Sales Manager: East & West Africa
Location - Johannesburg
Africa (Regional Role)
About the Client Company
Our client company is seeking an experienced and commercially driven Sales Manager to lead business growth across East and West Africa. This is a highly visible leadership role responsible for driving profitable growth, developing new markets, expanding strategic customer relationships, and leading a high-performing regional sales team.
This position is ideal for an individual who thrives in a fast-paced international environment and enjoys building business across diverse African markets through extensive customer engagement and market development.
Key Responsibilities
Market Development & Growth
- Develop and execute the regional sales strategy across East and West Africa.
- Identify, assess, and enter new African markets with strong commercial potential.
- Build and expand routes to market through distributors, partners, and direct customer relationships.
- Drive sustainable revenue growth through customer acquisition and market expansion initiatives.
- Maintain a strong pipeline of new business opportunities across multiple territories.
Business Development
- Personally lead business development activities with high-value prospects and strategic accounts.
- Conduct market mapping, customer prospecting, and relationship-building activities.
- Manage opportunities from initial engagement through negotiation and successful commercial closure.
- Position the client company's products and solutions to deliver measurable customer value.
Sales Leadership
- Lead, coach, and develop a geographically dispersed sales team.
- Establish clear performance expectations and sales objectives.
- Conduct regular pipeline and performance reviews.
- Support team development through field coaching and customer engagement.
Key Account Management
- Build and maintain strong relationships with key customers and strategic partners.
- Develop account growth strategies and identify opportunities for expansion.
- Collaborate with internal stakeholders to ensure excellent customer service and delivery.
Commercial Planning
- Manage sales forecasts, budgets, and regional performance plans.
- Monitor sales performance, profitability, and market trends.
- Provide regular reporting and recommendations on regional opportunities and risks.
Requirements
Education
- Bachelor's Degree in Business, Commerce, Agriculture, Animal Science, or a related field.
- Honours Degree or relevant postgraduate qualification will be advantageous.
Experience
- Minimum 10 years' sales and business development experience.
- At least 4 years' experience in a senior sales leadership capacity.
- Proven success developing business across multiple African markets.
- Demonstrated ability to win new customers and successfully establish new market opportunities.
- Experience leading and managing regional or geographically dispersed teams.
Skills & Competencies
- Strong commercial acumen and negotiation skills.
- Excellent relationship-building and stakeholder management abilities.
- Proven strategic planning and execution capability.
- Strong analytical and problem-solving skills.
- Experience working with CRM systems and Microsoft Office.
- Ability to work independently and effectively across diverse cultural environments.
Travel Requirements
This is a field-based regional role requiring extensive travel across Africa. The successful candidate should be willing and able to spend a minimum of two weeks per month travelling within assigned territories, with additional travel as required by business needs.
What Success Looks Like
- Achievement of regional sales and profitability targets.
- Successful entry into and development of new African markets.
- Growth of strategic customer and partner relationships.
- Strong new business pipeline and conversion performance.
- High-performing and engaged regional sales team.
- Accurate forecasting and effective execution of commercial objectives.
Apply Now
If you have a proven track record of developing business across Africa, leading high-performing sales teams, and driving sustainable commercial growth, we would like to hear from you.
#LI-DNP #LI-CES
IQVIA is a leading global provider of clinical research services, commercial insights and healthcare intelligence to the life sciences and healthcare industries. We create intelligent connections to accelerate the development and commercialization of innovative medical treatments to help improve patient outcomes and population health worldwide. Learn more at https://jobs.iqvia.com
IQVIA is committed to integrity in our hiring process and maintains a zero tolerance policy for candidate fraud. All information and credentials submitted in your application must be truthful and complete. Any false statements, misrepresentations, or material omissions during the recruitment process will result in immediate disqualification of your application, or termination of employment if discovered later, in accordance with applicable law. We appreciate your honesty and professionalism.
Skills Required
- Bachelor's degree in Business, Commerce, Agriculture, Animal Science, or a related field
- Honours degree or relevant postgraduate qualification
- Minimum 10 years of sales and business development experience
- At least 4 years of experience in a senior sales leadership capacity
- Proven success developing business across multiple African markets
- Demonstrated ability to win new customers and establish new market opportunities
- Experience leading and managing regional or geographically dispersed teams
- Strong commercial acumen and negotiation skills
- Excellent relationship-building and stakeholder management abilities
- Proven strategic planning and execution capability
- Strong analytical and problem-solving skills
- Experience working with CRM systems and Microsoft Office
- Ability to work independently across diverse cultural environments
- Willingness and ability to travel within assigned African territories for a minimum of two weeks per month
IQVIA Compensation & Benefits Highlights
The following summarizes recurring compensation and benefits themes identified from responses generated by popular LLMs to common candidate questions about IQVIA and has not been reviewed or approved by IQVIA.
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Healthcare Strength — Healthcare coverage is positioned as comprehensive, spanning medical/dental/vision plus programs like telemedicine, EAP resources, and additional insurance options. Feedback suggests the health offering is a meaningful part of the overall rewards package, though details can vary by location and plan design.
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Retirement Support — Retirement benefits include an employer match structure that supports employee contributions through a defined formula. This adds steady long-term value to total rewards beyond base salary.
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Leave & Time Off Breadth — Time off offerings include vacation/paid time off, holidays, and flexibility themes, with some roles described as having discretionary or unlimited time-off models. This can make the package feel more attractive even when cash compensation is viewed as only mid-range.
IQVIA Insights
What We Do
IQVIA (NYSE:IQV) is a leading global provider of advanced analytics, technology solutions, and clinical research services to the life sciences industry. IQVIA creates intelligent connections across all aspects of healthcare through its analytics, transformative technology, big data resources and extensive domain expertise. IQVIA Connected Intelligence™ delivers powerful insights with speed and agility — enabling customers to accelerate the clinical development and commercialization of innovative medical treatments that improve healthcare outcomes for patients. With approximately 70,000 employees, IQVIA conducts operations in more than 100 countries. To learn more, visit www.iqvia.com.
