Senior Director of Working Professional MBA Recruiting and Admissions

Position Summary

Rice Business is a globally recognized, top‑ranked graduate business school offering a full portfolio of MBA programs. The Senior Director of Working Professional MBA Recruiting and Admissions serves as an elevated strategic partner for the school, tasked with recruiting, admitting, and yielding future global business leaders. Reporting directly to the Assistant Dean, the Senior Director translates graduate management education trends into aggressive recruiting and yield strategies, directs a team of enrollment professionals, and maintains active hands‑on involvement in candidate cultivation and admissions decisions. As a core member of the Recruiting & Admissions Office senior leadership team, the Senior Director aligns portfolio strategy with operational, CRM, and candidate‑experience leadership to deliver a seamless, high‑touch enrollment pipeline and serves as a primary point of contact for Rice Business stakeholders to achieve strategic cohort growth.

Ideal Candidate

The ideal candidate is an enrollment‑management expert with team‑leadership experience, an excellent communicator who thrives in a fast‑paced environment, and a solutions‑oriented mindset. This senior‑level leader is focused, positive, and results‑driven, able to cultivate strong relationships and collaborate effectively with RAO leaders, Rice Business stakeholders, and industry colleagues. The candidate should have supervisory experience with concrete examples of holding teams accountable and leading with a coaching mindset, work autonomously, manage up, and provide action‑oriented solutions to the Assistant Dean. A deep understanding of the graduate management education market, strategic, outcomes‑oriented, data‑informed, and AI‑fluent capabilities are essential.

Workplace Requirements

Rice Business delivers residential classes and activities almost daily between 7 am and 10 pm. The culture is highly collaborative and community‑based, with expectations to provide in‑person support and services. Remote work options are limited; most duties are performed on‑site at McNair Hall on a 5‑day, 8:30 am – 5:00 pm schedule. Remote work may be approved on an as‑needed basis after the probationary period. The role includes a high volume of professional events occurring nights and weekends, extensive domestic and international travel, and business‑professional attire (with occasional business‑casual for non‑event, external‑facing interactions).

Minimum Requirements

• Bachelor’s Degree (no substitutions permitted)
• Four or more (4+) years of higher‑education and/or relationship‑management/recruiting professional experience
• In lieu of experience, additional related education may be substituted on an equivalent year‑for‑year basis

Skills

• Familiarity with modern admissions office work areas: CRM systems, reporting and analytics, recruitment, candidate evaluation and selection, marketing, on‑campus programming, staff training, budget management, and staff development
• Strong process and project management skills; ability to develop these skills in staff members
• Experience developing and implementing innovative solutions and processes in admissions
• Firm familiarity with the graduate management education prospective‑student market
• Ability to use admission and enrollment data for data‑driven decisions, measurement, presentation, and practice revision
• Effective collaboration with cross‑functional teams and development of partnerships with internal and external stakeholders
• Strong staff management and independent judgment
• Excellent diplomacy, organizational, and interpersonal skills
• Expert ability to lead and facilitate presentations/information sessions with clarity and confidence
• Proficient in Microsoft Suite (Word, Excel, PowerPoint)

Preferences

• Extensive professional experience in relationship management, either in enrollment management or sales
• Experience within the graduate business education landscape or higher education
• Experience supervising teams and professionally developing direct reports
• Familiarity with CRM systems or equivalent tools to support relationship‑management responsibilities

Essential Functions

• Design, execute, and continuously refine a holistic working‑professional MBA recruitment and evaluation strategy, using data‑driven approaches for market expansion, travel plans, and targeted sourcing to achieve enrollment targets.
• Serve as a core member of the RAO Senior Leadership Team and trusted senior advisor to the Assistant Dean, providing actionable intelligence, risk assessments, high‑touch relationship management, and strategic recommendations.
• Represent Rice Business with executive presence during high‑stakes domestic travel, delivering high‑impact recruitment presentations, and engaging elite candidate pools, corporate partners, and alumni networks.
• Own the end‑to‑end candidate lifecycle, driving sourcing, high‑touch relationship management, and cohort‑yield strategy to meet enrollment goals.
• Lead the working‑professional Admissions Committee as primary final application reader and evaluator on cohort composition.
• Perform comprehensive, evidence‑based evaluations of candidate applications, assessing qualitative factors and making formal recommendations for admissions decisions.
• Provide data‑driven recommendations for potential scholarship awards to the Assistant Dean.
• Direct, mentor, and build a high‑performing recruitment and admissions team, managing workload allocation for travel and candidate engagement while setting elevated standards for conversion and outreach.
• Pioneer AI fluency and advanced assessment technology to modernize candidate assessment, streamline evaluation, and enhance data‑driven selection frameworks.
• Drive quantitative decision‑making, predictive yield modeling, and data integrity within the Slate CRM, translating pipeline metrics into strategic updates for executive leadership.
• Own candidate conversion and melt‑mitigation strategy, nurturing admitted students from decision release to matriculation through personalized, high‑touch sales strategies.
• Collaborate in oversight of macro yield, melt‑mitigation, and retention operations, orchestrating high‑impact events and targeted touchpoints to convert admitted candidates into enrolled cohorts.
• Manage unit resource allocation and budget spend across recruitment travel, external vendors, and candidate‑experience touchpoints to ensure maximum ROI.
• Implement creative engagement strategies to maintain a robust candidate pipeline through consistent, personalized communication from inquiry to matriculation.
• Consistently collaborate with Rice Business stakeholders to align product, brand, recruiting, and admissions strategy.
• Embod​y the highest standards of professionalism and operational excellence.
• Perform all other duties as assigned.

Additional Functions

• Conduct evaluative interviews to curate a high‑caliber, diverse MBA cohort aligned with institutional standards and strategic enrollment goals.
• Commit to continuous learning related to graduate management education trends and competitive market landscapes to maintain Rice Business’s position within recruitment innovation.
• Represent Rice Business with key strategic partners, ensuring alignment with the evolving needs of the global business workforce.

Schedule

This position is exclusively on‑site, requiring a 5‑day in‑office schedule (8:30 am – 5:00 pm). The role involves a high volume of professional events occurring nights and weekends, as well as extensive domestic and international travel. Remote work opportunities may be assessed and approved on an as‑needed basis after successful completion of the probationary period.