Sales Director - Ebury

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Penguin Random House are looking for an ambitious and driven Sales Director to lead Ebury's UK Sales Strategy out to market.

About Ebury

Ebury books bring readers and authors together around shared passions in life: from cookery to creativity, from sport to spirituality, and from the most compelling personal stories to the biggest new ideas.

At the heart of Ebury are our Hubs - Lifestyle, Food, Entertainment, Self, Smart, Edge - and our BBC Books and Brand Partnerships lists. Investing our boundless energy and collective creativity into every book, we craft the record-breaking, chart-topping, perennial bestsellers that will get you through.

The Opportunity

As the Ebury Sales Director, you'll report to the Deputy Group Sales Director, UK and join the UK Sales Directors senior team, working collaboratively on our retail strategy. You will have your own divisional sales team, responsible for positioning and selling Ebury titles profitably across the UK books market, as well as partnering with wider team members who are also responsible for selling your titles. To be a strong leader here is not just about commercial success; we want leaders that can build teams, nurture talent, and develop the careers of colleagues from all backgrounds. You'll need to combine market leading retail relationships, and fantastic publishing instincts to work with our customers and Ebury divisional colleagues alike.

Key responsibilities:

Sales:

• Ensure the group-wide strategic objectives and goals are achieved and that the divisional sales team is working in pursuit of these aims.
• Develop strong retail partnerships and relationships to maximise the publishing house and Penguin Random House sales.
• Create and drive an innovative strategy to grow and sustain publishing house sales across all formats and retailers.
• Lead, challenge, motivate, and engage your sales team to deliver maximum performance for the publishing house.
• Ensure the sales team are active participants within the publishing house and fully engaged within the wider sales team.
• Work inclusively with colleagues across our non-trade, online and mass sales teams as well as our colleagues in Dublin, Ireland to ensure they're informed and focused on delivering the publishing house's goals.
• Collaborate closely with international colleagues, appreciating the varying demands of the global market.
• Equip the sales team to support the publishing company with market insight and communicate an understanding of all elements of the UK retail environment.

Strategy:

• Serve as a leading voice within your team and publishing house, working in close partnership with the publishing team on all aspects of the publishing business.
• Interpret the UK market, bringing a voice of retail and the wider consumer base to the publishing process.
• Demonstrate a talent for working collaboratively while being comfortable challenging processes and decision-making when appropriate.
• Bring a progressive and commercially minded viewpoint to all acquisition and publishing decisions.
• Be instrumental in determining and carrying out the publishing house's future strategy from a sales perspective; devising ways in which the business can grow, innovate, and become even more commercially successful.
• Own the UK sales budget and work with your sales team to develop processes to reach financial targets.
• Develop a working partnership with editorial, marketing, and publicity teams to ensure a seamless publishing vision that delivers a clear consumer proposition.

Sales Management:

• Responsibility for your team - this includes all aspects of people management, including ensuring the quality of their work, ensuring they are properly trained and developed in line with their abilities, and ensuring all team members receive regular feedback and effective PDRs.

What you'll bring

Essential criteria:

• Proven experience of managing customer relationships and accounts, ideally within a publishing or creative environment.
• Loves the challenge of driving book sales. Driven and adaptable, enjoys building strong relationships and understands how to bring the vision of a creative environment to align with the needs of our customers.
• Able to chase opportunities down, believing that big can start small and inherently wanting to do the best by our authors. Can bring our books to market across the diverse UK retail landscape in all formats.
• Able to provide accurate and insightful feedback from the market back to the division, and work in a trusted way with editorial and comms colleagues to bring titles to market in the most effective way possible.
• Proactive and forward thinking, bringing huge drive and energy. Curious about new opportunities and be invested in the UK market and how it is developing.
• Able to make decisions with the bigger picture in mind. Matching data and insight to your natural instincts to drive the Ebury and UK Sales strategy forward.

Disability Confident

As a Disability Confident Committed organisation, we offer interviews to candidates with a disability who meet the essential criteria for the role, and opt-in on their application form. The essential criteria for this role are listed as part of the 'What you'll bring' section. There may be times when the volume of applications means we cannot take all eligible candidates to interview. We encourage you to tell us about any reasonable adjustments you may need by emailing PRHCareersUK@penguinrandomhouse.co.uk. Remember, you only need to share what you are comfortable with, for us to support your request.

Application instructions

Please apply with your CV and cover letter outlining why you are the right candidate for the role by 11:59pm on Sunday 31st May.

Please ensure you include a cover letter, as it is a crucial part of our assessment process. The cover letter offers an opportunity to show how your experience and interests align with the role requirements. Typically, we expect the cover letter to be no more than one or two pages in length.

Use of AI tools

Here at Penguin, we believe in the power of authenticity and human creativity. When you apply for a position, we want to encourage you to showcase your unique voice. Throughout our recruitment process, please share your own thoughts, experiences, and skills. This helps us get a true sense of who you are and what you might bring to our team.

We celebrate creativity and diverse perspectives, so please be yourself! While we recognise AI tools can be helpful, we recommend using them thoughtfully to ensure your responses reflect you.

Salary

Competitive salary depending on how your experience and skills align with the role, plus bonus and benefits.

Hybrid working

While our offices across the UK are places to connect, collaborate and celebrate with colleagues, we recognise that flexibility around where you work is just as important. For this role, there are regular meetings and activities that you will need to attend in person at our offices in Nine Elms. We would expect to see you in the Embassy Garden office at least three days a week.

Company: Penguin Books Limited | Job ID: 288609