Commercial Excellence Manager - FMCG

Location: Dubai
Salary: AED 23,000 - 30,000

Job Code: 210/001/590
Industry: FMCG / Food Distribution

Job Brief:

Our client is seeking an experienced Commercial Excellence Manager – FMCG to drive commercial execution, strengthen distributor performance, improve sales productivity, and support profitable growth across the GCC, Pakistan, and Bangladesh.

The role focuses on hands-on Go-to-Market (GTM) and Route-to-Market (RTM) execution, sales operations, pricing strategy, commercial profitability, unit economics, and competitor benchmarking.

The successful candidate will work closely with country teams, distributors, and Finance to identify performance gaps, implement practical improvements, and ensure sustainable commercial results.

This is a market-facing position requiring extensive and frequent travel across the assigned markets, with substantial involvement in distributor operations, sales teams, and customer engagement.

Job Responsibilities:

Go-to-Market (GTM) and Route-to-Market (RTM) Excellence

Translate regional commercial priorities into practical, market-specific execution plans covering channel priorities, outlet segmentation, distribution expansion, product assortment, sales coverage, and execution standards.
Assess distributor structures, sales territories, route plans, call frequencies, and resource allocation to identify gaps in market coverage and sales productivity.
Work with country teams to implement improvements in route-to-market effectiveness and sales operations.
Conduct regular market visits, joint sales calls, and outlet audits to evaluate product availability, distribution, visibility, merchandising, pricing, and promotional compliance.
Convert market findings into corrective actions with clear responsibilities and deadlines.
Establish consistent distributor performance reviews, execution scorecards, and follow-up routines.
Coach sales teams on effective execution practices and ensure distributor capabilities and incentives support commercial objectives.
Analyse sell-in, available sell-out data, distributor inventory, and field observations to distinguish sustainable demand growth from stock loading.
Coordinate with country teams and Supply Chain to address product availability gaps, slow-moving inventory, and execution risks.

Pricing Strategy and Commercial Discipline

Develop and implement pricing frameworks covering list-price structures, channel and customer pricing guidelines, discount parameters, distributor margins, and trade terms.
Work closely with regional leadership, country teams, and Finance to ensure consistent pricing policies and commercial discipline.
Monitor actual selling prices, discounts, rebates, promotional expenditure, and other commercial concessions.
Identify price leakage, inconsistent pricing practices, and opportunities to improve net revenue.
Evaluate proposed price changes and promotions against competitor positioning, customer and channel economics, expected volume effects, and margin objectives.
Maintain clear pricing approval processes and track outcomes following implementation.

Unit Economics and Profitable Growth

Partner with Finance to assess commercial profitability by SKU, pack size, customer, channel, distributor, and market.
Analyse net revenue, landed product costs, trade investment, and cost-to-serve using consistent commercial definitions.
Identify margin dilution and recommend improvements to product mix, channel mix, promotional activities, order profiles, service requirements, and commercial terms.
Challenge commercial activities that generate revenue without adequate contribution margins.
Evaluate the commercial viability of new product listings, distribution expansion, product launches, and customer proposals.
Assess distributor and retailer economics to ensure margins and incentives support sustainable business growth.

Competitor Benchmarking and Market Intelligence

Monitor competitor pricing, pack sizes, price per comparable unit, product assortment, promotions, distribution coverage, shelf presence, and channel propositions.
Identify competitive gaps and market opportunities and recommend practical commercial responses.
Evaluate whether implemented actions improve market execution, competitiveness, and profitability.
Gather market intelligence through legitimate market observations, public information, and appropriate customer feedback.
Distinguish verified market information from estimates and avoid exchanging confidential commercial information with competitors.

Sales Performance Management and Capability Development

Maintain regional commercial dashboards covering market execution, sales productivity, pricing, and profitability.
Conduct regular performance reviews and ensure agreed actions are implemented and completed.
Develop practical sales tools, execution playbooks, and training programmes for country and distributor teams.
Share effective commercial practices across markets while adapting implementation to local distribution channels and operating requirements.
Work closely with regional commercial leaders, Finance, Marketing, Supply Chain, distributor principals, and distributor sales teams.
Lead regional commercial excellence initiatives while coordinating implementation with country management and operating within approved commercial authorities.

Job Requirements:

Typically 7–10 years of relevant FMCG experience, ideally within food distribution.
Substantial hands-on experience in commercial excellence, sales operations, GTM/RTM, distributor management, or regional sales management.
Strong GCC market experience is required.
Direct market exposure to Pakistan and/or Bangladesh is a significant advantage, particularly in distributor-led and general-trade environments.
Demonstrated success in improving field execution, sales productivity, distributor performance, distribution coverage, pricing, or contribution margins.
Practical experience in pricing strategy, trade investment, commercial profitability analysis, and unit economics.
Strong understanding of FMCG distribution models, sales territories, outlet segmentation, and distributor management.
Strong Excel and commercial analytical skills.
Experience with business intelligence tools, sales management systems, or distributor management systems is desirable.
A degree in Business, Finance, Economics, or a related discipline, or equivalent relevant professional experience.
Fluent business English is essential.
Additional regional language capabilities are advantageous.
Strong commercial judgement, analytical skills, communication, and stakeholder management abilities.
Ability to influence country teams and distributor partners, drive accountability, and implement sustainable commercial improvements.
Comfortable combining detailed commercial analysis with hands-on market execution.
Willingness and ability to undertake extensive and frequent regional travel across the GCC, Pakistan, and Bangladesh are essential.

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