Business Unit Director - Central

About Rockfon

Rockfon is the no.1 brand in Europe in acoustic ceilings segment. We are part of the ROCKWOOL Group.

Over more than 60 years, our purpose has been to make our world a better place with a broad range of acoustic solutions for schools, offices, hospitals and entertainment venues

We specialise in providing a complete solution that covers suspended ceilings, walls and zoning applications for passive noise management, visual comfort and biophilic experience in a built environment.

Our proud employees offer their deep know-how and high level of support to various stakeholders across the value chain - architects, interior designers, acousticians, contractors and distributors – to realize our solutions.

Our factories continue to drive down our carbon footprint and we leverage the wide footprint of the Rockwool insulation companies to secure closed-loop recycling of our stonewool based products. Furthermore, we are on a solid path to decarbonize our production footprint while we are already best or second best in several ceiling applications when it comes to carbon footprint

We distribute our products in more than 70 countries and represent 50+ nationalities. Our HQ is in Denmark and our staff is based in more than 15 locations across Europe, Middle East and Asia.

The role and desired skills

We are hiring a Business Unit Director Central Europe (i.e. BNL, DACH, and CEE as per our internal definitions) as part of the management team of Rockfon in direct reference to the Managing Director.

We believe great products and services come to life when someone has deep empathy with the bigger cause or purpose. Our purpose is to make the world a better place to live with our acoustic solutions for places for education, work, leisure and health care using sustainable materials. The BU Director for Central Europe should be someone who has experience in building materials (or services) and has passion for architecture, user wellbeing and sustainability.

You will be responsible for driving the market P&L and for leading an organization of approx. 70 employees in sales, customer service, local marketing and technical support. Your role would entail strategic planning, overall sales excellence, local market activation and building a skilled & engaged workforce.

We expect to grow the overall P&L in the region by 10% annually with clear focus on driving volume growth of most profitable product lines through existing and new segments. To meet such ambitions, it is key to evaluate, on an ongoing basis, your strategic priorities, overall organization skills, key processes and execution capacity. To support you in this endeavour you will also have a business controller assigned to your region from the central Finance organization.

As a P&L leader, you will also collaborate closely with the product organization, central marketing and financial functions to ensure a solid global vs. local alignment and secure your market needs and priorities are clearly understood by the global organization.

You should be able to inspire a team and influence without authority. To be successful, it is also key to make tough choices and engage others with clear communication, interpersonal relationship and a fact-based approach.

We imagine you have the following skills and experiences:

• Strategy planning, market insights and customer requirement understanding
• Annual sales and marketing plan creation, prioritization and delivery
• At least 10 years of experience in B2B (preferably in construction industry) with solid grip on specification processes, combined with installer & distribution management
• Well conversant with processes that touch upon project and distribution sales, order to cash, technical support, claims handling and pricing execution
• Price excellence covering topics such as pricing strategies and tactics, portfolio management, pricing tools for different types of business models, procedures and overall governance to secure continuous margin improvement
• Deep understanding of sales forecasting, contract negotiations, key account management and sales capabilities development to deliver short-/mid-/long-term P&L goals
• Ability to understand nuances of large sales contracts and experience in contract negotiations that cover prices, volume, logistics services, and several legal conditions
• Passion for understanding products and services and the USPs vs. competition
• Rich experience with CRM and CPQ tools and end-to-end lead management including organization development in implementation of these digital tools and workflows
• Experience in sales capability mapping and change management to drive growth in new applications or new channels
• Solid understanding of local marketing and its impact on the funnel in a B2B context
• Stakeholder management skills preferably acquired in a corporate environment to secure solid alignment in own region and across the company to support your region
• Excellent communication skills
• Fluent in English and conversant with German language. Knowledge of Dutch, French, and Polish is a plus but not a key requirement

Location: either in Germany, preferred (our local hub is in Gladbeck) or in The Netherlands (our local hub is in Roermond). Though the role involves extensive travel, we would prefer if the candidate can easily commute to one of these two hubs from own residence as all our back-office staff is located in these two hubs. Furthermore, as a management team member you would also play a key role in driving the local culture and staying connected with other Rockwool operating companies to set the local policies.

Next steps

If you want to know more, please contact HR Business Partner Rune Færgemann via mail rune.faergemann@rockfon.com or Dave Coppen, Regional Expert Recruitment via mail dave.coppen@rockwool.com. If you want to apply, then please follow the link below (CV and Cover letter should be in English).