Region Manager – Ghana, Togo, Bein, Niger, IVC

Department :Sales and marketing 

 Location Accra, Ghana 

 1. Job Purpose Summary - Describe the position, the size of the operation (in terms of monetary measures, numbers of staff etc) that the position manages or supports. The objective of this role is to develop and implement effective sales & commercial strategies that will contribute and thereby deliver the company’s sales objectives. The role will be leading the nationwide sales, customer, distributors and sales team members to achieve their respective objectives. 

The phase 1 – first 100 days - expectation is to 

1. Understand what the Brand is about & ways of working. 

2. Understand the brand in the markets you work on – channel, category, consumer, competition 

3. Develop bond with the respective distributors and understand ways of working. 

4. Ensure completion of the RTM in IVC with clear milestones and deliverables. 

5. Ensure revenue and volume objectives are met & ensure key KPI’s are delivered lead by IMS reporting. 

Phase 2 expectation is to 

1. Proactively build plans forward including forecasting, demand creation, gap identification to help build secondary and tertiary sales. 

2. Stakeholder management – upwards and lateral – Brand owner, Distributor, market relationships. 

3. Start to build the smaller and new markets around in the West led by the French speaking markets where today Sunmark does not play a big role in. Peer relationship.

 Internal contacts: 

This role works very closely and continuously with the Manager who leads this brand in these markets. External contacts: The incumbent works with the assigned market’s distributors and their marketing/trade marketing teams. There will also be direct relationship with the brand principal. 

2. Primary Accountabilities & Responsibilities - Major accountabilities and responsibilities. 

1. Volume & Revenue 

• Contribute to the delivery of country/category revenue, volume and trade promotion budgets. 

• Provide effective analyses to support category plan development. 

• Tracking and reporting category results. 

• Tracking and reporting New Product Development (NPD) performance. 

• Assist in the identification of new category opportunities. 

• Identifying potential gaps, communicating those gaps and recommending possible solutions. 

Scope the projects from end to end 

2. Planning 

• Assist in the sales planning process and actively support participation in the company planning process. 

• Provide effective data and analyses to formulate category plans. 

• Providing data to support resource allocation of trade promotion budgets. 

• Plan the right market organisation structure now and long term thereby establishing a strong foundation for the business to grow. 

3. Trade Fund Management 

• Provide data for the formulation of promotional plans by category. 

• Evaluate effectiveness of promotional plan and recommend promotional strategies to improve effectiveness. 

• Track results against budgets. 

• Assist in the optimisation of trade spend efficiencies. 

4. Customer & Distributor Management/Development & Route to Market (RTM) 

 • Assist in tracking appropriate KPI’s for distributor effectiveness. 

• Develop customer capability, processes and systems 

• Assist in the development of appropriate RTM strategies per category/channel out form the distributor until the consumer. 

5. Forecasting 

• Provide analytical support for short to medium term category sales, trade promotion and market share forecast. 

• Provide data to support identification of gaps to budget and prepare recommendations to close gaps. 

• Prepare and present category forecast during forecasting meetings. 

3. Education, Qualifications, Experience, Skills, and Language 

Requirements 

(a) Education & Qualifications 

University degree (any field) preferably business or economics.

(b) Experience 

Minimum 10 years sales experience with a FMCG company.

 Possess working knowledge of retail and consumer industry. 

Ability to work autonomously in an unstructured environment. 

Willingness to create plans, rules, processes if needed pro actively as enablers.  

Trade marketing and distributor management experience is required and experience in supply chain/marketing/business development will be an added advantage for this role.

Strong communication skills in English (oral and written) and French (Oral) is mandatory. ability to converse/communicate in regional national language and dialects are an advantage.

Strong with presentation and analysis tools, including Microsoft Office Excel and PowerPoint. 

(c) Skills/Leadership Competencies 

Interpersonal skills and networking capability, work with multiple departments internal and external  

Ability to organize and prioritize – multi country work 

Work around hurdles, Willingness to adapt to solve issues and think on your feet – high complexity of developing markets business. 

Keen eye for efficiency/needs to keep things simple in complex markets. 

 Bias for action – not wait but make things happen. 

 4. Dimensions: 

Geographical Responsibility: West Africa 

Phase 1 – Ivory Coast, Ghana, Togo, Benin, Niger 

Phase 2 – Gabon, Burkina Faso, Guinea, Senegal, Mauritania, Mali + other French markets

 5. Travel – Heavy travel involved locally + international travel from time to time to other markets managed.