Commercial Director - Industrial Automation (Northeast)

Director, Commercial Sales – Northeast US

Position Summary

The Director, Commercial Sales – Northeast US is responsible for driving profitable sales growth across the established Northeast US territory while leading commercial development within new and underpenetrated geographic markets for the Industrial Automation business.

This position provides strategic and operational leadership to the assigned sales organization, with accountability for revenue growth, gross profit, market penetration, new customer acquisition, customer retention, sales effectiveness, and talent development. The Director establishes clear commercial priorities and ensures consistent execution through disciplined territory management, pipeline development, forecasting, account planning, and seller coaching.

In addition to leading established markets, this role is responsible for identifying, evaluating, and developing geographic expansion opportunities. The Director will build measurable market-entry strategies, establish customer and supplier relationships, determine appropriate commercial coverage, and develop the sales talent and infrastructure necessary to create sustainable growth in new markets.

Essential Functions

Reasonable accommodations may be provided to enable qualified individuals to perform the following essential functions:

Sales Growth and Commercial Leadership

• Develop and execute the commercial sales strategy for the Northeast territory and assigned geographic expansion markets.
• Deliver profitable sales growth across assigned territories, including revenue, gross profit, margin, new customer acquisition, and existing-account growth.
• Translate organizational growth objectives into measurable territory, account, and seller-level priorities.
• Establish consistent sales-management practices, including pipeline reviews, forecasting, account planning, customer activity expectations, and performance management.
• Drive a proactive sales culture focused on opportunity creation, customer engagement, new-logo acquisition, and increased share of wallet.
• Monitor sales performance, market conditions, competitive activity, and customer trends to identify opportunities and commercial risks.
• Evaluate territory coverage and sales-resource alignment and recommend adjustments to improve market penetration and seller productivity.

Geographic Expansion and Market Development

• Develop and execute commercial strategies for new and underpenetrated geographic markets.
• Evaluate potential expansion markets based on manufacturing activity, customer concentration, target industries, competitive presence, supplier opportunities, and talent availability.
• Build measurable market-entry plans defining target customers, industries, commercial coverage, supplier alignment, resource requirements, and expected growth opportunities.
• Establish and develop customer pipelines within expansion territories.
• Build relationships with strategic prospects, customers, manufacturers, and industry partners in developing markets.
• Partner with leadership to determine appropriate commercial investment and staffing requirements for new markets.
• Monitor expansion-market performance against established milestones and recommend adjustments based on results.
• Develop repeatable commercial approaches for entering and scaling future geographic markets.

Sales Enablement

• Establish clear expectations and accountability for sales activity, pipeline development, forecasting, account management, and commercial performance.
• Coach and develop sales leaders and individual contributors to improve sales effectiveness and business results.
• Utilize sales and customer data to identify performance trends, growth opportunities, and areas requiring intervention.
• Ensure consistent utilization of the designated CRM and other approved commercial tools to maintain visibility into customer activity, opportunities, pipeline, and sales performance.
• Partner with sales leadership to improve territory planning, customer prioritization, opportunity management, and seller productivity.
• Identify capability gaps and implement appropriate development, coaching, or performance actions.
• Support effective onboarding and ramp-up of new commercial talent.

Customer and Market Development

• Develop strategies to increase new customer acquisition and penetration within existing strategic accounts.
• Identify high-potential, dormant, underpenetrated, and competitive accounts within assigned markets.
• Build and maintain executive-level relationships with strategic customers and prospects.
• Participate in complex, high-value, or strategically important customer opportunities.
• Position the organization as a comprehensive industrial automation and solutions partner rather than solely a product supplier.
• Leverage the organization's broader industrial automation portfolio, engineered solutions, technical expertise, and value-added capabilities to increase customer penetration.
• Maintain awareness of competitive activity, market trends, customer investment patterns, and emerging automation technologies.

Sales Talent and Organizational Development

• Lead, coach, and develop geographically dispersed sales leaders and/or individual contributors.
• Establish measurable performance expectations and maintain accountability for commercial results.
• Assess sales talent and organizational capabilities against current and future market requirements.
• Identify high-potential talent, succession needs, capability gaps, and development opportunities.
• Partner with Human Resources and Talent Acquisition to recruit experienced industrial automation sales professionals.
• Support organizational and territory planning necessary to scale established and developing markets.
• Recommend changes to sales structure, territory alignment, or commercial resources when necessary to support profitable growth.

Channel-Partner and Supplier Management

• Develop and maintain strategic relationships with key vendor and supplier partners.
• Align regional sales priorities with supplier growth strategies where commercially appropriate.
• Identify joint customer-development, market-expansion, and sales opportunities.
• Partner with suppliers on account strategies, technical resources, sales initiatives, and market-development activities.
• Monitor supplier performance and market opportunities and provide appropriate commercial feedback.
• Maintain knowledge of relevant industrial automation technologies, product portfolios, competitive positioning, and channel dynamics.

Commercial and Operational Alignment

• Partner with Operations, Engineering, Supply Chain, Marketing, Finance, Human Resources, and executive leadership to support profitable growth.
• Ensure commercial strategies and customer commitments appropriately align with operational and technical capabilities.
• Partner with Engineering and technical resources to develop differentiated automation solutions for customers.
• Provide leadership with visibility into sales performance, forecasting, customer activity, market conditions, competitive dynamics, talent requirements, and geographic expansion progress.
• Participate in annual strategic planning, budgeting, forecasting, and long-range commercial planning.
• Operate within approved pricing, margin, contractual, and commercial parameters and applicable company approval policies.

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in Business, Engineering, Marketing, or a related field, or equivalent combination of education and relevant experience.
• Ten (10) or more years of progressive sales, commercial, or business-development experience within industrial automation, industrial distribution, manufacturing, or a related technical industry.
• Demonstrated experience leading sales teams, territories, or commercial organizations.
• Proven record of delivering profitable revenue and gross profit growth.
• Demonstrated success developing new customers and expanding strategic accounts.
• Strong knowledge of industrial automation customers, technologies, distribution channels, and competitive dynamics.
• Experience leading or supporting geographically dispersed sales teams.
• Demonstrated capabilities in sales forecasting, pipeline management, territory planning, account development, and performance management.
• Strong leadership, coaching, negotiation, relationship-management, and executive communication skills.
• Ability and willingness to travel extensively throughout assigned and developing territories.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience within an industrial automation distributor, manufacturer, integrator, or engineered-solutions organization.
• Experience with industrial automation technologies including pneumatics, motion control, robotics, machine vision, sensors, PLCs and controls, electrical automation, mechatronics, or engineered automation solutions.
• Demonstrated experience developing greenfield or underpenetrated geographic markets.
• Experience recruiting and developing experienced industrial automation sales professionals.
• Established relationships within the industrial automation market.
• Experience working with major automation manufacturers and supplier partners.
• Experience within a multi-location or decentralized industrial distribution organization.

Key Performance Indicators

• Revenue growth
• Gross profit growth
• Gross margin performance
• New customer acquisition
• Existing-account growth and share of wallet
• Sales pipeline development and conversion
• Forecast accuracy
• Market and territory penetration
• Geographic expansion performance against established milestones
• Seller productivity and performance
• Customer retention
• Strategic supplier growth
• Sales talent development and retention
• CRM utilization and sales-process execution

Decision-Making Authority

The Director, Commercial Sales – Northeast is expected to exercise sound commercial judgment and make decisions within established company policies and approved parameters.

The position has authority to establish territory and account priorities, direct sales activities, coach and manage assigned sales resources, develop market-entry recommendations, and allocate commercial focus within the assigned area of responsibility.

Decisions involving significant financial commitments, headcount additions, organizational restructuring, contractual commitments, pricing outside approved parameters, new facilities, or other material investments remain subject to applicable company approval policies.