Role – Secondment to Senior Sales Manager to progress to Sales Director in circa 24 months.Having successfully transformed the BD Living business I wanted to progress within Barratts and took the opportunity of a secondment to the North Midlands division to act as deputy to the Sales Director and be next in the succession plan in a 24 month period.Became key leader in the sales team to drive sales on daily and weekly basis managing 5 sales managers with 19 active outlets to continue to exceed forecast. Drives sales through daily contact with managers and directly with outlets. Review product availability, competitors and current incentives versus target margins. Review teams performances with managers including mystery shopping, lead conversion and site presentation.Set my own learning plan to cover all the departments. Built relationships with the incumbent directors and learnt about their departments and key relations and interactions to sales. Gained understanding of land and planning and technical functions and build functions with finance and commercial overview.Supporting and managing a goal orientated contract chase team. Targeted with exchanging contracts and taking deposits on all sales within tight timescales to legally secure sales. Drive progression with contracts and support team to enforce deadlines and influence actions to achieve exchange. A very high pressure environment at period ends.

BD Living is a Division of the Barratt and David Wilson house building group that provides fitted furniture and shopfitting services.I designed and led a change program for the business focusing on Customer Service, Right first time, direct labour structure, overheads and engagement and then introduced and implemented an ERP model and led GDPR adoption.GDPR: led the adoption of new standards to meet legislation and protect the business. Assessed all potential risks with a full review of usage and storage of data including identifying informal processes and closing potential short-cuts. Produced training and communication plans for managers to follow and feedback forums for staff.Right First Time: Set up a full process of measuring performance at all levels and making teams accountable. Engaged teams with structured meetings to target day to day and medium term performance with focus on customer service both internally and externally. Used Lean and other six sigma principles to reduce errors and wastage. Reduced WIP and improved on time delivery by changing production flow and bottle neck control. Non-productive costs were unsustainable and by organising the work flow and enforcing cut off times and accountability they were brought under control.Took the business from an engagement score of 45% with 35% participation to 68% with 88% participation. Much of this was achieved by a better run business but significant factors were introducing accountability, making time to listen to concerns with individuals and working groups and communicating how the business was improving.ERP: Led the introduction of Microsoft NAV as an ERP system to replace unstable and disjointed spreadsheets supported by offline and assumed working practices. It gave us visibility of inventory and predicted ordering patterns; the fitters and workshop moved from paper-based to electronic job cards. Customer satisfaction was improved through better visibility and simplification.

I volunteer as a Trustee (Vice-Chairman) on the Board of this local training based charity. The Charity is set up to provide training and education for predominatly engineering based occupations for young people and apprentices. They also provide comercial training for businesses in health and safety, FLT and other industrial areas.We set the targets and strategy of the business and ensure the performance of the management team. I have contributed to improving the operational function of the organisation.

Launched savings through purchasing on all three key raw material streams. Moved steel to JIT purchasing and increased frequency of deliveries to reduce order lead-times. Moved Plastic purchasing to consignment stock ensuring better credit terms and 100% availability. Changed board types from single colours to double sided on key lines to reduce stock holding and cost.Have led and implemented cost saving solutions for manpower including negotiating wage reductions and implementing numbers reductions while protecting the business and maintaining compliance with legal requirements. In this time I have reduced spend on recruitment agencies from £100k to £10k, streamlined the workforce creating a flexible team able to manage a £9 million turnover with a wage bill reduced by 25% and a flatter structure.Regularly review working practices to ensure maximum efficiency through lean working practices and modern manufacturing theories. Introduced new machinery on cost/benefit structures to improve output or to ensure continued legislative compliance. Implemented winter stock building programs to focus on adding ‘manpower value’ as opposed to traditional ‘material value’ resulting in similar value of WIP but reduced raw material usage.I manage the company’s goods vehicle operator’s licence ensuring full legal compliance for a fleet of 12 goods vehicles through strict disciplines. I oversee the planning and routing of vehicles and external carriers with up to 500 deliveries per week to minimise driver’s hours, fuel consumption and other costs in this area. Last year I changed the fleet structure to incorporate new types of vehicles to enable faster loading and reduced fuel consumption and am planning further innovative changes this year as vehicle leases expire.

I covered the South of England for this growing brand direct selling to independent and multiple stores including several national chains. I grew the business here by introducing new products to customers and broadening the ranges available in stores through marketing campaigns and in store promotion.

I was recruited to Wynnster to sell their standard range to a portfolio of outdoor shops in the midlands. I consistently hit my sales targets circa £750,000 and opened new business in new streams. In late 2006 the company took on the distribution of several premium brands including Karrimor and Zamberlan, I took on this role covering the South of England and national key accounts. I increased sales from £500,000 to £1.5 million by a targeted sales approach and actively selling benefits and maximising profit per item.

I started here on a fast track management training program and was running my own store in six months with a turnover of £500,000. I progressed through the business rapidly learning through frequent internal training courses to manage people, sell products and be responsible for all the P&L of the stores I managed. When I left in 2004 I was managing two of the company’s top ten stores in Birmingham and Nottingham with a combined turnover of £1.5 million. I achieved my bonus on bottom line profit every year.