Senior Manager, Commercial Sales EMEA in Newcastle upon Tyne

Advanced Navigation is the world’s most determined innovator in AI robotics and navigation technologies across land, air, sea and space applications. Founded on a culture of research and discovery, Advanced Navigation's mission is to be the catalyst of the autonomy revolution. Fields of expertise include artificial intelligence, underwater sonar, GNSS, radio frequency systems, inertial sensors, robotics, quantum sensors and photonics.

The Head of Sales, Commercial – EMEA is responsible for driving and scaling revenue across all commercial verticals in the EMEA region (e.g. robotics & autonomy, survey & mapping, marine, agriculture, and other industrial applications). Operating as a player-coach, this role carries direct personal sales responsibility for a portfolio of strategic accounts while also leading, coaching and developing a small team of Business Development / Account Executives to build a scalable, repeatable commercial sales engine across the territory.

Location: Newcastle Upon Tyne, or REMOTE from other areas of Europe.

Role & Responsibilities:

• Own the EMEA commercial sales number – personally carrying a quota and closing strategic/key accounts, while also being accountable for total team attainment.
• Lead, coach and develop a team of Business Development / Account Executives – setting territory and account plans, running pipeline reviews, and building individual development plans.
• Design and execute the EMEA commercial go-to-market strategy across target verticals, in partnership with the Sales Director, EMEA and global Sales leadership.
• Research and identify key growth verticals, programs and accounts for our products/solutions portfolio outside of the defence sector across the region.
• Identify and develop strategic partnerships, channel and distribution relationships that accelerate commercial growth across EMEA.
• Build and maintain a rolodex of key relationships across target industries, including economic buyers, technical decision-makers and channel partners.
• Drive top-line revenue and orders by expanding existing accounts, acquiring new logos, and driving cross-sell/upsell across the team's book of business.
• Own end-to-end forecasting and pipeline accuracy for the EMEA commercial team, ensuring linearity and predictability of the business.
• Partner closely with Marketing, Sales Operations, Products Group, Support and Operations to improve go-to-market execution and acceleration of growth.
• Understand customer technical requirements and work closely with Support and the Products Group to guide product direction and roadmap input.
• Ensure operational excellence by keeping the CRM (Salesforce / MS Dynamics) consistently updated across the team, guaranteeing forecasting accuracy and business linearity.
• Recruit, onboard and ramp new team members as the EMEA commercial team scales.
• Develop a solid operational understanding of all aspects of the Company, immersing yourself into the wider organisation to understand how each team contributes to the strategic vision.
• Live by our values – setting quantifiable targets that demonstrate commitment to our values.
• Live & breathe a safety culture; be an advocate for safety within the workplace; remain compliant with all HSE requirements & obligations.

Key Measures:

• Team and individual quota attainment against target.
• Timely management and conversion of inbound leads and enquiries.
• Development and health of pipeline for new business and existing accounts, across the team.
• Progression of opportunities through the sales funnel and conversion of pipeline to orders.
• Forecast accuracy and business linearity across the EMEA commercial team.
• Team development – ramp time, retention and performance of direct reports.
• Collaboration with the wider Advanced Navigation team.

Behavioral Attributes for Success:

• Leading & Developing Others – Building the capability of the team through coaching, feedback and development planning; creating an environment where team members are motivated to perform and grow.
• Organising Self – Effectively managing own time and resources to ensure that work is prioritised effectively and delivered on time in line with the requirements of the team and business.
• Maintaining Positive Energy – Being relentless. Operating with a positive attitude, vigour and determination in the face of challenging situations, consistently maintaining high levels of effectiveness and productivity throughout.
• Delivering Excellence – Setting high standards of performance for self and others; assuming responsibility and accountability for successfully completing assignments or tasks; self-imposing standards and expectations of excellence rather than having standards imposed.
• Communication – Conducting positive and open interactions with others by conveying information and ideas clearly and concisely in an engaging manner that helps them understand and retain the message; listening actively to others and sharing proactively information.
• Decision Making – Identifying and understanding problems and opportunities relevant to role by gathering and analysing quantitative and qualitative information; generating and evaluating alternatives, identifying the best course of action, and making timely decisions within own decision making scope.
• Initiating Action – Taking proactive and independent action to accomplish work goals; taking prompt action to achieve results beyond what is required; anticipating and addressing problems without being prompted.
• Leveraging Feedback – Taking full advantage of opportunities to receive and explore feedback about own performance; responding favourably to feedback and using it constructively to deliver outcomes and improve knowledge, skills and behaviours.

Qualifications:

• 7+ years of experience in business development, sales and account management within a commercial technology/high-tech solutions environment.
• 2+ years of experience directly leading, coaching or mentoring a sales team, ideally in a player-coach capacity.
• Experience selling navigation solutions into one or more of the following: robotics/autonomous systems, survey & mapping, marine/marine autonomy, agriculture, industrial or other technology-led commercial verticals.

Skills:

• Proven ability to lead, coach and develop a small sales team while continuing to personally carry and deliver against a quota.
• Deep expertise in selling high-precision navigation and positioning solutions into commercial market segments, with a demonstrated ability to articulate the value proposition of Advanced Navigation’s technology to diverse industrial applications.
• Strong interpersonal skills – the ability to engage with customers and internal stakeholders at all levels, including C-suite.
• The ability to build and execute a go-to-market strategy across multiple verticals and navigate a complex, multi-stakeholder buying process.
• Strong sales skills, with the understanding of how to qualify a prospective customer and progress them through the sales cycle in a structured and methodical way.
• Business development skills – the ability to develop a pipeline of opportunities from scratch across new and existing verticals.
• Refined negotiation and closing skills.
• Opportunity analysis and development.
• Excellent communication and writing skills with the ability to be both technical and analytical.
• The ability to adapt to a fast-changing environment, international cultures, and distributed teams.
• Strong self-organisation and planning skills – the ability to set objectives, build a sales plan and execute effectively, both individually and as a team.
• Strong skills with Salesforce CRM, including forecasting and pipeline management.

Experience:

• Proven experience building and scaling a commercial sales function, ideally within a high-growth technology company.
• Extensive experience selling within the EMEA region.
• Experienced in remote and in-person selling and team leadership across a distributed, multi-country territory.
• Track record of consistent quota attainment, both individually and as a people leader.