Business Head for MiDCOM, Nigeria

Position Summary: Responsible for the sales, marketing, distribution, supply chain, finance, factory (including exports through ECOWAS) and service operations.  


Principal Responsibilities and Accountabilities 


Partner Management
• Align business and operations strategy with principal partner and plan timely and effective implementation across geographies
• Periodic reviews with principal partners to ensure that the business plan and the ground level actions are in sync with market realities 
• Ensure the approach and results of CE business are aligned with principal at all times


P&L Responsibility 
• Maximizing turnover and profitability (through increased sales, new markets / products and cost reduction and control in various areas of business).
• Monitor both revenue and expenses in order to meet the revenue and profitability targets. Formulate, implement, evaluate and refine the annual business plan
• Analyze market dynamics and special business cases, evaluate the pros and cons from both financial and non-financial point of views, and make recommendations.
• Prepare yearly business plans and prepare annual budgets for various resources including advertising / promotions, market research, setting up of branch offices, manpower.
• Monitor and report business performance, work towards achievement of the yearly business plans and act on deviations from the budgets.
• Developing, implementing, reviewing and modifying policies, processes, systems relating to the department.
• Provide Rolling Sales Forecast by product line on a monthly basis.
Sales Management
• Set and achieve sales targets, market share and collections.
• Design and institute a system to track market trends, competitor strategies
• Define performance parameters for sales and track the same for various territories / regions.
• Ensure periodic market research of and generate new project proposals. Implement the same within estimated cost and time.
• Initiate the development of other distribution models for entering new channels.
• Optimize current distribution strategy by changing over to a differentiated channel approach through sales activities, product-mix with key focus on margins.
Cross Functional Coordination 
• Ensure the market information flows into production plan and procurement plan on a planned and proactive basis
• Ensure that all plans for factory and SCM are aligned with Sales plan, leaving no room for stuck/non-moving inventory.  


Brand & Product Management
• Create and recommend a marketing strategy for achieving business unit goals and objective.
• Deliver input on marketing trends and customer requirements concerning the brand portfolio.
• Co-responsibility for driving the cycle planning with principals to get to better integrated brand activities and promotions.
• Communicate the marketing & sales activity calendar to the sales & distribution force on a timely basis
• Implement visibility programs, aimed for brand building and development with the principal.
• Support the Marketing function on Pricing of products with qualitative insights on consumer behavior & market conditions
Distributor & Retail - Trade Management
• Develop and maintain relations with key distributors, top key accounts and other business relations. Recruit and evaluate new distributors and key accounts before committing business
• Clear target to manage distributors & key accounts so as to meet sales & distribution requirements.
• Evaluate distributors' performance and set the framework for negotiating targets, trade margins, terms and conditions
Order Planning and Inventory Control 
• Take market dynamics into considerations and project unit sales. 
• Detailed order planning and effective inventory control to maintain inventory at cost effective levels which satisfy both seasonal and situational demand.
Pricing
• Develop and recommend pricing structure which meets or exceeds profit margin targets. 
• Build and put price deviation procedure in place to ensure effective price control. 
• Set very clear and measurable targets, rules and procedure for calculating and recording sales rebate.


Credit Management & Account Receivable 
• Analyze outstanding, monitor credit to customers/ dealers. 
  Review AR situation, pull resource to maximize collection efforts, formulate and implement action plans to achieve collection targets.
• Improve DSO and reduced bad debts.
Employee Development
• Hire and train the best talent by offering challenging role, paying for performance and cross functional engagement. 
• Conduct regular coaching and counseling the team to build motivation.
• Plan an efficient and scale-able organization with aggressive productivity norms
• Integrate training into day to day sales operations. 


Process Orientation
• Ensure there is strong focus on processes and enough checks and balances to ensure adherence
• Proactively plan the changes required in Policy framework and plan accordingly 

Position Reports To : Group COO
Direct Reports: Head of Sales, Manager Finance, Manager SCM, Factory Head, Service Head
Interfaces: Marketing Agencies, Distributors, Factory
Team Size: 700+ employees ( direct / indirect )
Location of Work: Lagos, Nigeria Geographical Spread West Africa


Minimum Qualification and SkillsMBA/PGDM 


Attributes
• Financial acumen
• Planning, forecasting and production skills and exposure
• Excellent oral and written communication skills
• Problem-solving and analytical skills to interpret business performance and market trend information.


Experience
• 20+ years experience in handling overall business operations in Consumer Electronics industry.
• Experience in developing sales strategies, optimizing resources, achieving topline.
• Excellent overall business management & operational skills including strong negotiating, influencing and relationship management skills

Sudhanshu Varma

sudhanshu.varma@midcom-group.com