance measurement, prioritisation, and forecasting.

. End-to-end ownership of business-critical initiatives, such as new product launches, with full delivery against business case targets, documentation and close collaboration with enabling and supporting functions.

. Earning a reputation as a trusted, collaborative partner internally, who builds strong relationships and consistently gets things done.

What youʼll bring with you
Critical competencies
. Strong understanding of international and APAC tax and accounting legislation, or the ability to get across it quickly

. Advanced research skills with the ability to translate insights into action

. Clear communicator of complex technical concepts to a range of stakeholders

. Deep, practical knowledge of accounting practice workflows and operations

. Solid understanding of Xeroʼs ecosystem and the broader APAC tech landscape

. Commercially savvy with a sharp eye for viable, scalable opportunities

. Working knowledge of APIs and integration technologies

. Excellent written and verbal communication and presentation skills

. Skilled at influencing without authority and driving alignment

. Strong business acumen with a practical, customer-first mindset

Experience
. Experience working in a senior role in an accounting firm or SME

. Extensive knowledge of Xero products and apps

. 7 years experience with compliance related activity