Managing Director Shipping & Logistics

Theopportunity

Our client is a fast-growingdiversified African Group with significant operations in Nigeria and ambitiousexpansion plans across several business sectors.

Its shipping and logisticsbusiness is already a sizeable, integrated logistics platform, providing landtransportation, sea freight, air freight, freight forwarding and customsclearing, as well as cold chain and end-to-end supply-chain solutions.

The business operates a modernfleet of 250+ trucks supported by 270+ professional drivers, and hassuccessfully handled exports, imports and domestic distribution across Nigeria,West Africa and international markets.

Its activities includecontainerised shipping (FCL/LCL), bulk cargo, air freight, road haulage andspecialised logistics solutions. The company serves both businesses within thewider Group and a substantial portfolio of external clients across sectorsincluding FMCG, agriculture, manufacturing, oil & gas, pharmaceuticals andhealthcare.

The business is now entering amajor new phase of growth. Significant expansion across the wider Group willgenerate substantial additional logistics volumes, while the external marketoffers considerable further growth potential.

The ambition is therefore notsimply to manage the existing operation, but to scale the business into asignificantly larger and increasingly competitive logistics platform.

The role

The Managing Director willhave full commercial, operational and P&L accountability for the business.

This is a business-building MDrole combining strategy, commercial development, operations, investment andpeople leadership.

The incoming MD will beexpected to:

• Define and execute the next phase of the company's growth strategy.
  
• Further develop the external client base and increase third-party revenues.
  
• Lead and optimise the company's shipping, freight forwarding, port-related, haulage, fleet, warehousing and specialised logistics activities.
  
• Strengthen relationships across the maritime and port ecosystem, including shipping lines, port and terminal operators, customs and regulatory stakeholders.
  
• Anticipate the significant capacity requirements created by future growth.
  
• Determine where additional warehouses and logistics infrastructure should be developed.
  
• Plan the substantial expansion and evolution of the company's fleet.
  
• Identify new logistics services and market opportunities that can strengthen the company's position and revenue base.
  
• Take full ownership of revenue, costs, margins, cash flow and working capital.
  
• Build robust business and investment cases for fleet, warehousing and other infrastructure expansion.
  
• Work with banks and financial partners to secure the funding required to support growth.
  
• Maintain high levels of operational reliability, fleet utilisation, safety and regulatory compliance.
  
• Continue developing the technology and systems required to manage a larger and increasingly complex logistics platform.
  
• Build the organisation, management capabilities and performance culture required for the next stage of growth.
  

The growthchallenge

The scale of the next phasemakes this role particularly interesting.

The company has alreadydemonstrated significant logistics capabilities, having handled 115,000+ metrictons of exports, 70,000+ metric tons of imports and 35,000+ metric tons ofdomestic and West African distribution.

Future growth within the widerGroup is expected to create a substantial increase in logistics requirements.

Requirements

The profile

We are looking for anexperienced shipping and logistics business leader who combines:

• Strong experience in the Nigerian shipping and logistics sector.
  
• Significant knowledge of port and maritime activities, freight forwarding and customs/clearing.
  
• Experience growing or significantly scaling a logistics company or business unit.
  
• Strong commercial and business-development capabilities with external clients.
  
• Broad operational understanding of road haulage, fleet management and warehousing.
  
• Experience across multiple logistics activities rather than a narrow single-service background.
  
• Strong P&L and financial-management capability.
  
• Experience evaluating significant capital investments and financing growth.
  
• Credibility in dealing with banks, financial institutions and other external stakeholders.
  
• Strong leadership experience within a sizeable operational organisation.
  
• The ability to combine strategic thinking with very hands-on execution.
  
• A strong owner's mindset, drive and entrepreneurial spirit.
  

Experience across several ofthe company's customer sectors such as FMCG, manufacturing, agriculture, oil& gas, pharmaceuticals or industrial businesses would be an advantage.

Benefits

Theenvironment

This is not a highlystructured corporate environment where every process, resource and decisionframework is already in place.

The wider Group is growingrapidly and expects its business leaders to take ownership, make decisions,solve problems and build the capabilities they need as the organisationevolves.

The successful candidate willtherefore need to be comfortable combining strategic ambition with operationalreality: defining where the business should go while remaining close enough toexecution to make it happen.

Why thisopportunity?

The business already hasmeaningful scale, infrastructure, customers and capabilities. The opportunityis therefore not a start-up and not a turnaround. It is a scale-up challenge.

The incoming Managing Directorwill inherit a functioning logistics platform and have the opportunity todetermine what it becomes next: expand its external business, significantlyincrease capacity, develop new infrastructure and services, and build an organisationcapable of supporting a much larger logistics operation.

For the right person, itoffers an unusual combination of existing scale, strong growth potential,entrepreneurial freedom and visible impact.