Director of Rights and Permissions Sales

Capstone is seeking a Director of Rights and Permissions Sales who will be responsible for actively seeking, managing, and generating profit from sales of Capstone-owned intellectual property. This includes co-edition and sub-licensing opportunities, as well as permission requests across a range of territories in all formats. This is a strategic role that leads and oversees Capstone’s rights sales business.

Our preference is for this role to be hybrid, based out of either our North Mankato, MN or Edina, MN locations. However, fully remote work may also be considered.

Why You’ll Want To Join Capstone

Your work will directly impact an innovative company whose mission is to improve the educational experiences of children and the educators who serve them. Capstone is a fast-paced growth company committed to cultivating a love of reading and learning. We know that Learning is for Everyone.

For more than 30 years, Capstone has been a national leader in K-5 educational content including digital products (PebbleGo, PebbleGo Next, Capstone Interactive, Capstone Create) and award-winning books. We combine a passion for helping foster a powerful love of reading and learning with the talent to create amazing content. 

We are a mission-driven company that provides opportunities for professional learning and development and a culture of inclusion and belonging.

YOUR RESPONSIBILITIES

Licensing Rights and Agreements 

• Confirm underlying rights for sublicensing opportunities, maintain and track sublicence agreements. 
• Manage relationship with rights agencies that represents the company’s content, ensuring goals are agreed upon, relevant product insight and material is provided in a timely fashion and all contracting and payments are handled appropriately. 
• Deal with revenue permission requests promptly and accurately. Review permissions procedures, as necessary.
• Request costing for appropriate re-use of rights (within margin requirements) and instruct clearance.

Customers

• Work with sales support to generate quotes to customers, within required profit margins, negotiating prices/terms as necessary and to seek approval of Rights team before agreeing to any deals that fall below required profit margin. Responsible for gathering specs, quoting, and negotiating terms. 
• Research, create and maintain customer and market profiles to identify potential new customers and ensure sales opportunities are realized.
• Maintain accurate, consistent, and accessible records of all customer contact including entry and housekeeping of all information in Biblio.
• Manage key accounts, sub agents and scouting agencies. 
• Develop strong product knowledge to better serve the needs of customers and identify sales opportunities.

Media Content 

• Responsible for gaining knowledge of key series, titles, and programs through regular contact with publishing teams, and attending product meetings.
• Pass on relevant information on e.g., series extensions, add-ons to customers who bought the original title, series, or program.
• Work with Sales support to supply accurate and up to date material to customers via Egnyte. Ensure that any updates or corrections made to the original edition are passed on to customers working on translations. Work with editorial to gather sample material ahead of sales trips and book fairs.

Education, Expertise and Skills required:

• Bachelor’s degree or higher preferred.
• Minimum of 5+ years of IP sales management.
• This role requires significant experience of working in a rights sales role in children’s or educational publishing.
• Ability to travel overseas for book fairs.
• Strong interpersonal and relationship building skills.
• Ability to work independently – self-starter.
• Strong negotiation skills.
• Excellent problem-solving ability.
• PC proficiency, including internet, Outlook, Word, and Excel.
• Salesforce and Biblio proficiency helpful.
• Demonstrates strong sales quota achievement year over year.
• Excellent communication skills, both written and verbal, with the ability to articulate complex ideas/solutions clearly and concisely.
• Advanced listening skills and ability to successfully address customer needs, pain points, objections, and inquiries and align Capstone solutions with their objectives, goals, and vision.

Travel Requirements

This position requires some travel – up to 20%.

Inclusion & Belonging

Capstone embraces diversity, inclusion, equal opportunity, and belonging for all employees and applicants. Many times, underrepresented individuals, including people of color, women, protected veterans, individuals with disabilities, may only consider applying for roles in which they meet all the criteria listed in a posting. Capstone is advancing and changing, and we encourage anyone to apply to our roles, even if you only meet some of the criteria, because you may just be a perfect fit!

We are an Affirmative Action and Equal Opportunity Employer. As such, we welcome applicants of diverse races, ethnicities, geographic origins, gender identities, ages, socioeconomic backgrounds, sexual orientations, religions, work experience, physical and intellectual abilities, and financial means. All candidate information will be kept private according to EEO guidelines.

If you need assistance and/or a reasonable accommodation due to a disability during the application or the recruiting process, please send a request to hrservices@capstonepub.com. 

The pay range for this role takes into account the wide range of factors that are considered surrounding compensation including but not limited to: skill sets, experience and training, work location, and other business and organizational needs. At Capstone, it is not typical for an individual to be hired at or near the top of the range for their role. A reasonable estimate of the base range for this position is $100,000-$125,000. This role is eligible for a sales commission plan, with the annual total on-target earnings (OTE) range of $125,000-$160,000. 

Capstone strives to provide comprehensive and market-competitive benefits to meet the needs of our employees and their families. Click here to see our benefits. 

Pre-Employment Background Check Required

California Applicants: 

Applicants from California can access our California Privacy Notice here. 

Employment Authorization: 

At this time Capstone unfortunately cannot sponsor or take over sponsorship of an employment visa. To be considered for one of our roles, applicants must be authorized to work in the United States.