Head, Commercial at Dangote

Job Summary

• The Head of Commercial leads all sales, marketing, pricing and customer-management activities for the company's polypropylene (PP) woven sack range produced across its two factories.
• The central mandate is to grow sales to non-business-unit (external third-party) customers, reducing reliance on internal and captive demand and increasing capacity utilisation, revenue and margin across both plants.

Duties & Responsibilities
Commercial Strategy and Growth:

• Develop and execute a multi-year commercial strategy to grow external sales volumes and revenue share.
• Identify and prioritise target segments such as cement, fertiliser, grains and agro-commodities, sugar, salt, flour, animal feed, chemicals, minerals and exporters.
• Build a business case for new products, specifications and value-added offerings (e.g. laminated, printed, BOPP-coated, valve and FIBC sacks).
• Assess market size, competitor positioning, pricing and share to inform targets and investment.

Sales and Business Development:

• Lead new customer acquisition, tender participation and long-term supply agreements with external customers.
• Develop and manage distributors, agents and channel partners, including regional coverage.
• Manage key accounts to ensure retention, repeat orders and share-of-wallet growth.
• Explore export markets and regional opportunities.

Pricing, Margin and Contracts:

• Set pricing policy, discount structures and credit terms that balance volume growth with margin, taking account of polypropylene resin price volatility.
• Negotiate and approve major contracts, ensuring commercial and legal risks are managed.
• Monitor receivables and work with Finance to control credit risk and bad debt.

Two-Factory Demand and Capacity Alignment:

• Work with Operations and Supply Chain to align the sales plan with capacity, product mix and lead times at both factories.
• Run a regular sales and operations planning (S&OP) process and allocate orders efficiently between plants.
• Feed customer specifications, quality complaints and demand signals back to Production and Quality.

Marketing, Brand and Customer Experience:

• Build the company's brand and market presence through trade shows, digital channels and technical sales collateral.
• Establish CRM, order-tracking and customer service standards, including on-time-in-full delivery.
• Run customer feedback and satisfaction programmes.

Leadership and Governance:

• Build, coach and motivate a high-performing commercial team, with clear targets and incentive schemes.
• Prepare sales forecasts, budgets and management reports for the executive team and Board.
• Ensure compliance with company policy, ethics and applicable trade regulations.

Qualifification & Work Experience 

• Bachelor's degree in Business, Marketing, Engineering or a related field; MBA or equivalent preferred.
• 12 or more years of commercial experience, with at least 5 years in a senior sales or commercial leadership role.
• Background in packaging, plastics, polymers, FMCG or industrial B2B manufacturing; knowledge of woven polypropylene sacks is a strong advantage.
• Proven record of growing third-party sales and winning large industrial accounts.
• Experience managing multi-site manufacturing demand and distributor networks.

Skills & Competences:

• Strategic thinking and commercial acumen
• Negotiation and key-account management
• Pricing and margin management in a commodity-linked environment
• Data-driven decision making and CRM proficiency
• Cross-functional collaboration with Operations, Finance and Quality
• Leadership, coaching and talent development
• Strong communication and stakeholder influence.

Key Competence Indicators

• External (non-business-unit) sales volume and revenue growth versus target
• Share of total sales from external customers
• Number of new active customers and distributors
• Gross margin and price realisation
• Capacity utilisation across both factories
• Customer retention, on-time-in-full delivery and complaint rate
• Days sales outstanding and bad-debt levels
• Sales forecast accuracy.

Work Conditions:

• Regular travel to customers, distributors and both factory sites is required.
• Occasional extended hours may be needed during tender and peak seasons.