Director, Sales Operations & Fulfillment

• Responsible for directing the efforts of the Customer Finance/Sales Operations and Order Fulfillment teams providing leadership and shared goals in the collaboration of the two groups.
• Provide day-to-day oversight and strategic direction to the Customer Finance team toward its primary objective of providing customer quotes in accordance with field sales requests and company policies in a responsive, accurate and consultative manner.
• Direct the fulfillment team toward achieving its primary objective of ensuring customer orders are fulfilled timely, efficiently and accurately.
• Work with Corporate Counsel and other functions to maintain the company’s Standard Terms, Order Form, Order Policy, Statement of Work and other sales related documentation in manner that is consistent with the company’s philosophy on its commercial relationships with customers.
• Participate in the RFP process by providing and completing key corporate information, as well as providing any vendor exceptions to the RFP terms and conditions.
• Develop and enhance the methodology, processes, and procedures of the team and successfully integrate those methods and processes into other work groups such as Sales and Services.
• Proactively work to identify process improvements and/or systems automation to achieve continuous improvements in service levels, efficiency and effectiveness
• Accomplish departmental objectives by clearly and frequently communicating performance expectations; planning, monitoring and appraising results; coaching and counseling team members; and initiating, coordinating and assisting with day-to-day execution as needed.
• Significant accountability to ensure that the Customer Finance & Operations team is highly valued by, and integrated with, all other customer facing work groups within PLATO.

EDUCATION and/or EXPERIENCE

• BA/BS in Business, or related field
• 8-10 years of experience in Sales Operations working directly with field sales; finance and/or contracts experience a signficant plus
• Demonstrated experience providing responsive service, under pressure on short timelines
• Minimum of 5 years experience managing a team
• Previous experience with CRM software

KNOWLEDGE, SKILLS & ABILITIES

• Proven leadership skills in establishing vision and goals and implementing process improvements.
• Understanding of legal contracts and terms and conditions associated with it.
• Ability to resolve issues and provide solutions in customer facing activity
• Recognize and understand financial concepts in the context of sales quoting and order process. This would relate to discounting and application of promotional pricing
• Ability to balance sales requests /priorities with order recognition while maintaining financial integrity and policy assurance. Partnering sales and finance for a win-win solution.
• Ability to provide superior customer service to the sales organization by being responsive in nature and having the ability to multi-task.
• Ability to work under pressure, manage deadlines and react professionally in fire drill situations.

• Demonstrated ability to select, organize, lead, participate and facilitate a team to produce results.
• Demonstrated ability to work independently and then train, guide, or assist others to perform complex assignments; solid project management skills
• Experience in managing a team and motivating them to successful, measurable outcomes
• Excellent analytical, troubleshooting, decision making, organizational, time management, persuasion, and communication skills.

·         Problem solving skills, solution oriented; identify and suggest solutions.

• Proven ability to manage budgets with proper resource allocations
• Proficiency with Internet and Microsoft Office products

KEY ATTRIBUTES

• Passionate.  Demonstrates a passion for business, excellence, continuous improvement and high performance in their leadership style
• Curious.  Strong curiosity that drives a constant search for complete understanding of everything they touch – our business, the challenges of selling in our market, how and why our customers purchase PLATO solutions, other PLATO organizations and how they work, our industry, our competitors, etc.
• Self Starter/Independent Thinker. Must be able to work independently, but collaboratively.  Seek vision and requirements from executives, not tasks.  Build solutions at the Company level wherever possible, not just functional solutions.
• Can See Over the Horizon. Ability to anticipate business needs, not simply react to what the business has already identified as needs
• Excellent Communication Skills. Communicate effectively in all forms – verbal, e-mail and meeting presentations - across all levels of the organization
• Player Coach. Must be equally skilled at leading a team toward objectives and taking on critical, difficult or high visibility assignments personally as circumstances dictate.
• Systems Experience. Has demonstrated ability to move data and analysis from a manual or Excel based process through to automation in an on-demand, enterprise level system.
• Strong Work Ethic. Must be willing and able to invest whatever time is necessary, whenever necessary, to meet the demands of the business as is reasonably expected of a person at this level of the organization.  Positive attitude with willingness to do what it takes to get the job done