About the role:
The Cocoa CI&TS Lead bridges the gap between global strategy and dynamic, customer-oriented support for cocoa products in the CEE region. This role combines leadership with hands-on expertise to ensure both customer satisfaction and business growth.
The Cocoa CI&TS Lead oversees and drives customer-facing activities related to cocoa, working closely with Sales to identify priorities, define KPIs, and deliver results. A key aspect of the role involves building and nurturing relationships with customers, ensuring their needs are met through expert technical and strategic support. The position also involves coordinating cocoa-specific activities across various internal teams, including chocolate CI&TS roles, and managing the cocoa CI&TS support role for EE, CIS, and SEE clusters.
The role’s scope is broad, requiring interaction with numerous internal stakeholders (e.g., Sales, QA, Supply Chain, and R&D teams) to align and collaborate effectively on customer solutions. It also emphasizes creating a collaborative and inclusive work environment that promotes innovation and excellence.
Travel is an integral part of this position, primarily within the CEE region but extending to other locations as needed. Exceptional stakeholder management, a customer-first mindset, and the ability to thrive in a dynamic environment are critical for success in this role.
This is an exciting opportunity to take on a key role at the intersection of strategy, leadership, and customer engagement.
Key responsibilities:
The Cocoa CI&TS Lead is responsible for leading the customer-facing CI&TS team for cocoa in the CEE region. This includes direct management of one team member and matrix collaboration with chocolate customer-facing teams to ensure the delivery of exceptional technical support. The role also involves defining the regional customer strategy in alignment with sales and marketing leads and executing cocoa-specific customer activities for the Tiga and Central country clusters.
Manage the Cocoa CI&TS Customer Support Team (15%) Translate the customer strategy into clear, measurable goals for the team. Monitor team performance to ensure objectives are achieved. Define development plans to enhance team capabilities. Guide the team in creating sub-regional CI&TS plans
Define the Regional Customer Strategy (25%) Develop the CI&TS customer-facing strategy for the region in collaboration with Sales and Marketing, ensuring alignment with business targets. Allocate team resources effectively based on customer priorities and business opportunities. Implement tools and processes to report project pipelines and progress across the region. Identify regional customers to partner with in driving BC innovations.
Manage the Sub-Regional Customer Base (60%) Execute the Cocoa CI&TS customer strategy for assigned country clusters. Act as the primary point of contact between customers and BC Cocoa CI&TS. Serve as the bridge between customers, Cocoa CI&TS, Chocolate CI&TS, and the Sales community for all customer-related issues and projects. Identify customer needs for cocoa products and provide tailored solutions. Share expertise in BC cocoa products, offering technical support and resolving issues. Provide customer training as requested. Manage a balanced, results-driven customer project portfolio. Maintain accurate records of projects using tools like Salesforce. Regularly report on the progress of customer projects to internal stakeholders. This role demands a proactive and strategic approach to managing customer relationships, ensuring their needs are met while driving business success.
About you:
The ideal candidate will possess a unique blend of technical expertise, leadership ability, and cultural understanding to drive success in this challenging and dynamic environment and also has:
Master's degree in Science or Engineering, preferably in Food Science, or equivalent experience.
At least 5 years of experience in a relevant role, ideally in a Chocolate or Cocoa environment.
Fluent in English and Turkish; proficiency in Polish is a plus.
Deep knowledge of R&D, project management, and cocoa applications
Strong leadership capabilities, with the ability to lead, coach, and inspire teams.
Customer-focused, with proven experience in managing customer relationships and delivering tailored solutions.
Strategic thinker with the ability to execute and drive results.
Excellent communication and stakeholder management skills.
Problem-solving mindset, ambitious, and results-driven.
Proactive and entrepreneurial, with a strong sense of commercial impact.
Committed to equality, inclusion, and valuing diversity in the workplace.
Willingness to travel at least 40% of the time, primarily within the Tiga and Central country clusters.
Open to managing and collaborating with teams across EE, CIS, and CEE regions.
We offer: