Associate Director of Business Development at BioLite

This Role:

New Business Development:

• In close collaboration with the Business Development Director, Management, and the Carbon Team, will lead all new clean cooking business development opportunities.
• Lead the business development priorities across Partnerships, Geographies, and Clean Cookstoves product verticals.
• Leverage market insights and networks to find and track high-potential new distribution partners across Africa and Asia.
• Identify and initiate relationships with these partners, influence decision makers at various levels inside the partners’ organization and mature these leads to successful partnerships. Strategically maintain and grow a network of potential key partnerships through calls/video meetings, events, relationships with professional bodies, customer/field visits etc.
• Lead and manage (direct reports) a team of 3-4 Business Development/Key Account Managers and overall team responsibility of ~10 people.

Manage existing Key Partnerships

• Work with Management and Business Development Director to support key Clean Cooking Distributor Partnerships across multiple geographies.
• Build and maintain trust and rapport with existing partners.
• Project Manage all key aspects of key partnerships internally (i.e., responsible for tracking key deliverables across departments (e.g., Ops, Tech, Marketing, Finance)) and externally (i.e., be the ”go to” contact for partners).
• Examples: meet with key BioLite distributors to co-develop new go-to-market strategies and help BioLite deliver more value to these distributors.
• Lead and manage a team of Business Development and Key Account Managers.
• Work closely with BioLite’s Carbon Team around data collection and program implementation.
• Forecast responsibility.

Cross-functional communication and processes:

• Work with the Operations Department to ensure successful, on-time delivery to partners.
• Work with the Finance Department to ensure on-time payment from partners.
• Work with the Marketing Department to determine marketing initiatives required to convert new partners.
• Work with the Carbon Department to ensure successful progress of BioLite’s Carbon activities.
• Work on continuously improving cross department processes and communication efficiency.
• Collect partner feedback on products to inform the product development team on market trends and customer preferences.

Reporting:

• Build and manage sales forecasts on a weekly basis and report to the management team on progress and challenges during weekly sales meetings.
• Populate CRM with info to vet prospective key partnerships and track communication and minutes of meeting with relevant potential key partnerships and opportunities.

Other Info:

• Expected 30-40% travel time across Africa.

QUALIFICATIONS AND EXPERIENCE REQUIRED:

• More than 7 years of experience in a similar role/position in the industry or relevant adjacent industries
• Experience in and demonstrable track record managing, training, and supporting a senior business development team
• Ability to produce and present professional strategy, reports, accurate forecasts, and channel sales plans
• Network of business and institutional contacts in the clean cooking and carbon industries
• Strong communication and presentation skills in English
• Strong Excel and PowerPoint skills