Position description:
Responsible for sales, market development and customer relations management within the Abrasive market.
Main responsibilities:
1. Accountable for the commercial success of Abrasive business in the area of competence
2. Ensure compliance with Ahlstrom Group and Building Materials Division sales strategies, policies and guidelines
3. Provide customer and market insight and build growth strategy and implementation plans
4. Execute regional sales strategy
5. Continuously seek new growth opportunities within Abrasive business
6. Ensure consistent achievement of key performance indicators (measured through growth, profit, revenue, margin, efficiency KPIs)
7. Manage technical issues and opportunities with customers, by acting as contact point between customers and internal technical customer service/product development and operations
8. Cooperate to establish annual sales targets and to build the sales budget
9. Work closely with own logistics and technical / development teams and those of the customers to ensure a profitable business development
10. Be knowledgeable in customers' activities in terms of payment, ability to pay on time and credit history
11. Manage receivables, past due amounts and finished good stock
12. Monitor sales volumes and profitability performance against plan
13. Report sales volumes and sales activities on a monthly basis
14. Ensure that proper sales processes and procedures are followed, including terms and conditions, Customer Contact system, consignment programs, exclusivity arrangements, and warehouse programs
15. Work with business unit to ensure Ahlstrom is properly represented at trade shows and industry organizations
Profile and qualifications:
16. University Bachelor/Master degree in paper/chemical engineering or equivalent is preferred requirement.
17. As alternative, University Bachelor/Master degree in marketing or economics, if combined with meaningful technical sales or technical customer service experience
18. Minimum 4 years of sales, product or business management experience with strong technical insight, preferably within Abrasive business
19. Excellent interpersonal and negotiation skills
20. Excellent communication and presentation skills
21. Technical approach and problem solving skills
22. Good leadership skills
23. Able to develop close networking relationships at all level of organization, in different languages and cultures
24. Excellent organizational skills
25. End-to-end process understanding
26. Strong drive for delivering results
27. Knowledge of IT systems (Ahlstrom software applications, Microsoft office tools)
28. Languages: Fluent English and a second language, preferably German. French is definitively plus.
29. Availability for travelling extensively - more than 50% of the time
Location: France -preferably Grand Est-, DACH