Country Manager – Southern & English-Speaking Sub-Saharan Africa needed at Cepheid

Key Responsibilities

Commercial Leadership

• Define and lead the commercial strategy across South Africa & English-speaking Sub-Saharan Africa in full alignment with regional and global vision.
• Lead high-performing direct and indirect sales teams through strong commercial stewardship and accountability.
• Act as the senior representative of Beckman Coulter with customers, ministries of health, regulators, and industry bodies.
• Embed the Voice of the Customer (VOC) in commercial decision-making.
• Drive channel excellence with strong distributor scorecards, governance, and capability building.
• Collaborate across the MEA matrix (Service, Applications, Marketing, Finance, HR, Supply Chain) to build integrated, competitive solutions.
• Monitor market and competitive trends, ensuring proactive and innovative responses.
• Ensure compliance to all legal, regulatory, and internal governance standards.

Business Development & Market Growth

• Develop 3-year strategic business plans, annual operating plans, and growth priorities.
• Identify new market segments, product opportunities, and customer clusters across the region.
• Strengthen relationships with key opinion leaders, healthcare institutions, and national programs.
• Drive tender excellence, pricing strategy, and market access execution (including NHLS and regional tenders).
• Optimize product portfolio performance to deliver sustainable market share expansion.

Financial & Legal Oversight

• Full P&L responsibility, ensuring revenue, margin, and profitability targets are achieved.
• Lead forecasting, budgeting, and financial analysis with accuracy and transparency.
• Own accounts receivable performance, working with Finance to safeguard cash flow.
• Ensure compliance with all corporate and local legal requirements.

Leadership & Talent Development

• Build and inspire a high-performance, high-accountability culture across the region.
• Develop talent pipelines and ensure strong succession planning for critical roles.
• Coach and mentor teams using the Danaher Business System (DBS) to drive continuous improvement.
• Assess organizational structure to ensure readiness for future scale and operational excellence.

Key Performance Indicators

• Quarterly & annual revenue and margin growth
• Market share expansion in South Africa & SSA
• Customer satisfaction and VOC indicators
• Distributor scorecard performance and governance
• Forecast accuracy and operating rhythm discipline
• Compliance to legal, financial, and ethical standards
• Talent development and retention of top performers
• Effective execution of new product launches and market-entry initiatives
• Strength of cross-functional collaboration and stakeholder engagement
• Implementation of DBS and continuous improvement initiatives

Qualifications & Experience

• Bachelor’s degree in Management, Finance, Business, Life Sciences, or equivalent
• MBA preferred
• 10+ years in business management within Diagnostics, Medical Devices, or Life Sciences
• 5–7 years in Sales leadership in the IVD industry
• 3–5 years managing distributor networks in regulated markets
• 6+ years of people leadership
• Proven track record in P&L ownership, tender management, and commercial strategy execution
• Experience with NHLS and African healthcare systems is highly desirable

Preferred Skills

• Strong strategic thinking with long-term vision
• Advanced negotiation and stakeholder management
• Excellent executive communication and leadership presence
• Deep understanding of compliance, governance, and quality systems
• High financial acumen
• Ability to lead in a multicultural, matrixed environment
• Strong operational discipline with DBS/Lean experience
• Analytical mindset and problem-solving capability
• Ability to build trust with customers, governments, and internal stakeholders