The opportunity:

Our Ocean Freight Procurement Team is essential to winning new business, supporting all current business, and building out the future of Flexport’s ocean services. As an Ocean Freight Procurement Manager, you’ll be an integral part of helping achieve Flexport’s growth goals.

We’re looking for a leader, the key responsibility of your role will be to drive the trade growth in terms of volume, revenue and net revenue by managing external & internal customers’ expectations, as well as carrier (vendors) relationships. Doing so successfully, you will provide a clear strategy to optimize Flexport’s buying position and at the same time offer a good level of service to our clients. While you will also mentor the Associates, Sr Associates of procurement team to support the related activities on the assigned trade lanes and ensure a smooth shipment flow, you will be expected to have a large individual contribution.

You will:

• Be responsible for key Ocean procurement initiatives and lead cross-team development
• Be an Ocean Leader, contribute and lead setting of team OKRs, setting project priorities, and coordination with other internal stakeholders
• Build long-term plans for your team and its contributions to trade lane development
• Coordinate and align trade-lane procurement activities with other procurement managers
• Design workflows and procedures that advance Flexport forward as a business and increase the long-term scalability of the team
• Ability to manage the most complex Ocean accounts, from opportunity to long-term execution, delegating and advising other parts of the organization where necessary
• Leading key account meetings, be present at QBRs and account planning with a strong commercial mindset
• Clearly and comfortably delegate both routine and important tasks and decisions where possible; similarly know when to escalate and ask for support
• Negotiate complex deals with Ocean carriers and actively work on sub-provisions of agreements (T&Cs, etc)
• Formulate and recommend overall trade Ocean strategy, considering both short and long term Flexport priorities
• Be able to clearly articulate and demonstrate what success looks for on team for next year
• Work with internal and external stakeholders to set-up and implement long-term changes and improve Flexport efficiency, revenue terms, and operations
• Create strong morale and spirit within team; create a strong sense of belongings in the team
• Actively participate in external recruiting and build an industry network
• Represent Flexport at external industry events or webinars
• Maintains and develop carrier relationship at all levels, primarily focused on trade/line management leaders and key account management leaders at regional / headquarter levels
• Work on plans to share to the team how to improve existing processes and drive change to either lower cost to serve or generate extra net revenue
• Conduct QBR with carriers and drive better terms and conditions as well as better service quality from carriers towards Flexport
• Act as secondary escalation point for fulfillment team

• You should have:

• A minimum of 6 years of prior experience at a top freight forwarder or carrier and a BA/BS Degree, at least 3 years in managerial role
• Resourceful in industry knowledge with an in-depth understanding of ocean freight and carrier management, hand on experience of Transpacific trade is a plus
• Strong command of English and Mandarin
• Strategic vision and proven strong capabilities in driving and motivating the team
• Strong sense in identifying & seizing opportunities that can bring extra revenue or net revenue to the company, think end to end
• Strong team player with self starter attitude and also diligent in follow up and completion
• Excellent communication, organizational skills and strong commercial sense
• Strong interpersonal and negotiation skill is must in this role
• Next-level attention to detail, think end to end
• Strong analytical skills and ability to structure, interpret and action data
• Strong in problem solving and ability to apply judgement for day-to-day decisions
• Ability to handle change and perform under pressure and tight timeline with great time management skill
• Excellent networking skills to build strong relationships with internal and external stakeholders, existing senior level relationships with external industry participants is a plus
• An obsession with client happiness. You succeed when they succeed
• Ability to travel locally, nationally and internationally
• 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 industry talent, also a fast learner to adapt to ever changing environment