From classifying the enquiry to owning the marketing recommendation

Mandate

Connect segment selection and public propositions with the service the business can credibly arrange.

Outcomes

• Supported a review of eighty-four tender invitations: thirty-two declined, fifty-two submitted and nine awards recorded.
• Published a selected 640-shipment evidence account with 608 deliveries inside the original window and later amendments separately described.
• Redirected US$120,000 of a US$420,000 exhibition allocation into buyer decision materials, retaining US$300,000 for one event.
• Kept the 2026 industrial-parts investigation open at fifteen of twenty-four interviews, without announcing a launch.

Decisions in context

My appointment brought responsibility for the whole marketing recommendation, including occasions when the attractive prospect list exceeded the operating proposition. I report to the chief executive and work with the chief operating officer on service evidence, while sales and finance retain bid and pricing responsibilities. The current team comprises twenty-eight employees through five direct reports; six agency personnel are additional. My US$8.4 million authority is for calendar 2026, not a statement of total freight expenditure. The tender-selection review, shipment note and buyer-material programme show different uses of that remit. Each contains a decision with an alternative and a limit on what its outcome establishes. I have presented to the board since January 2020 without serving as a director. The continuing industrial-parts research is deliberately left unfinished in this record because a current executive account should distinguish an investigation in progress from a concluded market-entry decision.

Reason for the move

Current appointment; any future role would require an agreed transition and a clear commercial remit.

Mandate

Make the commercial proposition usable across several participants in larger shipper buying discussions.

Outcomes

• Reorganised eight proposal packs into three audience-specific sets with a shared factual account.
• Used fourteen account discussions to test whether the revised material answered the intended buying questions.
• Established four scheduled annual reviews of segment-programme priorities.

Decisions in context

I moved from developing individual markets to comparing the marketing effort assigned across them. By the end of 2019, twenty-two employees reported through four direct reports and US$5.6 million annual programme authority was in scope. The employer's US$390 million gross shipper billings described its scale, not revenue that my team owned. Eight proposal packs had evolved separately and did not always help different buying participants understand the same arrangement. We developed three audience-specific sets and tested them through fourteen account discussions. The work required operating review as well as editorial judgement. Four scheduled annual priority reviews gave segment expenditure a recurring forum instead of allowing the previous programme to define the next one automatically. The CMO appointment followed because I was ready to own the wider marketing recommendation, including the decision to stop or narrow activity when its commercial basis was insufficient.

Reason for the move

Promoted to chief marketing officer in January 2020, with direct chief-executive reporting.

Mandate

Build an account-selection practice that joined market opportunity with operating assessment.

Outcomes

• Combined three regional prospect lists into one reviewed account register.
• Examined forty-five accounts in the initial selection exercise.
• Introduced six shared review questions for marketing, sales and operating participants.

Decisions in context

This was a functional director appointment and carried no board membership. I led sixteen employees through four direct reports by December 2015, with US$3.2 million annual authority. The immediate challenge was that three regional lists described opportunity in different ways. Bringing them into one reviewed register did not mean imposing a single numerical score on every customer. We examined forty-five accounts and used six shared questions to make the reasons for interest or hesitation discussable across functions. I learned to distinguish the appeal of an account name from the suitability of the proposed freight. The register recorded a judgement at a particular time and could change when the requirement or our proposition changed. Promotion into commercial marketing widened my responsibility from developing this practice to comparing the resources committed to different segments and the materials supporting their buying discussions.

Reason for the move

Appointed vice-president of commercial marketing from January 2016.

Mandate

Explain the brokerage's sector propositions without implying ownership of carrier operations.

Outcomes

• Developed six sector briefs with operating input.
• Released four briefs and withheld two while service questions remained unresolved.
• Organised twelve proposition discussions between marketing and operating colleagues.

Decisions in context

Joining Selverton required me to learn a business that arranged transportation rather than owning the fleet described in the customer's shipment request. I could not carry assumptions from industrial distribution into that model. The role grew to eleven employees through three direct reports and US$1.8 million annual authority by May 2011. Six sector briefs were developed with operating input; four were released and two held back pending unresolved service questions. Twelve proposition discussions helped colleagues understand why withholding a brief could be a responsible commercial decision rather than an editorial delay. I also learned to specify what would make a withheld proposition usable. The move into market development added responsibility for choosing where the proposition should be taken, not only describing it accurately. That transition began the account-selection work that later became central to my CMO judgement.

Reason for the move

Advanced to director of market development in June 2011 after establishing the sector-brief practice.

Mandate

Make campaign categories more useful to the way industrial buyers selected maintenance products.

Outcomes

• Reworked twelve overlapping campaign categories into seven buying situations.
• Held nine joint category sessions with sales colleagues.
• Prepared five revised segment briefs without changing the underlying product specifications.

Decisions in context

My first management appointment gave me responsibility for people and programme expenditure, as well as research interpretation. By May 2004, seven employees worked through two team leads and the annual authority was US$900,000. Twelve campaign categories had accumulated around internal product distinctions. We reorganised them into seven buying situations and prepared five segment briefs, while keeping the product specifications intact. Nine sessions with sales made the change practical rather than purely editorial. I learned that a clearer customer explanation can still disrupt the categories colleagues use to organise their own work. The discussion therefore needed their knowledge, not just their acceptance of new copy. Moving to Selverton offered a different commercial model and a larger proposition remit. I chose it to learn how the relationship between a promise and its delivery changed when the company arranged a service through other operators.

Reason for the move

Moved to Milwaukee in June 2004 to develop freight propositions at Selverton.

Mandate

Classify customer enquiries and develop useful category evidence for the research manager.

Outcomes

• Reviewed 720 historical purchase enquiries.
• Prepared twenty quarterly category summaries across the five-year appointment.
• Accompanied sixteen customer visits to understand buying and receiving responsibilities.

Decisions in context

I joined after completing my business degree in May 1992. The work was an individual research contribution inside a nine-person group, with no direct reports or budget authority. Reviewing 720 historical enquiries taught me to preserve the customer's stated problem before assigning it to an internal category. I prepared twenty quarterly summaries during the five-year appointment and accompanied sixteen customer visits. Those visits made the difference between ordering, choosing and using a product more concrete than the records alone could do. I was not responsible for the company's US$82 million sales in 1996, and this early role should not be read as a retrospective claim to executive scope. The promotion in June 1997 added staff leadership and spending responsibility. It allowed me to test whether the research distinctions I had developed could help a team make better practical choices about segment communication.

Reason for the move

Promoted to segment marketing manager in June 1997.