Candidates interviewed by RJM come from sales, business development, key account management and operations backgrounds basing their careers in industry specialisations including 3PL, warehousing, sea freight, airfreight and e-commerce.
Employers have multiple career opportunities and the market is crying out for sales, key account and business development professionals who have additional experience in on boarding new clients so are also operational savvy. Hot spot areas include warehouse fulfilment , e-commerce logistics and last mile delivery. Employers seek candidates who take a solution sales approach, have a track record in building customer relationships, embrace technology, problem solving and continuous improvement opposed to traditional 3 PL approached which have now grown obsolete. The market is seeing a far more humanistic and informal approach across the board including interaction with senior management, colleagues and customers as a preferred and more effective option to building fruitful relationships.
Candidates who have developed sales track records in the above areas over the last 3-5 years are eager to step up to official management roles. Many feel they are being held in their current positions for revenue generating purposes only which denies them career development opportunities. Many sales professionals who have built up solid track records and career achievements are often faced with the following:
Having to hand over their customers accounts to operation teams after 12 months seems to be a market norm yet neither the candidate or the customers want to be separated.
Limited /capped commission schemes that does not remunerate a candidate’s true contribution to their employer’s business
Having a limited range of supply chain products to sell to their customer portfolios often making candidates feel like they are under serving them
Candidates are valuing honesty more so then ever before preferring to be told how it is rather than sugar coating a situation. Many have decided to seek career opportunities elsewhere after having promises broken by their current employer on multiple occasions.
Junior sales candidates in this space are tasked with sales targets of 500-750 k gbp per annum, more senior candidates are tasked with 1 M - 3 M GBP per annum while managing teams and coaching rookies
Candidates are being offered lucrative packages in this space including guaranteed compensation commission for walking away from their current portfolios , life time commission on new accounts developed with an increase in base salary and bonuses as normal to apply. This is due to the shortage of talent in the space and an overwhelming demand outweighing supply.
To discuss the supply chain talent pool market reach out to Robert - founder and managing director at RJM - rjmaguire@rjm-associates.com