Global Sales Manager

Position: Global Sales Manager (Automotive/Aerospace/Defence) Location: UK Salary: £Negotiable OTE £100k + car allowance Company/ Sector: Chemicals Distributor The Role: • Strengthening and expanding key strategic accounts. • Identifying and capturing new technical opportunities and projects. • Building trusted partnerships with key suppliers to bring innovation into customer applications. • Maintaining deep market understanding to ensure the company stays ahead of industry change. • This is primarily an individual contributor role with significant influence across regions, including coordination with colleagues in Europe and potential future international resources. • Develop and grow relationships with global automotive OEMs. • Manage complex, multi-site customer environments spanning engineering, procurement and operations. • Retain and expand existing business while identifying new opportunities for growth. • Coordinate activities across international customer locations to ensure consistent engagement. • Act as a credible technical partner supporting customers through design and material selection, testing and validation, and transition into production environments. • Promote high-reliability solutions aligned with automotive quality expectations and a “never fail” approach. • Focus initially on silicone technologies while expanding cross-selling across adhesives, tapes and engineered solutions. • Build strong, trust-based relationships with key strategic suppliers. • Work collaboratively on project development, new product introductions and technical opportunities. • Coordinate samples, trials, marketing initiatives and joint customer engagement activities. • Align supplier innovation pipelines with their automotive strategy to support mutual growth. • Maintain deep understanding of automotive market trends, technology shifts and emerging applications. • Identify opportunities arising from industry transformation, including electrification, thermal management and high-vibration environments. • Provide insight to shape the company’s long-term automotive strategy. Requirements: • Proven success in technical B2B sales within automotive/aerospace/defence or closely related manufacturing sectors. • Knowledge of silicones, adhesives, tapes or related engineered materials preferred. • Experience supporting engineering-led design-in processes. • Comfortable operating within global customer structures. • Strong commercial judgement and negotiation skills. • Driven by growth and opportunity, with strong ownership mentality. • Credible communicator with engineers and procurement teams alike. • Structured, resilient and able to operate independently. • Practical and solutions-focused. • Comfortable with international travel and flexible working hours