Sales Manager (International Freight… at Mohawk Global · Itasca

SALES MANAGER (INTERNATIONAL FREIGHT FORWARDING) Regular Full-Time · Location: Chicago, Itasca, IL, US / Chicago, IL, Chicago, IL, US Position Title: Sales Manager Reports To: Vice President, Global Sales & Marketing Employment Type: Full Time FLSA Status: Exempt Please note that the salary range referenced is a general guideline only. Salary differentials are based on multiple factors including (but not limited to), geographic location, education/training, years of relevant experience/seniority, merit, qualifications, as well as market and business considerations. Mohawk Global considers all of these variables when extending an offer of employment. Who We Are: Mohawk Global is a 350+ person team of logistics and trade specialists dedicated to fulfilling the supply chain needs of our customers with a strong emphasis on customs brokerage, domestic and international transportation, trade compliance, education, and consulting. Our business practices are driven and exhibited daily by our three core values: to ENRICH purposefully, to CARE personally and to DELIVER professionally. To learn more about our core values and what makes us truly unique in our industry, please click here. We pride ourselves in being a highly employee-centric organization that truly puts our people (and clients) first! At Mohawk, these aren’t just words, they are a demonstrable value that we put into action by our behaviors each day. We have been certified as a “Great Place To Work” for the past thirteen years…see what our greatest assets, our people, have to say about us here: Mohawk Global - A Great Place to Work! POSITION SUMMARY: The Sales Manager is a field-based sales leadership role focused on new business acquisition, pipeline creation, seller development, and sales process discipline. This role does not carry a personal book of business. The Sales Manager acts as a force multiplier for assigned sellers by coaching lead generation, prospecting, discovery, solution design, proposal strategy, internal coordination, and close execution. The Sales Manager is accountable for both total team performance and individual seller performance. Team results should not hide individual rep or branch-level underperformance. Each seller must have clear goals, quality pipelines, active coaching, accurate Salesforce discipline, and a practical path to production. The Sales Manager works closely with branch leadership, operations, pricing, customs, trade consulting, product leadership, marketing, People & Culture, and the Vice President of Global Sales & Marketing to remove roadblocks, align internal support, reinforce sales standards, and build a stronger sales team.   DUTIES & RESPONSIBILITIES: • Support sellers in creating access to prospects and developing new business opportunities • Participate in ride-alongs, customer meetings, prospect meetings, live deal coaching, and field sales activity on a regular and schedule. • Coach sellers on better customer conversations, stronger discovery, clearer positioning, and accurate expectation setting. • Help sellers build credibility with prospects while connecting customer confidence back to Mohawk’s broader team and service capability. • Support existing customer escalations when sales leadership involvement is needed, while keeping the primary focus on pipeline and new business acquisition. • Lead, coach, and manage assigned salespeople across Associate Account Executive, Account Executive, Senior Account Executive, and Strategic Account Executive roles. • Help sellers execute the sales process from lead generation and prospecting through Discovery, Solution Design, Proposal, and Closed Won or Closed Lost outcomes. • Own weekly one-on-one meetings with each assigned seller. • Lead monthly small team meetings for assigned direct reports. • Prepare sellers for monthly regional pipeline reviews. • Support monthly large sales team meetings and sales training sessions by reinforcing priorities, follow-up, and adoption. • Deploy assigned sellers within their approved product focus areas, markets, territories, accounts, and opportunities. • Maintain product focus discipline. International sellers stay focused on international opportunities. Domestic sellers stay focused on domestic opportunities. Cross selling ties everything together.  • Help sellers build internal deal teams around qualified opportunities, including pricing, operations, customs, trade consulting, implementation, and other subject matter experts when needed. • Support recruiting, selection, onboarding, and training of sales talent. Hiring decisions are shared, but the Sales Manager has a strong voice and is ultimately responsible for team quality.  • Diagnose what is limiting each seller’s performance and coach to that constraint. • Support sellers who are struggling with prospecting, opportunity creation, discovery, internal coordination, proposal strategy, close execution, or sales process discipline. • Remove roadblocks by using Mohawk expertise, internal relationships, and sales process knowledge. • Help sellers decide when to push, pause, rework, or qualify out an opportunity. • Help sellers secure internal support for larger or more complex opportunities. • Balance total team performance with individual seller accountability. Team results should not hide branch-level or seller-level underperformance. • Address performance issues directly and professionally in close collaboration with the People & Culture team and guidance from the Vice President of Global Sales & Marketing. • Work closely with the Vice President of Global Sales & Marketing on team performance, pipeline health, forecast accuracy, training priorities, and organizational sales standards. • Align with branch leadership on local sales goals, rep performance, office priorities, and operations support. • Build strong working relationships with operations, pricing, customs, trade consulting, product leadership, marketing, and other internal stakeholders. • Communicate pipeline risks, seller performance issues, deal support needs, and forecast changes clearly and early. • Support organizational sales training priorities and reinforce adoption with assigned sellers. • Coach sales apprentices as required. • Own team budgeting and forecast accuracy for assigned sellers. • Ensure seller forecasts are real, current, defensible, and reliable before they roll up to sales leadership. • Enforce Salesforce usage and data quality as a management standard. • Inspect stages, next steps, close dates, activity, pipeline value, forecast category, and opportunity quality. • Track team and individual progress against new logo GP goals, qualified pipeline creation, opportunity creation, sales process discipline, and win quality. • Report performance clearly, including both total team results and individual seller performance. • Perform other duties as assigned BENCHMARKS FOR MEASURING SUCCESS: • Achieving assigned team new logo GP goals. • Ensuring assigned sellers make clear progress toward their individual new logo GP, pipeline, and opportunity creation goals. • Maintaining healthy qualified pipelines across the team, with sufficient coverage, stage movement by sellers, and opportunity quality. • Improving seller performance through weekly one-on-ones, field coaching, ride-alongs, deal strategy, and targeted development. • Maintaining accurate team forecasts and clean Salesforce discipline across assigned sellers. • Building, hiring, onboarding, and developing sales talent capable of producing in Mohawk’s sales model. • Strengthening branch alignment, internal deal support, and cross-functional collaboration around new business opportunities. SKILLS & QUALIFICATIONS: Technical Skills: • Uses Salesforce to inspect pipeline, forecast accuracy, seller activity, opportunity stages, next steps, close dates, and data quality. • Coach Mohawk’s sales process from lead generation and prospecting through Discovery, Solution Design, Proposal, and close. • Understands Mohawk’s service offerings well enough to coach sellers, qualify fit, and identify when to involve subject matter experts. • Support opportunity management by advising when to bring in pricing, operations, customs, trade consulting, implementation, product leadership, or other internal resources. • Uses sales metrics, pipeline data, budget information, and forecast reporting to manage team performance. Business Skills: • Coaches sellers at the specific point where performance is breaking down. • Improves seller execution in prospecting, qualification, discovery, solution design, proposal follow-up, internal coordination, and close preparation. • Helps sellers build stronger opportunity plans and internal deal teams. • Balances team goals, individual seller goals, branch expectations, and product focus requirements. • Deploys sellers within their assigned product lanes and markets based on opportunity quality, pipeline needs, and business priorities. • Supports hiring, onboarding, training, and development of sales talent. • Translates company growth priorities into practical sales execution for the assigned team. • Supports strong branch and sales collaboration especially as opportunities move through the funnel and get closer to implementation.  Leadership Skills: • Leads through coaching, inspection, accountability, and field presence. • Conducts regular one-on-ones, ride-alongs, live deal coaching, and performance conversations. • Builds trust with sellers while holding clear standards for activity, pipeline, CRM discipline, and results. • Addresses underperformance directly and professionally, in coordination with P&C and the Vice President of Global Sales and Marketing. • Builds internal relationships that help sellers remove friction, use the right resources, and compete for better business. • Works collaboratively with branch and operations departments to ensure a strong and regular flow of information to eliminate any silos between departments Required Qualifications: • Proven ability to lead, coach, and develop B2B salespeople • Strong understanding of sales process, pipeline creation, opportunity qualification, forecasting, and new business acquisition • Ability to coach sellers across lead generation, prospecting, Discovery, Solution Design, Proposal, and close execution • Strong Salesforce discipline and ability to manage through CRM data, pipeline inspection, and forecast accuracy • Strong working knowledge of logistics, supply chain, freight forwarding, customs brokerage, domestic transportation, trade consulting, or the ability to rapidly build Mohawk-specific knowledge from a strong adjacent background • Ability to build strong internal relationships across branches, operations, pricing, product leadership, customs, trade consulting, marketing, P&C, and sales leadership • Ability to address performance issues directly, professionally, and consistently Preferred Qualifications: • Sales leadership experience in logistics, freight forwarding, customs brokerage, domestic transportation, trade consulting, supply chain, or a closely related field. • Experience managing new logo sales teams across multiple territories, branches, or service lines. • Experience coaching field sellers through ride-alongs, customer meetings, live deal strategy, and pipeline reviews. • Experience recruiting, interviewing, onboarding, and developing commercial talent. • Experience using Salesforce or a comparable CRM to manage team performance, pipeline, and forecast accuracy. • Experience supporting sales training, sales methodology adoption, or apprentice development. OFFICE / WORK ENVIRONMENT & PHYSICAL DEMANDS This position operates in a professional office environment (and/or remotely from a home office) with a quiet to moderate noise level and routinely requires the use of standard office equipment such computers, photocopying machines and storage/filing cabinets. This is a largely sedentary role, however, lifting items under 25 pounds as well as the ability to bend, stand and walk short distances may be required.  Travel Requirement: Local and regional travel should be expected based on assigned sellers, branch locations, customer needs, field coaching needs, and business priorities. The schedule should support customer access, seller development, pipeline inspection, branch alignment, and consistent new business execution.   Mohawk Global is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability or veteran status.    Equal Employment Opportunity is The Law  Employee Rights Under the FMLA  Employee Rights - Employee Polygraph Protection Act