This wonderful, high growth and deeply entrepreneurial premium food and retail hospitality business is seeking to appoint a first-class non-executive director to facilitate the further acceleration of their growth.
- Package: Appropriate NED fee plus an opportunity to take a credible equity stake.
- Location: South East
Role headlines:
Our client sees this role as the means to transfuse an individual’s invaluable knowledge, experience and insight in to what is still an adolescent business. Furthermore, the role carries the responsibility for providing challenge to the leadership team, whilst also facilitating greater sophistication to their strategic planning and operational performance.
- Being an active and well-rooted member of the Board, attending all formal meetings and ad-hoc requirements as required.
- Becoming the formal representative of the investor stakeholders at the Board meetings, ensuring that their investment is secure and being leveraged appropriately.
- As part of the overall Board, play a key role in ensuring the management of the business is conducted in such as way to meet all legal, moral and ethical codes of conduct.
- Take an active role in developing the commercial and branding capability within the business, where appropriate offering targeted, light-touch coaching to the Head of Sales and Head of Marketing.
- Be able to leverage the individual’s personal network to the net advantage of the business, including with key customers, markets and relevant agencies.
- Be prepared to be a visible ambassador and representative within and without the business, including with such parties as future investors, debt-providers and strategically important customers and suppliers.
- Creating a sense of pace and urgency at Board level but also proactively encourage, wherever feasible, this behaviour across the wider business.
- As a key member of the Board, overseeing the implementation of the business’s wider strategic goals, achievement of the 3 year business plan and the delivery of EBITDA goals within it.
- Keeping up to date with the very latest retail premium food and hospitality trends in the UK and global markets, with a specific focus on those that could offer new routes to sales and margin growth for the business.
Candidates will need to offer:
- Proven Business, Marketing and Sales leadership experience from within a known and credible UK Food or Hospitality context. It is possible that the individual may have spent part of their career in an adjacent sector, such as Retailing or FMCG.
- Highly credible understanding of the growth prospects for premium food businesses and demonstrate their willingness to share these insights with the Board and management team.
- A successful track record in bringing a step-change in business performance, both as an executive leader but also at non-executive level. It would be ideal if the individual had experienced this within a P/E, or leveraged buy-out environment.
- A demonstrable, highly credible personal knowledge of the UK and international premium food environment, including a current network with the senior influencers from that arena.
- It is essential that the person also has experience of building a sustainable international proposition.