Ocean Freight LCL Head

Job Title

1. Key Responsibilities

1.1. P&L:

• Full LCL P&L ownership, to deliver budgeted EBIT and volume targets for both LCL and Buyer's Consolidation
• Monitor the productivity of the LCL product, adjust resource allocation accordingly, drive GSC offshoring and/or automation of tasks
• Develop strategy and implementation of ocean freight LCL plans, measures and budgets to achieve operational results driving profitability, volume growth and service expansion

1.2. Growth & Product Development:

• Drive the LCL volume development on focus tradelanes in collaboration with Growth, Sales, RDM and overseas counterparts focusing on SME business decided locally.
• Drive market and competitor research and analysis activities to understand and identify market opportunities and challenges.
• Design and implement new products within country and provide input on solution design and service elements, ensuring that all services comply with relevant regulations and industry standards. This strategic focus will help strengthen the value proposition and maintain DGF LCL's competitive edge in the market.
• Lead the development of new export and import own LCL consol box services in cooperation with overseas counterpart, Growth, Sales and product management
• Define and implement pricing strategies that align with market conditions and business objectives, while also analyzing yield performance to maximize profitability across services. Ensure completeness and monitor hit rates of LCL pricing in MTS to ensure competitive and transparent pricing.
• Train and liaise with sales to support interaction with key customers and provide pricing and margin guidance, support on bids, RFQs and customer presentations

1.3. Operations:

• Oversees the national LCL gateway operations, ensuring efficient management of all consol level activities, coordinating with stakeholders to streamline processes, monitor and drive initiatives to optimize utilization of DGF LCL consol boxes, reduce lead times, and ensure compliance with international and local regulations.
• Ensures own country's export and import LCL consol box services adheres to the DGF Global LCL Routing Policy and are accurately reflected in the DGF LCL Routing Guide, including preferred CFS-CFS routes, frequency, movement, and transit times.
• Monitor preferred/primary carrier/co-loader usage and ensure adherence to the Routing Guide
• Understand the bigger picture and have the DGF end to end thinking in mind, thereby also supporting our in-house strategy in close collaboration with the MNGW manager and Regional LCL Pricing & Network Development Director
• Implements, monitors and enforces service and quality standards at station level in cooperation with Station and product management
• Identifies, influences and implements improvement measures at station level
• Drive buying improvement (CFS costs, Ocean Freight rates, LTL trucking rates, etc.) in cooperation with product management and according to corporate policy.
• Supplier performance management i.e. Co-loader, Ocean Carrier, CFS and trucking through regular reviews to ensure service quality in adherence to DGF SOP and compliance. Identify performance issues of suppliers, and propose solutions to improve performance
• Support to resolve recurring customer issues and incidents

2. Stakeholders:

• Directly reporting to the Country Ocean Freight Head and matrix line to the Regional Head of LCL
• Extensive contact, cooperation and communication with departments and 3rd parties with potential conflicting objectives (i.e. Marketing & Sales, Growth, Customer Service, Route Development Managers, Procurement, Product Management in country or region, overseas counterparts)
• Negotiating with other departments and 3rd parties in line with corporate guidelines and policies
• Influence and challenge key stakeholders effectively
• Influence others across the company and externally as an internally and externally recognized thought leader representing the Group
• Develop strong, trusting cross-functional relationships with senior business leaders
• Champion cooperation and partnership to provide integrated solutions to problems
• Management Responsibility
• Lead (directly or indirectly) multiple teams or individuals on equal or lower levels
• Develop short to long-term (1-5 years) plans for optimizing the organization, function, or job-family and the talent required to execute strategies

3. Qualifications & Key Requirements:

• Deep knowledge of forwarding business and understanding of supply chain logistics
• Recognized subject matter expert of OFR LCL product offering typically obtained through advanced education and work experience
• Manage large projects or processes with limited oversight from manager
• Strong project management skills paired with pro-active behavior to stay on top of multiple deadlines for multiple bids in parallel
• Good communication skills to properly engage with country OCCs of different countries and cultural backgrounds
• Strong analytical mind ideally paired with ops experience to be able to quickly understand and challenge country bid input
• Ability to work under pressure to cope with periods of high workload and tight timelines
• In-depth knowledge of LCL operations, pricing strategies, and RFQ processes.
• Strong negotiation and relationship-building skills.
• Analytical mindset with the ability to identify network optimization opportunities.
• Education Level: Bachelor's degree in Business, Logistics, or a related field or equivalent experience/qualification.
• Experience Level: At least 7 years experience in Freight Forwarding/Carrier/Supply Chain Management/Logistics industry and At least 3 years management experience