What are the 10 Highest-Paying Strategy Jobs for Career Growth

Many modern businesses are struggling to navigate increased business uncertainty and complexity. However, leading organizations are leveraging this uncertainty to create new business avenues through strategic planning and implementation. Therefore, strategy is one of the highest-paying careers across different industries. Therefore, if you want to build a career in strategy or business management, read this blog to discover the highest-paying jobs in strategy and the skills and experience required for such jobs.

What are the Top 10 Highest-Paying Jobs in Strategy?

1. Chief Strategy Officer (CSO)

First on the list is the role of CSO. It is one of the highest-paying jobs in strategy in large companies or multinational corporations. This is a leadership role that involves building corporate vision and strategy for an organization, communicating it, and executing it in alignment with an organization’s overall goals.

Responsibilities

• Identify competitive advantages and growth opportunities for an organization
• Focus on strategic planning as well as implementation
• Oversee strategic alliances and business development
• Also lead innovation programs within an organization

Skills and Experience

• Innovation and planning
• Strategic partnership
• Change management
• Risk management 

This role requires 10+ years of experience in business strategy or similar roles.

Average Salary

As befits the position, the top strategy job salaries for a chief strategy officer in the US are in the upper reaches—$194,981 on average.

ALSO READ: What is Business Strategy – Definition, Importance and Levels

2. Director of Strategy

Next in line is a strategy director. This is the senior-most position after CSO and has almost similar functions as a CSO. Their primary responsibility is to lead market research, analyze trends, and identify growth opportunities as well.

Responsibilities

• Manage overall development and execution of corporate strategies for an organization 
• Build solutions and frameworks to improve strategy outcomes
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams to not only understand their challenges but align objectives as well
• Define Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) to measure strategy performance

Skills and Experience

• Strategic planning and thinking
• Business consulting
• Business development
• Project management 

This role requires eight or more years of experience in strategy planning and management.

Average Salary

A director of strategy and planning earns an $140,084 annual average salary.

3. Senior Strategy Manager

This is one of the highest-paying strategy career opportunities for mid-level professionals. Furthermore, their role involves planning and implementing business strategies for various functions or departments within an organization such as human resources or finance.

Responsibilities

• Strategic planning and execution by understanding department-wise performance and goals
• Identify potential business threats and find solutions to mitigate them
• Oversee various projects and assist CSOs or directors in decision-making
• Ensure operational efficiency by collaborating with various stakeholders 

Skills and Experience

• Project management
• Business strategy development
• Change management 
• Risk management 

This role usually requires five to six years of experience in strategy planning and business growth or similar functions.

Average Salary

The average salary of a senior strategy manager is $130,303 per year.

ALSO READ: What is Strategy? Choose the Best Approach for Business Growth

4. Corporate Strategist

It is crucial for organizations to build a long-term competitive advantage or strategy to succeed in a complex market. Therefore, corporate strategy has become one of the indispensable jobs in strategy for organizations focusing on innovation and sustainable growth.

Responsibilities

• Understand business objectives and prepare and execute expansion plans accordingly
• Build long-term strategies for sustainable business growth
• Align stakeholders’ objectives and operations toward overall business goals
• Research market trends to assess the organization’s position in the industry with respect to its competitors

Skills and Experience

• Competitor analysis
• Market research
• Operations management
• Business or management consulting 

A corporate strategy job requires six to eight years of experience in business management or business growth roles.

Average Salary

Top strategy job salaries for corporate strategy managers are around $114,381 per year.

5. Innovation Strategy Manager 

Changing customer trends and increasing competition have made it necessary for companies to regularly innovate new products and processes not only for customer satisfaction but also to generate revenue. Therefore, innovation strategy roles offer high strategy job salaries.

Responsibilities

• Conduct market research to understand customer pain points and find innovation opportunities 
• Develop and promote an innovation culture in the organization
• Create strategies or frameworks for innovating new products/features, resource allocation 
• Establish and monitor metrics to assess innovation management

Skills and Experience

• Adaptability
• Analytical thinking
• Project management
• Agile development 

Innovation strategy jobs demand six to eight years of experience in leading product innovation or business growth.

Average Salary

The average annual salary of an innovation manager is $146,607.

6. Product Strategy Manager 

Product strategy is also one of the most in-demand jobs for strategy. The role involves building and executing a product strategy by understanding business objectives, customer pain points, and doing competitor analysis.

Responsibilities

• Define the product vision and also create a roadmap for successful product development
• Notably, oversee production and launch of Minimum Viable Product (MVP) and 
• Define user personas and identify market opportunities through research and analysis
• Build strategic partnerships to increase product reach

Skills and Experience

• Product management
• Product marketing
• User experience
• Stakeholder management 

This is one of the most popular jobs in strategy for mid-level professionals with five to six years of Post-qualification Experience (PQE).

Average Salary

A product strategy manager earns $106,000 average salary per year.

ALSO READ: What is Product Strategy and How Does it Determine a Company’s Success

7. Digital Strategy Manager

An increasing number of companies globally are adopting technologies such as AI), Internet of Things (IoT), and cloud to improve operational efficiency and drive innovation. Therefore, digital strategy has become one of the most crucial jobs in strategy. This role involves facilitating digital transformation to improve business processes.

Responsibilities

• Create a digital roadmap to improve operational efficiency 
• Identify and implement tools for digital transformation and process automation
• Collaborate with stakeholders to build digital assets for the organization
• Additionally, stay updated with and integrate the latest digital trends to facilitate organizational growth

Skills and Experience

• Digital transformation
• Change management
• Digital analytics
• Multimedia management 

This role requires a PQE of four to five years in digital innovation, operations management, or process improvement.

Average Salary

The average digital strategy manager salary is $76,923.

8. Strategy Consultant

Consultant jobs in strategy are similar to a corporate strategist role. However, strategy consultants offer consulting services on specific business issues or goals to small or mid-scale organizations. On the other hand, corporate strategists focus on overall strategic planning for an organization.

Responsibilities

• Assist organizations in developing their mission, vision, and core business values 
• Analyze the organization’s workflows and processes and also suggest frameworks for continuous process improvement
• Plan strategies to further increase revenue and reduce operational costs 
• Moreover, plan strategies for launching new products in the market

Skills and Experience

• Analytical and critical thinking
• Problem-solving
• Market research and analysis
• Corporate finance

This role also requires four to five years of experience in business consulting, business management, or project management.

Average Salary

A strategy consultant, on an average, earns $97,563 annually.

9. Marketing Strategist

Effective marketing is crucial for businesses to promote brand awareness and grow. Therefore, marketing strategy is an in-demand role in the strategy job market. It involves creating and implementing marketing strategies by researching target audience and market trends.

Responsibilities

• Plan and execute marketing strategies across various channels to achieve business objectives
• Prepare an action plan to increase website traffic and boost visibility
• Set and analyze marketing metrics to monitor campaign performance
• Also research market trends to find creative advertising ideas

Skills and Experience

• Marketing analytics
• Storytelling
• Knowledge of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software
• Marketing automation

Marketing jobs in strategy demand four to five years of experience as a marketing manager.

Average Salary

The average marketing strategist salary is $66,098.

ALSO READ: What is Strategic Planning? A Simple Guide

10. Business Analyst 

Business analysis is a crucial role in the strategy job market because strategic planning requires data-driven decision-making. Therefore, business analysts understand market trends and consumer behavior so that organizations can gain a competitive advantage.

Responsibilities

• Provide insights into market trends to help organizations achieve their strategic goals
• Collaborate with various stakeholders to find new growth opportunities based on these market trends
• Create a digital strategy roadmap
• Find bottlenecks and business processes and suggest solutions to eliminate them

Skills and Experience

• SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) analysis
• Data mining
• Business analytics
• Strategic decision making

A strategic business analyst role demands three to four years of experience in data analytics.

Average Salary

The average salary for a business analyst role is $97,964. 

FAQs

1. How Can Strategy Professionals Increase Their Earning Potential?

The most recommended way for strategy professionals to increase their earning potential is to upskill and reskill, as well as stay updated with the latest industry trends. You can do this by pursuing online strategy and innovation courses, attending conferences, or joining like-minded business or professional communities 

2. What Factors Contribute to the High Salaries in Strategy Jobs?

The three most important factors that contribute to getting the highest-paying strategy jobs are skills, experience, and technical know-how of the relevant industry.

3. Are There Specific Industries or Sectors That Offer the Highest-Paying Strategy Jobs?

While strategy job salaries are mostly similar across different industries, some sectors that offer the highest-paying jobs in strategy are IT, finance, and health care.

4. What Skills and Qualifications are Required to Land a High-Paying Job in Strategy?

The top skills required for getting high-paying strategy career opportunities are leadership, innovation, project management, strategic planning, business development, and competitive analysis.

Rapid industrial innovation and changing customer demands have increased jobs in strategy. As a result, organizations inevitably need skilled individuals who can adapt as per the changing trends and help achieve goals. One way to do so is enrolling in courses to upskill or reskill. Explore Emeritus’ online strategy and innovation courses to learn critical skills for the strategy job market and become eligible for highest-paying strategy jobs.

Write to us at content@emeritus.org