This role exists to strengthen Pernod Ricard’s commercial growth engine across Africa by improving market coverage, distributor capability, route-to-market effectiveness, trade investment efficiency and distributor financial performance. The Business Development Manager is responsible for developing and maintaining an efficient, commercially viable route-to-market strategy across Africa, with a core focus on business development, distributor capability and profitable market expansion. The role initiates, designs and implements distributor and market development programmes with sales teams, distributors and key stakeholders to improve universe coverage, sales force effectiveness, operational discipline, reporting quality and distributor financial performance. The role analyses market structures, distributor models, route-to-market performance, trade investment efficiency and distributor P&L dynamics, recommending changes where required to ensure the organisation and its partners are fit-for-purpose to capture growth opportunities across diverse African markets.

Key Duties and Responsibilities

1. Universe & Coverage Mapping and Territory Design

• Define, maintain and continuously improve market universe mapping across priority channels, customers, geographies and outlet segments.
• Identify coverage gaps, white-space opportunities and market development priorities by market, distributor and channel.
• Develop tools, templates and reporting routines to track reach, frequency, numeric distribution and quality of coverage.

2. Distributor Capability, Performance Review, & Assessment Frameworks

• Design and manage a structured distributor assessment programme covering operating standards, infrastructure, sales force capability, reporting discipline and KPI performance.
• Benchmark distributors against agreed standards and identify capability gaps, risks and development needs.
• Coordinate capability-building actions, induction and training programmes for distributor teams in partnership with sales, capability and market teams.

4. Sales Systems & Technology

• Improve sales reporting, master data quality and performance visibility across markets, distributors and channels.
• Support the adoption and effective use of sales automation, Power-BI and reporting tools where available.
• Translate sales, distributor and market data into clear insights, actions and follow-up routines.

5. Partner Management Frameworks

• Act as a key business development partner to markets, sales teams, distributors and cross-functional stakeholders.
• Define standards, principles and practical tools for effective distributor management and market development.
• Drive alignment, accountability and follow-through on agreed market and distributor development priorities.
• Partner with Trade Marketing to ensure route-to-market structures, distributor capability and market coverage support activation priorities, visibility objectives and commercial growth plans.

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6. Trade Incentive Frameworks & Commercial Governance

• Design and govern distributor, customer and sales force incentive frameworks that support profitable growth objectives.
• Establish principles, measurement methodologies and governance standards for incentive programmes.
• Assess effectiveness of incentive frameworks and recommend structural improvements to drive commercial performance, ensuring investment is linked to measurable outcomes.
• Partner with Trade Marketing and Sales teams to ensure incentive programmes are executed consistently and evaluated against agreed objectives and mechanics are simple, scalable and aligned to business priorities, and execution standards with ROI expectations.

7. Distributor P&L Review & Financial Performance

• Develop and maintain distributor P&L review routines to understand profitability, margin drivers, cost-to-serve and reinvestment capacity.
• Identify financial risks, efficiency opportunities and commercial actions required to improve distributor sustainability and market investment capability.
• Prepare clear scorecards, dashboards and recommendations to support management decisions on distributor development, investment and RTM priorities.

8. Distributor Development Projects

• Initiate, plan and manage distributor development projects that improve operational efficiency, execution capability, data quality, infrastructure and commercial performance.
• Work with markets and distributors to define project scope, milestones, owners, investment requirements and expected business impact.
• Track implementation, resolve barriers and report progress against agreed distributor development roadmaps.

Key Competencies and Experience

Key Competencies

• Strong business development, sales and route-to-market understanding
• Distributor management and capability-building experience
• Strong analytical capability with ability to translate complex data into practical actions
• Financial acumen, including distributor P&L, cost-to-serve, ROI and investment effectiveness
• Project and change management capability across multiple markets and stakeholders

Leadership & Behavioural

• Strong stakeholder influence and collaboration across markets, distributors and functions
• Ability to operate with structure and discipline in complex, diverse market environments
• Ownership, accountability and follow-through on agreed business development priorities
• Clear communication, business presentation and problem-solving skills

Experience & Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Business, Commerce, Marketing, Engineering or a related analytical field.
• +5 years’ experience in sales, business development, sales operations, distributor management or route-to-market roles, preferably within FMCG or beverage alcohol.
• Experience working with distributors, sales teams and/or commercial partners across multiple markets or complex environments.
• Strong Excel, reporting and analytical skills; familiarity with BI, sales automation or SFA tools is advantageous.
• Experience in project management, change management and cross-functional stakeholder engagement.
• Willingness to travel across Africa as required.