Commercial Manager: Project | KZN - Rainbow Chicken

This position plays a key role in the commercial engagement within the business. The individual will be responsible for the ongoing advancement of a suite of commercial reporting that will provide meaningful insight, stimulate further discussion, and assist in focused strategic decision making all supporting a profitable bottom line.

The individual will drive the commercial case for Processing plant to maximise group opportunity, maintain consistency and take advantage of potential synergies.

Requirements:

• B.Com, CIMA or CA(SA)
• 5 - 7 years management accounting experience (articled or otherwise), people management and some exposure to processing or manufacturing environments

Key responsibilities:

Annual Budgeting and Quarterly/Monthly Forecasting

• Coordinate the annual budgeting and quarterly forecasting processes for the regional processing operations in accordance with the national time scheduling and guidelines.
• Consolidate regional Processing budgets and forecasts.
• Ensure completion and reasonableness of departmental budgets and forecasts.
• Ensure completion of regional Processing capex budgets, including collation of information and liaison with operations.
• Report key performance indicators on a daily/weekly/monthly basis.
• Report financial performance of the regional Processing function on a monthly basis in the agreed format that will include commentary on key performance areas.
• Calculate returns on investment for proposed budgeted capital projects in order to assist management with the prioritisation of capex, and ensuring that capital budgets are aligned with Group allocations of funds.
• Report the budgets and forecasts according to the formats supplied by National Office.
• Interpret the final outcome of the budgets and forecasts ensuring that they reflect the strategic objectives of the business and initiating changes where necessary.

Product Costing and Margin Improvement

• Maintain a close working relationship with the MACS team to ensure that the standard cost of various products are accurately maintained on the MACS system.
• Continuously analyse and audit the standard costs of products to ensure that they are accurately maintained and that they reflect the cost of the production processes.
• Analyse variance reports of actual cost vs. standard cost on a monthly basis and highlight variances to management.
• Maintain a close working relationship with the regional sales team highlighting cost changes in order for them to proactively take corrective action to optimise margins.
• Work with the Processing Team and Planning on unlocking profitable mix in the Region.
• Assist with the formulation and implementation of the optimal mix and resolution of stock which supports the overall national Customer strategy.

Cost Control

• Responsible for identifying wastages and costing inefficiencies in the production process, including stock management, raw material and ingredient consumption and ongoing monthly operational costs.
• Continuously work with Operations 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.
• 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
• Ensure that all expenditure is as per levels of authority.

Capex Management

• Identify capex opportunities to unlock profit of the operations within the context of Group capex requirements and strategy.
• Prepare and follow up on capex motivations.
• Review capex applications and ensure ROI requirements are met.
• Comply with capex applications and procure to payment processes (payments must comply with approved bills of work).
• Evaluate capex vs. maintenance decisions by applying company guidelines and accounting practices.

Stock Control

• Investigate raw material and finished goods stock variances and take corrective action.
• Assess the stock control procedures on a continuous basis ensuring proper internal controls.

Information and Data Management

• Ensure team members accurately and regularly capture data into the information system to enable access to reliable data and reporting for trend analysis and decision making.
• Share relevant data with management teams to enable reliable business decision making.

Financial Reporting and Governance

• Ensure compliance with IFRS, the Income Tax Act and Business-wide operational procedures internal controls.
• 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 and clearly articulate the impact of Processing performance, key KPIs and cost management.
• Identify opportunities for reporting to improve the quality and content of reporting and messaging into senior management.
• Compile and analyse various reports for the month-end reporting as well as other ad hoc reports and presentations to Senior leadership.
• Ensure compliance with Capex application policy.
• Through regular review, ensure that there are no high‑risk audit exceptions for the attention of the audit committee.
• Ensure post implementation audits are completed and results are submitted and distributed accordingly.

Functional Strategy into Action Contribution

• Work in conjunction with the Regional Commercial Executive, Regional Processing Executive and the Regional Director to co‑create the regional strategy, based on a 1 to 5 year view of requirements.
• Communicate operational capacity required over both the medium term and longer term plan, required asset utilisation and capex requirements for Processing processes accordingly.
• Work closely with the cross functional teams to ensure the delivery of an integrated supply‑chain benefit.
• Suggest improvements to annual functional Strategy into Action plan and participate in the compilation of the regional finance teams' contribution to the plan.
• Ensure that the agreed SIA is implemented through team targets and that these targets align cross functionally within area of responsibility.

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 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.

Staff Management

• 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 organisational 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 utilisation 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 organising and communication structures and systems.
• Lead the team towards meeting the strategy and targets through regular communication and utilisation of the full organisational talent management tool set.
• Drive employment equity within the team to ensure that diversity is achieved at all levels and that statutory targets and requirements are met.
• 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.

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