Market Collaboration Planner

**Who we are?**

On any given day, 2.5 billion people globally use Unilever products to feel good, look good and get more out of life. Many of our brands are well-known, household staples and old-time favourites including Dove, Rexona, Lynx, Vaseline, OMO/Persil, Surf, TRESemmé, Continental, Ben & Jerry’s and Streets.

We have a long tradition of being a progressive, responsible business. It goes back to the days of our founder William Lever, who launched the world’s first purposeful brand, Sunlight Soap more than 100 years ago, and it’s at the heart of how we run our company today. In 2022 Unilever Australia & New Zealand became a Certified B Corporation (B Corp), joining a growing network of organisations committed to galvanising a stronger, more inclusive, equitable and regenerative economy for all.

A job at Unilever is a career made by you, with development opportunities, benefits and a working culture that embraces diversity and is pioneering flexibility. There’s no better time to join our team

**Job Description Overview**

Market Collaboration Planner (MCP) is a key role within the Execute function of the Customer Operations. MCP owns the volume forecast & accountable for delivering an aligned, unbiased & accurate forecast. As a master in demand planning and S&OP, this role translates insights and collaborates to ensure cross functional inputs in the creation of the forecast. In conjunction with Category, Customer, Marketing and Supply functions, they will ensure the delivery of business targets by improving forecast fundamentals and influencing through storytelling of the numbers.

Main Responsibilities

**Demand Collaboration**
- Drive collaboration across the business teams to ensure that forecast represents are good mix of value and volume growth. Own the demand drivers
- Be a key member of the S&OP forum; Drive Activity & Demand Review meetings through business insights
- Utilizing full benefits of technology and data to drive monthly S&OP forums.
- Using the base of analytics, to provide insights and drive Activity Review Meetings for a better-quality forecast across medium & long-term horizons
- Being a true market facing role, Market Collaboration planners will be responsible for all collaborations with commercial, finance, marketing and customer/category teams
- Ensure updated and agreed volume forecast are submitted and aligned with financial forecasting
- Actively identify the gaps in forecast and ensure that the business team maintain focus on delivery business targets
- Lead the relevant S&OE (0-3 months) and S&OP (4+ months) discussions at ARM/DRMs and weekly collabs to drive the improvement agenda

**Growth**
- Be at the core of robust innovation business cases and identification of most optimal Forecast
- Identify assumption for incremental volumes across the various channels and ensure alignment with market data & promo group trends
- Collaborate with Marketing, Category and finance. Estimate volumes of regular items, innovations and offerings by customers
- Adopt new technologies such Forecast Utility Engine (FEU)/Machine Learning
- Work with Planning (Supply) for handling exceptions (late change requests)
- Present plan & innovation updates in the relevant business meetings
- Display strong understanding of Supply solutions and optimisation opportunities

**Decision Making**
- Participate S&OP reviews and meetings for the relevant category and manage supply chain stakeholders
- Collaborate with Trade & supply to address product availability constraints and identify alternatives for effective gap management
- Highlight risks and opportunities, alignment with Top-down sales volume
- Review Late Changes with Customer managers and effectively engage with Execution for effective and quick decisions
- Engage with Plan & Execute to review the outcome of key forecast changes, major upcoming promotions, potential supply risks, late changes
- Engage with VRP and Customer Sales team weekly to review Projected Orders, PDQ requirements, innovations in near term and late changes
- First point of contact for exception management (Incremental Promotions, Changes in Innovations, Customer Ranging outcomes, Managing De-listings, Customer Off-location opportunities, etc.)
- Provide support to the Business Unit on Scenario Planning & Trade-Offs
- Support Scenario Based planning to identify and offer multiple solutions

**Agility and Responsiveness**
- Drive concurrent planning across Demand and Supply elements to embed agility and responsiveness in the way we operate
- Identify opportunities to automate and get continuous benefits for data analytics and intelligence

**Key Deliverables (KPI)**
- Forecast Accuracy & Bias
- Volume Value Disconnect
- Forecast Value Add for input-led forecast
- Innovation Forecast Bias
- FEU Adoption metrics (automated forecasting)
- Supply Metrics: Customer Service, Inventory & Business Waste

Key Skills
- Strong Excel Skills
- Planning Mastery, S&OP and Business Financ