Position: Senior Vice President, Direct Sales Job Description: The Senior Vice President, Direct Sales is responsible to develop and lead the direct sales team. Included in this oversight is the go-to market strategies, execution to grow market and wallet share through new customer sales, growth of current customer volume/services, and amplified customer experience and retention. This role will be responsible for building and leading the entire direct sales organization while creating market and customer value. This role is a key member of the Commercial senior leadership team. It is imperative that the Senior Vice President, Direct Sales shares the passion and commitment for leading change that has been embraced by the Executive Leadership team. This individual must be a dynamic commercial leader with the ability to successfully execute the sales goals that will take the company to the next level of growth. However, this will only be accomplished by a team player, a team builder trusted by other corporate teammates, and an accomplished leader of people. Core Responsibilities & Duties: + Translate strategic vision into an aligned and executable operating plan. Ensure the alignment of initiatives to drive profitable revenue growth through growing with customers that know us, finding and selling new customers that can benefit from our services, growing our reach, leveraging technology and data, and finally uniting the team and simplifying our processes. + Responsible for the implementation and achievement of the Commercial mission, goals and financial objectives. Develop long-term plans and budgets, monitor progress, and evaluate performance. + Align the Sales organization’s objectives through active participation in corporate strategic planning, sales strategy development, forecasting, sales resource planning, and budgeting. + Accountable for effective sales organization design, including sales job roles, sales channel, Sales incentive structure, and sales resource deployment. + Meets assigned targets for profitable revenue growth, new market share, and other key financial KPI’s + Leads sales organization learning and development initiatives and provides stewardship of sales/sales management talent. + Governs the sales organization’s performance, establishing and managing performance metrics for all sales jobs. + Fosters a culture of accountability, professional development, high performance, and ethical behavior. + Leads sales organization change initiatives by continuously assessing the need for change to meet industry environments. + Build and deliver compelling presentations to both customer teams and Forward’s ELT. + Establish and maintains productive Customer engagement experiences and relationships at all levels of hierarchy + Manage sales pipeline to ensure accurate and adequate lead inflow to reach targeted sales objectives + Cultivate a culture of performance. + Should be a magnet for talent. Attract, build, train, motivate, and lead the Sales team to deliver exceptional growth for the team, customers, the company, and shareholders. + Be a great ambassador for the company and attend relevant networking and speaking events. + Other duties as assigned Professional Experience/Qualifications: The desired candidate will be an experienced Sales executive whose career has a distinguished progression in Sales roles, and may also include Marketing, Product or Sales Operations. The successful candidate is an individual with a strong “leadership presence” who works well and engages at all levels of the organization. The candidate is assertive and self-confident, and able to provide a leading role both internally and externally. Additionally, s/he will have an eye for the bottom-line impact of decisions or strategies. The right Candidate will be energetic, resourceful and a hands-on individual with a strong service orientation and bias for action, someone who commits himself/herself fully to the job and who is dedicated to the company’s strategic direction. The ideal candidate will be known as a highly collaborative and results-oriented leader, a change agent who brings a strong point of view yet can drive towards collective ownership of ideas for the good of the business. The candidate must be a strong communicator and influencer who possesses professional maturity and credibility with little ego. S/he should also have a healthy respect for the Forward brand and heritage. The Successful Senior Vice President, Direct Sales will have: + Bachelor’s degree in a relevant discipline, master's degree or MBA + Results oriented with relevant industry experience in revenue generation, building and growing a dynamic and high performing sales team and delivering on financial expectations. + A propensity for data analysis, systematic thinking and building simplified frameworks to ensure speed in execution. + Demonstrates collaborative leadership that builds consensus with key stakeholder leaders across the entire enterprise. + Expert in consultative and solution-based selling along with superior customer relationship management skills. + Ability to manage complex selling relationships. + Experience in engaging C-suite and senior management professionals + Proven experience with an extensive network and a successful track record in commercial leadership + Demonstrated strategic, organizational, and financial planning and execution skills. + The ability to work positively and collaboratively with the senior leadership teams and the executive leadership team + Exceptional market based business and financial acumen including the ability to explain business models, financial performance, forecasts, headcount models, ROI, etc + Outstanding verbal and written skills, and experience working with staff on all levels Leadership Characteristics: The ideal leader will be an engaging and collaborative executive with good listening skills, but a decisive style. With all of this must come a hands-on, detailed, action-oriented personality and style. S/he will have demonstrated the ability to provide a solid and approved vision to drive execution using wise judgement and inspiring trust. Stylistically, this person should be savvy, highly credible and collaborative with a partnering mindset across the company. The Senior Vice President, Direct Sales will possess the following characteristics and skills: + Proven Change Agent: Desire and ability to lead by bringing bold thought leadership to the sales teams. An inspiring leader who communicates passion, energy, and excitement with high emotional intelligence. + Broad Business Perspective: Exceptional strategic skills and the ability to balance intuitive and analytical. Has the proven ability to blend high level strategic skills with short-term focused initiatives. + Strong Relationship Builder, Communicator, and Influencer: An outstanding relationship builder with strong communication skills who can articulate concepts, initiatives, and goals with clarity to a range of constituents. Significant team-building experience with proven success in developing strong relationships throughout an organization and achieving buy-in across various constituencies. + Innovation Mindset - Providing support and vision for the IT teams relationship with the Operating leadership teams, ultimately driving precise cross department collaboration with proper resourcing, vision, and aligned goals. Forward Air is an Equal Opportunity employer. About Us Since 1990, Forward Air has been a leading provider of ground transportation and related logistics services to the North American air freight and expedited LTL market. We offer surface shipping on an accelerated “time-definite” basis, delivering cargo at a specific time, but under less time-sensitive situations – supplying you with a cost effective, reliable alternative to air transportation. We work with companies of all sizes to develop tangible advantages and build the best products to meet your specific needs. Forward Air presents to the wholesale transportation community (logistics companies, freight forwarders, integrated air cargo carriers, passenger/ cargo airlines, and non-traditional shippers), a single-source provider that can deliver more supply chain services and a superior menu of choices. Throughout the years we have added supplementary lines to our linehaul service, such as full truckload operations (Truckload Services), final-mile coverage (Complete® Cartage), and an Airline Logistics program, and we will continue to expand our services to meet the changing needs and growth of our customer base. Forward Air is structured to optimize both savings and service to our customers. Direct partnerships with owner-operators and other surface transportation providers, enable us to remain cost-competitive. The Forward Air network is designed with over 90 facilities located at or near major U.S. and Canadian airports, 12 regional sort centers and over 300 beyond points (secondary airports provided through our Complete Cartage service), creating one of the most comprehensive linehaul networks in the industry. Ranked 3rd in Newsweeks 2022 "Americas Most Trustworthy Companies (https://www.newsweek.com/americas-most-trustworthy-companies-2022/transport-logistics-packaging) " publication About the Team