Searching for a Regional Commercial Executive to join a Chicken Business Unit. The role will be based in Rustenburg, looking after the Inland Region and will provide strategic and direct commercial and financial support to the Region.

The Regional Commercial Executive will be entrusted to:
• Assure the delivery of enhanced business profitability and costing information designed to unlock profit opportunities,
• Assist in focused strategic decision-making and drive regional profitability Drive ongoing,
• Robust commercial engagement with the rest of the Business
• Manage and coordinate commercial and financial support for the entire value chain including agriculture, processing, distribution, and customer to the broader Business.
• Provide accurate and timeous operational financial reporting and ensure corporate governance compliance across the Region Duties & Responsibilities Strategy Contribution and Execution Together with the Regional Director drive the implementation of the Regional strategy that supports the Overall Chicken Strategy and:
• Ensure that assigned commercial strategic targets are operationalized and achieved
• Provide and promote the commercial and financial perspective in the growth strategy
• Drive strategic commercial and operations financial support and constantly evaluate alignment and execution against overall Chicken strategy
• Customer Pricing and mix management
• Provide pricing support to the Regional Director and Regional customer teams for the successful conclusion of price negotiations that meet profitability objectives and ensure that products are sold at targeted margins
• Attend regional pricing negotiations when required to settle pricing with customers
• Constantly review customer performance data for opportunities relating to improved efficiencies and pricing
• Assist with the formulation and implementation of the optimal mix and resolution of stock which supports the overall national Customer strategy
• Budgeting and Forecasting
• Take overall responsibility for the formulation and control of the Regions budget and forecasting process and delivery within deadlines
• Ensure that budgets and forecasts support the overall Chicken strategy
• Ensure that CAPEX budgets support the prioritization of projects based on return on investment and risk and are in terms of the overall Chicken growth strategy
• Provide insight and interpret the impact of key cost drivers on profitability
• Provide reporting against budgets and forecasts and together with the Regional Executive team ensure that any over spend or under recovery are addressed

Capital investment
• Lead the commercial input for all new investment opportunities
• Evaluate capital investment projects as and when they arise by reviewing the financial indicators and ensuring that projects yield the required return
• Provide return on investment information to the Regional Executive team to assist with the prioritization of projects
• Identify sound investment opportunities for the business and communicate such to the appropriate role-players
• Lead the reporting of post implementation reviews to the business
• Cost control and management
• Continuously work the regional executive team to identify cost saving opportunities or areas where waste/inefficiencies can be eliminated and influence corrective action
• Drive decision-making in commercial contracts that will impact on and benefit the Business
• Together with the Agri Director, Regional Director and Commercial Executive -Chicken ensure that contract grower contracts and negotiations are commercially optimal
• Ensure that appropriate costs analysis is being performed across the entire value chain and Identify efficiencies to ensure maximum cost effectiveness Investigate major variances against budgets, forecasts and prior years Compile appropriate reports that highlight issues to management based on findings Implement uniform, standardized process and controls to manage costs and drive governance and accountability with regional teams
• Ensure that all expenditure is as per levels of authority

Regional Reporting
• Deliver accurate month end results are in terms with IFRS
• Perform comparative analyses of results to budget, forecast and last year to test accuracy and reasonableness.
• Oversee prompt resolution of queries / reconciling items.
• Assess the level of accruals held for operational expenditure each month to cover timing differences
• Provide monthly feedback on the financial performance of the region and clearly articulate the impact of Front-end performance, key KPIs and cost management Identify opportunities for value added reporting to improve the quality and content of reporting and messaging into senior management.
• Compile and analyze various reports for the month-end reporting as well as other ad hoc reports and presentations for leadership and Exec meetings
• Through regular review, ensure that there are no high risk audit exceptions for the attention of the audit committee Commercial Insight and Technical Expertise
• Oversee calculations, detailed analysis and associated recommendations emanating from any and all queries that arise as a result of changes in business operations, the economic climate or potentially might offer more profitable solutions.
• Provide expertise in executive team meetings and to internal clients and colleagues and recommend solutions based on insights and findings
• Provide practical and strategic commercial expertise and insights to external customers as part of regular engagement and ad hoc requests.
• Provide strategic commercial insight for new projects including the application of financial modelling tools such as discounted cash flows to evaluate the financial benefits and payback of new projects.
• Provide strategic commercial insight in the implementation of projects related to Operations

Governance Compliance
• Ensure compliance with IFRS, the Income Tax Act and Business-wide operational procedures internal controls
• Ensure national compliance with Capex application
• Ensure post implementation audits are completed and results are submitted and distributed accordingly Staff Leadership Lead and develop staff within the context of the Labour Relations Act, Employment Equity Act, Basic Conditions of Employment Act and the Skills Development Act.
• Monitor staff performance and provide regular feedback.
• Manage staff activities, ensuring service levels are met and protocols are adhered to.
• Coach and support staff where necessary to achieve objectives.
• Manage staff leave and general time management issues in line with organizational deliverables and standards.
• Manage and deliver on succession plans to enable the development of a future generation of leaders and specialists and ensure optimal turnover and retention levels are maintained.
• Champion staff training and development through the utilization of available training opportunities or contributing to the development of new training solutions in collaboration with national training specialists.
• Conduct regular performance appraisals with subordinates.
• Establish sound staff and labour organizing and communication structures and systems.
• Lead the team towards meeting the strategy and targets through regular communication and utilization of the full organizational talent management tool set.
• Develop and manage high performance multidisciplinary teams in order to solve problems within the commercial arena.
• Conduct regular meetings and ensure that records are kept and shared across the team and that action plans agreed to within team meetings are delivered upon.

Minimum Requirements
• CA or CIMA
• More than 10 years’ experience, including commercial costing, people management and some exposure to milling, agriculture, processing and/or manufacturing environments
• Experience in leading business / cross functional projects
• Excellent analytical and communication skills
• Ability to make an impact in a complex environment, manage parallel tasks and challenge pro-actively
• Strong integrity, objectivity and independence of judgment
• Ability to identify and define simplification and automation opportunities