Senior Manager, Customer Assurance

Job Description

Are you ready to power the World&aposs connections

If you dont think you meet all of the criteria below but are still interested in the job, please apply. Nobody checks every box - were looking for candidates that are particularly strong in a few areas, and have some interest and capabilities in others.

Are you ready to power the World&aposs connections

If you dont think you meet all of the criteria below but are still interested in the job, please apply. Nobody checks every box - were looking for candidates that are particularly strong in a few areas, and have some interest and capabilities in others.

About the role:

Kong is establishing a global Customer Assurance team that will play an important role in helping Kong gain and keep the trust of its customers around the world with respect to its information security, operational resilience and data governance practices. Reporting to Kongs US-based Director, GRC, the Customer Assurance Senior Manager will be the first hire into this India-based team, and will play an important role in helping build the team.

What you&aposll be doing:

- Manage Customer Assurance :Oversee customer assurance initiatives, focusing on completing customer security questionnaires, RFP security sections, certification documentation sharing, and other due diligence requests to build trust in Kong&aposs product and service security.Lead the customer assurance team and communicate program issues to leadership as needed.Ensure a deep understanding of the product and maintain a well-organized library of resources.
- Coordinate Cross-Functional Responses:Serve as the primary point of contact for customer security and compliance inquiries.Collaborate with internal teams (Compliance, Security, Engineering, Legal, etc.) to gather necessary information and provide thorough, prompt and accurate responses to customer questionnaires and inquiries.
- Develop Scalable Processes:Create and refine processes to efficiently handle questionnaire completion and information security inquiry responses.Maintain a repository of standard answers, templates, and documentation to enhance efficiency and consistency.Leverage tools or automation to manage repetitive questionnaire content.
- Proactive Customer Assurance:Produce and maintain customer-facing security documentation and collateral (such as FAQ and trust portal content).Anticipate and address common customer questions proactively to build trust.
- Cross-Department Collaboration: Work closely with global Sales and Customer Success teams during pre-sales and renewal cycles to address security and compliance questions.Attend customer calls as the companys Customer Assurance representative, providing clear explanations of our security posture and practices to shorten sales cycles and reassure customers.
- Program Monitoring and Improvement:Track and report on customer assurance activities and metrics (such as questionnaire turnaround times, common security concerns, and customer feedback).Use these insights to continuously improve the customer assurance program, streamlining workflows, enhancing answer quality, and maintaining thorough and timely communication.

What you&aposll bring:

- Experience: Over 5 years of experience in information security or compliance, with substantial involvement in security assurance or GRC programs. At least 1 year of experience in a customer-facing role, such as responding to client security questionnaires or participating in trust-building activities. Total professional experience is less than 15 years.
- Security Knowledge:Understanding of security and compliance frameworks/standards (such as SOC 2, ISO 27001, NIST, GDPR, CCPA).Working knowledge of cloud security principles and IT controls related to SaaS environments.
- Technical Skills:Expertise with cloud platforms such as GCP, Azure, or AWS, as well as containerization technologies like Docker and Kubernetes. Strong background in SaaS security.
- Non-Technical Skills:Experienced in creating clear and accessible documentation that explains complex technical scenarios to non-technical audiences.
- Process Management:Ability to manage multiple requests simultaneously and meet deadlines.Experience maturing customer assurance processes, such as implementing tools for security questionnaire automation or knowledge bases.Experience developing or improving processes to increase efficiency is a plus.
- Communication Skills:Ability to translate complex security concepts into clear, customer-friendly written and verbal communication.Comfortable interacting with enterprise customers and internal stakeholders.
- Collaboration:Ability to collaborate effectively with diverse groups (engineering, legal, sales, etc.) through proactive and customer-service-focused approaches.
- Education:Bachelors degree in Information Security, Computer Science, or a related field (or equivalent work experience).
- This opportunity requires you to work from our office in Bangalore, India in a hybrid manner with three days in the office and Two days working from home.

Preferred Qualifications

- Certifications:Professional certifications such as CISSP or CISA (preferred but not required).
- SaaS/Industry Experience:Experience working in a SaaS company, especially in cloud services or API management.

About Kong:

Kong Inc., a leading developer of cloud API technologies, is on a mission to enable companies around the world to become API-first and securely accelerate AI adoption. Kong helps organizations globally from startups to Fortune 500 enterprises unleash developer productivity, build securely, and accelerate time to market. For more information about Kong, please visit www.konghq.com or follow us on X @thekonginc.

About Kong:

Kong Inc., a leading developer of cloud API technologies, is on a mission to enable companies around the world to become API-first and securely accelerate AI adoption. Kong helps organizations globally from startups to Fortune 500 enterprises unleash developer productivity, build securely, and accelerate time to market. For more information about Kong, please visit www.konghq.com or follow us on X @thekonginc.

---