Order to Cash Lead -Tea Export Company

The Netherlands

Open towards flexible working models

10-20% travel (currently none due to Covid-19 restrictions)

Full-time

Background

A great opportunity becomes available to design, set up and subsequently run the Order to Cash function of the Tea Export Company – which will serve a large number of distributor markets worldwide.

Unilever’s Tea business will be established as a separate business by July 1, 2021 to ensure the category can best achieve its potential. Unilever’s Tea business is the biggest in the world, with world class purpose-driven brands such as Lipton, PG tips and Pukka. As a separate division, the Tea Company will assume responsibility for all geographies and all elements of its value chain, with the exception of the Tea businesses in India and Indonesia and the partnership interests in the ready-to-drink joint ventures.

As a standalone entity, the Tea Company (which generated €2 billion revenue in 2019) remains the biggest Tea business in the world and is even better positioned to lead the industry and take full advantage of the opportunities in the category, with more focus and entrepreneurship driving greater growth and value. The current vision for the Tea company is to champion a tastier, healthier, more sustainable world of plant-based drinking. Purposeful thinking will be the core anchor of the business, its brands as well as its culture, and enables simple and agile decision making, supports an entrepreneurial mindset and is driven by passion for our consumers. Beyond the internal separation, future options for the Tea Company – including an initial public offering, a disposal, a demerger or through partnership models – are continued to be assessed. This process is expected to be concluded by the end of 2021.

Tea Export Company

Tea Export Company will be set up as a global team, based out of the Netherlands, to support the local and regional hubs managing Distributor Markets. The role of the Tea Export Company team is to:

• Act as an export company for markets where there is no local transacting legal entity, and provide transactional routing for export transactions between supply markets and distributors – including responsibility for the Order to Cash process;

• Act as a sales and marketing center of excellence to support all distributor markets / managers selling Tea Company products through providing a central point of contact for guidance, templates and best practices (e.g. export/import processes; international shipping; duties, taxes and regulations; and distributor contracts);

  • Drive the growth agenda within all distributor markets, by unlocking distributor markets through cross-border expansion of assortment & brands, and unlocking white spaces in terms of consumer groups and channels.

Job Purpose

The Tea Export Company (TEC) Order to Cash Lead will be responsible for the TEC end-to-end Order to Cash process. This is a unique role, as the Order to Cash (O2C) Lead will support with the design, implementation and testing of all O2C processes – before becoming responsible for best-in-class Order to Cash performance.

As we go through the various phases of separation and standing up a stand-alone Tea Company, the scope of the role will gradually change towards running the business. We are seeking candidates with the desire to be an integral part in building the bright future of the plant-based Tea Company, and the Tea Export Company specifically.

You will:

• Be an escalation point for the TEC O2C team and direct interface for key and strategic distributors;

• Develop and maintain an End to End efficient and effective Order to Cash process;

• Ensure Order to Cash performance with focus on distributor satisfaction, and cash flow delivery;

• Manage operational issues and exceptions in distributor markets.

Both Day 1 (July 1st) and end state processes will be designed, as well as a smooth transition process to maintain business continuity. As of July 1st TeaCo will have strategic control over the Tea business, but until the transition to the end state Unilever will still provide support through Transitional Service Agreements (TSAs) for many distributor markets and processes.

Task horizon of >3 years.

Responsibilities

• Coordination of the work of the TEC Order to Cash team

• Support the implementation of the interim TEC processes, tools and organization

• Facilitate the onboarding of a number of additional countries onto the interim TEC landscape

• Co-design the end state TEC landscape, and assist with typical project deliverables such as user acceptance testing, change management with distributors, etc

• Establish the working relationship and act as first point of contact between the third party service provider and TEC O2C roles to ensure a seamless O2C process

• Own the TEC O2C policies, service catalogue and distributor segmentation strategy

• Ensure distributor satisfaction in alignment with the defined Customer Service strategy

• Manage exceptions and distributor requests relating to Order to Deliver, Claims and Bill to Cash activities

• Manage set up of new distributors and distributor data changes

• Execute distributor facing and collaboration activities

• Control and execute credit management and collection activities in collaboration with the third party service provider

• Control and execute customer pricing on- and off-invoice

• Coaching and development of 2 direct reports (Order to Cash Specialists; timing of recruitment tbd)

Key interfaces and relevant stakeholders for this role

• Distributors

• CD Distributor manager roles in market

• Tea Export Company Controller (line manager)

• TEC Order to Cash specialists (direct reports, tbd)

• Third party service provider for Order to Cash

• Tea Company Order to Cash process specialists

• Central and regional roles for Finance, Planning, Logistics and Master Data

• Cross-functional collaboration with TEC Sales and Supply Chain functions

• Other members of the TEC Finance team (e.g. Finance Manager)

• Internal and external temporary resources / advisors supporting the project

Required Knowledge and Experiences

• At least 3 years in-market work experience in Order to Cash operations (e.g. Customer Service, Order Management, Bill to Cash) or a related role (e.g. CD Operations, Planning, Trade Terms Management)

• FMCG experience

• Good SAP user knowledge

• Order to Cash process and systems experience

• Familiar with Financial and Supply Chain transactional processes

• A degree in CD, Finance, Supply Chain or an Order to Cash related function

• Experience working with distributors, and/or familiarity with global export processes is a big advantage

• Preferably experience working with third party service providers

• Good written and verbal communication skills in English, proficiency in other languages could be a benefit (e.g. Spanish)

Required Skills

• Customer service mindset

• Good communication skills

• Self-motivated, working independently

• Comfortable working in a fast changing environment

• Team player

• Business thinking

• Project management skills

Excited about the role?

Please apply online with your CV and Cover-letter. Your application will be reviewed against our requirements and we will be in touch to provide you with an update on the status of your application.