Interim Regional President, Commercial Markets — Proposition Renewal

A commercial leader who can say which proposition loses

The right candidate has, at some point, told a product team that its proposition would no longer receive sales and marketing effort, and made it stick. Your knowledge of telecommunications and technology comes from calls that were yours to make, among them a commitment without backing that you halted before it caused harm. You have worked where products and customer platforms had to keep running while leadership changed hands. You have declined to fund propositions that could not name their buyers or their downside, and then rebuilt the commercial capacity the stronger propositions needed.

That experience was gained where revenue reached $615 million or more, headcount 1,400 or more, and operations crossed two countries at least. The committee weighs restructuring, professionalisation and buy-side M&A; acquisitions in particular tend to leave a portfolio with overlapping propositions that someone must rationalise. Commercial economics at level 4 is the leading capability; revenue architecture, managing the board and stakeholders, and channel partnerships are each expected at level 3. Anyone uneasy about telling a proposition's champions that it will now receive less selling effort should not take this on.

The allocations you will make

Commercial capacity means the people and budget that sell, market and support a proposition. It is always scarcer than the propositions competing for it. As interim Regional President, reporting to the Board Commercial Committee, you hold executive authority to allocate it. You will decide where the regional line falls between local leaders' calls and yours, choose the evidence by which propositions compete for budget and people in both countries, and rule on which customer propositions and inherited commitments keep their place. You can stop a proposal that leaves its cost with nobody and decline investment whose case assumes customers will buy, ignores what it depends on or never prices the downside. How the leadership is organised, and the route disputes take to you, are also yours to approve.

A year of moving capacity to demand

Within the first ninety days, criteria for allocating commercial capacity across propositions should be agreed with the Board Commercial Committee, with an accountable leader for each proposition. Around month nine each proposition should have kept its capacity, waited or been closed against those criteria, and capacity moved to the ones with evidenced demand. By month 12 the proposition portfolio should be renewed and reviewed regularly, with regional leaders owning the allocation of capacity.

Ranking propositions in front of the people who decide

The Board Commercial Committee opens the process in week one with a confidential call by video. Week three is a working session with the Audit Committee Chair on the evidence you would use to rank propositions. Week five is a panel of executives, met in person, who lead the company's functions, and week seven a discussion with the full board of directors. A written reply follows every stage within 3 working days.