SSA Strategy Manager - JHB at Mondelez International

Key Responsibilities

Business Strategy and Insights

• Lead research and develosp insights, both quantitative and qualitative, analyse data to develop an understanding of the business environment
• Evaluate and define competitive landscape for new and existing competitors
• Package the insights in charts / reports / presentations and other outputs to communicate findings to key stakeholders
• Identify key business opportunities within the BU, articulate the business case and develop relevant solutions to solve complex problems across the BU
• Assist BUPO in preparation of key stakeholder meetings by providing relevant information and preparing presentations as required e.g. Bottler Conference, Annual Kick –Offs, Senior Group/ Corporate official visits
• Build value based and strategic “win-win” relationships with key stakeholders at all levels

Strategic Planning

• Develop the long term plan that will be implemented by reviewing and establishing strategic priorities and converts them to quantitative and actionable plans
• Ensure that current plans provide focus, improves operations, increases collaboration and sets priorities
• Identify the specific time and resources needed to meet business goal
• Align the long term roadmap with commercial programs from Marketing and Sales
• Use analytics for benchmarking initial results to measure long-term market trends which aid in making financial and resource decisions
• Identify gaps in the business and advice on the corrective actions necessary
• Enable innovation and creativity to develop new winning strategies
• Ensure that the long term ambitions are on track through managing project deliverables and business KPIs
• Collaborate with the senior executive leadership in setting the businesses' agenda and vision

Competitive assessment

• Track performance of current and emerging competitors and provide insights into their strategy, marketing, sales, investment, and choices and their plans across SSA
• Understand Competitor SWOT in the context of our current plan and future plan
• Enable strategic dialogue on competitors that may impact our business

Pricing Analytics

• Independently manage multiple Pricing Research or Price Pack Architecture Analyses based on identified priorities and needs in the SSA BU
• Utilize core PPA tools such as Mekko Charts, Threshold and Quartile analyses and run Pricing Simulators to flesh out and measure key PPA opportunities in SSA
• Provide regular PPA training support, communicate the capability resources available from Global CoE (e-learning modules etc.) to BU stakeholders
• Keep fully updated on how to use the Global Pricing & PPA tools and models developed by Global COE
• Identify KPIs to measure the implementation and usage of PPA, Pricing Tools and Strategic Analytic tools and processes.
• Identify opportunity areas and make recommendations

Strategic projects and questions

• Work on big and small strategic questions for the Business Unit that either develop / enable the long term roadmap, mitigate risks for the business
• Ensure collaboration on strategic projects with key business leaders and enable fast decision making

Communication:

• Communicate all learning and insights in a compelling way to drive action: Ensure presentations and reports are clear, timely and inspiring as well as actionable. Influence BU Teams. Build management confidence in recommended actions with appropriate interpretation and integration of key concepts.

Workshop & Activation:

• Set up detailed agenda, invite key stakeholders, arrange other logistics
• related to a debrief workshop to share and align on the learnings, recommendations which should be considered for short term (Annual Business Plans) and long term (Strategic 3-year Plans).
• This position requires a proactive, mature and self-reliant person who can always take the initiative and influence within a broad team environment.  
• Specific skills also include: Superior written and verbal communication skills.  A strong story-teller, a lucid and structured communicator, who makes their point clearly and persuasively.
• Must be able to handle numerous projects at one time and meet fast turnaround deadlines
• Advanced organizational skills
• A good balance between using empirical data and common sense and “gut feel”
• Prior knowledge and experience of the Mondelēz International organization, is preferred but not a requirement.
• Persuasive and stimulating ‘packaging’ and presentation of all materials is a significant part of the job, as is explaining/arguing/defending/developing the thinking in all meetings and communication scenarios.
• Balancing the ability to deliver with urgency with the ability of keeping momentum due to the reality that building capabilities is more of a marathon than a sprint
• Take, understand and establish project briefs, communicating and presenting to all parties to ensure the approach is supported, project managed, and excellence is achieved
• Become a respected internal source of knowledge on best practices

Knowledge & Skills:

• Min. Bachelor’s Degree (Social Science, Business Administration, Marketing, Statistics, Economics, preferred)
• MBA or MA in Social Science with concentration in research, marketing, quantitative analysis. PhD is a plus
• Min 5 years working experience in marketing research, Advanced Analytics preferably at an CPG or a FMCG company and 5 years in forecasting/business planning in increasing responsibility positions
• High analytical skills and wisdom/judgement to evaluate and improve delivery
• Strong knowledge of advanced analytics methods (Marketing Mix Econometric modelling, Forecasting Simulators, Price Pack Architecture / Pricing, Dashboarding, Innovation Incrementality. etc.)
• Able to synthesize data from different sources into a well-structured story with clear implications
• Has very good understanding of Pricing concepts – Price elasticity, demand & supply theory, role of pricing in relation to other marketing mix sales drivers
• Good interpersonal, intercultural and communication / influence skills
• Self-starter, comfortable working remotely and strongly influence & work with others in multiple locations
• Effective management skills to develop team and lead/contribute to project management of custom projects.
• Cross-country experience, demonstrated ability to work across cultures, and in remote teams
• Experience in using Nielsen Retail Audit database softwares (Answers, Nielsen Insight Studio) to extract data, prepare reports & dashboards
• Strong knowledge, capability & experience in Household Consumer Panel, Euromonitor & Media Databases
• Experience in working with advanced statistics
• Expert knowledge of business process, key functions, and leveragability of information
• Experience and ability to extract & work with finance data from Internal Financial systems