Senior Manager, Ocean Freight (ISC region)

The Opportunity: 

To accelerate our growth and capitalize on the ISC region's potential as a strategic trade lane for explosive growth, we are seeking a Senior Manager, Regional Ocean Freight (Indian Sub-continent). This leader will oversee the Ocean P&L and drive substantial business growth across the Indian Sub-continent Region.

Key Responsibilities:

• Own and grow the Ocean P&L for the Indian Sub-continent with focus on increasing volume, yield, and profitability
• Lead market development and strategic customer engagement
• Ensure comprehensive business growth through collaboration, innovation, and data-driven process improvement
• Ensure the ISC ocean freight product is world-class and prepares the organization to become the largest player on key trade lanes through innovative solutions, strategic partnerships, and a robust operational foundation.

This is a critical, senior-level role for someone passionate about achieving large-scale market growth, operational efficiency, delivering exceptional customer value and leading the ISC region to market ocean leadership. 

Job Scope:

• P&L Management & Revenue Growth
• Oversee a sizable Ocean P&L for the ISC district, focusing on scaling volume, increasing yield, and driving overall profitability.
• Build, review, and actively manage the book of business and financial health levers, including quoting, invoicing, dispute escalation, and forecasting.
• Drive near- and long-term forecasting in alignment with business goals.
• Market & Trade Expertise
• Act as the market expert for the ISC region, providing the organization with market intelligence, trade-specific trends, and customer interfacing.
• Collect and leverage local market intelligence on rates, utilization, blank sailings, and extra loader plans, in partnership with procurement and fulfillment teams.
• Monitor volume performance and bookings against commitments, ensuring optimal utilization.

• Ocean Carrier Procurement 
• Support procurement strategy and negotiations with ocean carriers for ISC trade-lanes, ensuring competitive cost, capacity, and reliable partnerships.
• Oversee carrier allocation, supply forecasting, and performance in alignment with commercial and network needs.
• Drive cost-efficiency, process improvements, and effective cross-functional collaboration across procurement activities.
• Business Development & Go-to-Market Strategy
• Design and implement tailored ocean freight products and customized go-to-market strategies for key customers. Drive growth for FOB and CIF through the collaboration with the Ocean procurement, AM and AE team. 
• Support tenders and RFQs for regional and global clients, ensuring competitive rate structures and appropriate margin management.
• Regularly review the sales pipeline and define data-driven action plans, ensuring alignment with commercial opportunities and client needs.
• Collaborate with District GMs, Sales, Business Development, and Account Management teams to identify and pursue Line of Business (LoB) growth initiatives.
• Customer & Carrier Relationships
• Build and strengthen relationships with internal and external stakeholders, including partner carriers, account executives, and senior leadership.
• Negotiate local carrier terms such as freetime, local charges, waivers, and credit terms, where carriers are open to the collaboration, to ensure commercial competitiveness
• Participate in client calls and webinars as the region’s ocean freight representative to support strategic client initiatives.
• Set and maintain local charge tariffs for all ISC origins with the gateway Ocean Ops team. 
• Cross-functional Collaboration & Continuous Improvement
• Work closely with Procurement, Pricing, Planning, Allocation, and District Management teams to deliver globally optimized results and capture market-specific knowledge.
• Identify, lead, and drive improvements in go-to-market, operational, and financial processes to enhance efficiency and output.
• Leverage data and analytics for decision-making across all responsibility areas.

You should have:

• +10 years of prior Ocean Freight experience at a top freight forwarder or carrier or 10+ years of supply chain experience and a BA/BS Degree;
• Strategic vision and ground floor execution;
• Bias to Action, Process, Structure and Data;
• Excellent communication, interpersonal, and organizational skills;
• An obsession with client happiness. You succeed when they succeed;
• Ability to travel regionally / globally;
• Courage to challenge the status quo when logic and reason require it. See something broken? Fix it;
• The desire to lead, train, and develop up-and-coming talent