Head of Commercial - Africa

ABOUT SWISSPORT

Swissport is the world's largest provider of ground and cargo handling services in the aviation industry with global operations in 269 airports in 47 countries. Swissport is positioned to continue to invest in growth alongside our customers and has the ambition to emerge post COVID as THE most customer centric Aviation Service Provider in the industry. To support us in this ambition and transformation, we will be investing in many new positions, over several disciplines and geographical locations.

Working for Swissport you will be in the position to make an impact on all travelers worldwide. Be it the hurried businessman or that party of four embarking on a life changing family venture, ultimately you will be part of defining their aviation experience. Besides that, you will in the driving seat in defining your own career journey, as Swissport is able to offer you a world of knowledge and personal development.

ROLE SUMMARY

The Head of Commercial - Africa will lead and deliver all sales and commercial activities in the sub-region in close partnership with the country commercial teams to achieve revenue, sales, and profit targets in line with financial objectives while ensuring full compliance with Swissport’s governance, policies, and procedures. Position reports to Head of Commercial, CEMEAI.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

• Develop sales plans, budgets, forecasts, and activities based on a deep understanding of customer priorities.
• Propose, develop, and execute new sales plans to ensure the organization’s sales volume and profitability objectives are met.
• Explore new business opportunities and protect existing business while building a pipeline.
• Monitor sales volumes, revenue, and costs against forecasts and build in contingencies.
• Utilize key sales tools and Salesforce to monitor metric performances and apply strong corrective actions where applicable.
• Adapt procedures or reallocate commercial resources to improve performance.
• Stay up-to-date and aligned with customer buying preferences, and align resources and solutions accordingly.
• Conduct client insight research to ensure Swissport’s current and future opportunities align with customers' key imperatives.
• Apply industry and customer knowledge to improve relationships and create opportunities by aligning their needs and pain points with Swissport capabilities.
• Manage and process customer deals to complement Swissport's revenue, profit, and general terms aspirations, balancing this with customer needs.
• Effectively drive any deal originating within your region and create strong alignment with other regions where applicable, allowing for high-quality and timely delivery.
• Ensure new business is profitable by implementing appropriate control mechanisms.
• Lead client negotiation sessions to resolve key contract issues, such as price increases.
• Manage and lead tender processes.
• Collaborate and coordinate input and approval from internal departments to ensure profitability development.
• Be aware of policies related to pricing, yield improvement, contract terms, conditions, and negotiation.
• Maximize account potential by delivering to the needs of customers and continuously improving competitive position on account opportunities.
• Use key sales tools and Salesforce to monitor pipeline performance and manage new and existing business in line with Swissport compliance and governance policies.
• Regularly provide constructive feedback on sales approach, competencies, win strategy, deal structure, and guidance on internal processes.
• Coach sales teams on technical aspects of pricing, negotiation, and customer service to achieve high customer retention, high business acquisitions, and sales targets.
• Advise on policies related to pricing, yield improvement, contract negotiation, and pipeline development.

QUALIFICATIONS/REQUIREMENTS

• Aviation Industry or Airport Services: Ground Handling, GSA, Airline, Integrator, and Logistics Supply Chain experience.
• Proven track record: Demonstrated success in leading and delivering sales and commercial activities, preferably within the African market. Previous experience in a similar leadership role is highly desirable.
• Prospecting: Prior prospecting experience from similarly sized businesses.
• Deal Shaping: Experienced in shaping multi-regional deals from start to finish.
• Sales Negotiations: Mastery in successfully navigating complex negotiations.
• Contract Management: Proven experience with contract negotiations with strong attention to detail, coordination, and communication.
• Ability to interpret and apply knowledge of business financial drivers, practices, concepts that drive profitable growth.
• Can understand and solve business problems, keeping a financial as well as a customer perspective in the forefront when making decisions.
• Ability to create and foster internal and external relationships that enable the development of beneficial solutions.
• Works cooperatively with others across the organization to achieve shared objectives.
• Credits others for their contributions and accomplishments.
• Ability to communicate with internal partners and external organizations.
• Can communicate in a variety of formats, including formal presentations and required documentation.
• Providing feedback, instruction, and development guidance to help others excel; planning and supporting the development of individual skills and abilities.
• Developing people to meet both their career goals and the organization’s goals.
• Taking accountability to deliver results.
• Measuring progress and taking corrective actions if metrics are not achieved.
• Ensuring others contribute to organizational goals by focusing them on the most critical priorities.

Key Performance Indicators:

• Renegotiation: Delivering Target Rate Increases.
• Existing Business: Renewal Ratio above 90%, No unforeseen losses beyond what is assumed in the budget.
• New Business: Success Ratio above 35%, Achievement of budgeted win target in €.
• Achieving budgeted target in €.
• Management: Customer Engagement, CRM and Compliance/Governance, aligned to set targets.

Your Next Step:

When you are looking for a challenging next step in your career as the Head of Commercial Africa within an ambitious international aviation company, please apply. When you do, please send your resume in English via the Apply button.

Because we get many applicants for our jobs, it is impossible to contact everybody personally. If you, therefore, do not hear from us, we have chosen another candidate at this moment.

We do invite you already to keep following Swissport (and me) because new opportunities may arise.

Hope to hear from you soon!

Equal Employment Opportunity Statement

Swissport as an equal opportunity employer bases its hiring decisions on the business need and the best qualified candidates available and does not discriminate in its employment decisions based on any protected category.

Candidates who are offered employment may be subject to a criminal record and other background checks as permitted or required by company policy or applicable law.