Job Description

Strategy Associate

Department: Strategy

Employment Type: Contract / Temp

Location: South Africa

Reporting To: Engagement manager

The client is seeking a Strategy Associate to support a senior executive in shaping the strategic narrative, high-level business case, and market analysis for a new B2B health offering. This is a time-sensitive initiative requiring additional capacity to structure thinking, develop robust insights, and translate analysis into a compelling storyline for decision-making. The ideal candidate will bring strong generalist consulting capabilities, experience working closely with senior stakeholders, and the ability to distill complex analysis into clear, decision-ready outputs, with exposure to healthcare or related sectors considered advantageous.

Key Responsibilities

• Offering design
  • Design a franchise-style commercial model, including definition of target network archetypes, roles, and decision rights.
  • Incorporate client-provided or parallel workstream inputs on value propositions into the design of aligned incentive and rewards mechanisms across archetypes.
  • Translate strategic choices into clear supporting operating logic and economic assumptions.
    
• Economics & Assumption Testing
  • Build and refine economic and financial analyses underpinning the proposed commercial model.
  • Test key assumptions related to incentives, unit economics, scalability, and network performance.
  • Use analytical insights to refine design choices and support client decision-making.
    
• Engagement Outputs & Decision Support
  • Produce decision-ready materials synthesising diagnostic findings, commercial model design choices, and economic implications.
  • Develop clear, structured client outputs (e.g. frameworks, exhibits, and narratives) to support senior decision-making.
  • Support and document client working sessions, capturing decisions, open questions, and implications for next steps.
  • Act as the day-to-day client point of contact for defined workstreams, leading discussions, addressing questions, and coordinating inputs with guidance from senior team members.

Skills, Knowledge and Expertise

Experience required:

Frame the strategic narrative and key questions

• Structure the core problem statement, objectives, and success criteria for the B2B health offering
• Develop initial hypotheses and define the key questions required to shape the opportunity

Conduct market analysis and derive actionable insights

• Assess market size, segmentation, and growth dynamics Analyse competitive landscape, comparable offerings, and emerging trends
• Identify implications for positioning and commercial viability

Develop the high-level business case

• Define core revenue drivers, cost components, and economic logic
• Assess key value levers and sensitivities impacting the opportunity
• Translate market and strategic insights into commercial implications

Synthesize insights into a clear strategic storyline

• Integrate market, commercial, and strategic inputs into a cohesive narrative
• Ensure alignment between analysis, implications, and proposed direction
• Refine messaging to support clarity and executive-level communication

Develop decision-ready outputs and executive materials

• Translate analysis into clear, structured presentations and supporting exhibits
• Synthesize key insights, implications, and recommendations for decision-making Iterate rapidly with the senior executive to refine messaging and storyline

Support executive working sessions and ongoing refinement

• Support structured working sessions by capturing key insights, decisions, and implications
• Continuously refine outputs based on feedback and evolving priorities
• Ensure consistency and quality across all materials delivered

Technical requirements:

• Strong ability to frame ambiguous strategic problems, define clear problem statements, and structure them into coherent workplans.
• Experience developing and refining hypotheses, identifying key value drivers, and prioritising analyses to inform decision-making.
• Ability to design and oversee targeted qualitative and quantitative analyses, ensuring analytical effort is focused on the most decision-relevant questions.
• Proven capability to synthesise complex analyses into clear insights and translate them into concise, decision-oriented recommendations for senior stakeholders.
• High level of comfort working independently in Excel and PowerPoint (or equivalent tools), producing client-ready outputs with limited oversight.
• Exposure to healthcare or health-related sectors is advantageous

Soft skills:

• Strong ownership mindset and accountability for outputs.
• Comfort working under time pressure and adapting to evolving priorities.
• Collaborative, professional engagement style with confidence front-of-client.
  
  

Working arrangement
Location: Johannesburg
Travel requirements: Minimal
Required start date: Immediate
Contracting period: 12 weeks