Farm Operations Manager Required
United Emirates Based
Excellent Expat Salary on Offer
Our client is a very impressive UAE-based, established high-tech horticultural business. They develop and operate high-tech, climate-controlled farms to grow a variety of crops and sell directly into the markets in which they operate. Their produce is selling out at major retailers in the UAE and are consumed at an assortment of elite restaurants & hotels. Their brand is associated with incredibly tasty produce and they have built a loyal and vocal customer base. Expansion wise now they are venturing into new cropping (fruit) and into new geographies (Saudi Arabia, Kuwait). Technology, data, and innovation are core to their ethos, and they aim to redefine the Middle Eastern agricultural sector. They are hugely passionate about what they do, and are believers in the growth potential of the company. The team is multi- cultural (American, European, African, Middle Eastern, South Asian), and backgrounds diverse (horticulture, engineering, private equity, management consulting, retail, marketing, etc.).
Due to their ongoing expansion, they now wish to source a key individual as Farm Operations Manager to join with them and share in their success as they grow.
Who You Are:
They are ideally looking for a driven candidate to help build a great organisation that is motivated and passionate in all that they do. You should be well versed and experienced in growing, building and steering people to deliver on company objectives.
You will have high standard in work ethics and don’t shy away from challenging situations and with the ability to deliver high performance with minimal oversight. As a high trust organisation, they are looking for you to understand requirements fully, take ownership and deliver results at a high standard consistently.
Key Aspects of the Role:
Setting up operations in all locations
- Ensure the building designs are in line with the requirements of the service area
- Create and manage the procedure and business planning for setting up operations in different farms
- Develop, implement, and review processes and procedures
Own all operational KPI’s across the farms
- Overall responsible for the packing as per customer requirements
- Own the KPIs and performance management in the organization
Manage complete farm related activities
- Responsible for managing the packhouse supervisors across the farms and across the locations
- Manage the inventory at the farm sites in all aspects
Budget preparation, owning the budget and cascading the responsibility across operations
- Responsibility of budget preparation for all the functions across the farm
- Tracking of the budget and own the operations CAPEX project planning and improving the operations
Set up processes, ensure regular reporting and set targets
- Set up operations process across operations value chain from communicating orders, packing and communicating packing fulfilment and transport
- Ensure regular reporting of insightful data
- Set ambitious targets and support the organization to achieve them
- Identify quality control issues and offer ways to improve
People and Labour Management
- Recruit, train, and supervise staff
- Mentor the team
- Examine data and help forecast any long-term planning
Your Background to Date:
- Have an excellent background in a senior operational/production position within fresh produce
- Used to working on international supply chains within the fresh sectors and also fully used to working with multi-cultural teams
- Highly ambitious – curious, resilient and a great communicator
- Must have excellent written and verbal communication skills with the ability to influence at the highest level
- Have great working proficiency in MS Office
- Be able to make bold decisions and recommendation and have credibility to consultant with senior leaders
- Ability to understand key business drivers and commercial orientation
- Strategic Proficiency influencing/aligning strategy around talent capability and behaviours, collaborate and influence, provide team and change leadership.
- Execution- Deliver on what matters by getting the right things done
What we want to see for you:
- Knowledge of organisational effectiveness and operations management
- Experience budgeting and forecasting
- Familiarity with business and financial principles
- Excellent communication skills
- Leadership ability
- Outstanding organisational skills
- Degree in Business, Operations Management, or related field would be very advantageous.
What’s On Offer:
An excellent ex-pat package is on offer plus significant benefits for the right candidate.
Unique roles require unique people. If this role if of direct interest to you, please apply via this website or call Ian Reed on +44 (0) 1284 715055 quoting Ref: 05576IR
