Senior Commercial Manager

As Cornerstone continues to evolve and grow its portfolio of strategic customer relationships, the Senior Commercial Manager plays a pivotal role in maximising commercial value, driving account growth, and ensuring commercial excellence across key customer accounts.

The Role

The Senior Commercial Manager is a senior commercial leadership position responsible for supporting Key Account teams across a portfolio of major customers and contracts.

The role sits at the forefront of customer engagement and commercial decision-making, providing strategic commercial leadership while helping account teams optimise contract performance, identify growth opportunities and deliver strong commercial outcomes.

This role requires close partnership with:

• Sales
• Delivery
• Legal
• Finance
• Commercial Marketing
• Senior Leadership Teams

The successful candidate will act as a trusted advisor to both customers and internal stakeholders, leading negotiations, governance activities and business improvement initiatives while driving profitability and long-term customer value.

Why This Role Matters

This role is critical to ensuring Cornerstone maximises value from its most significant customer relationships by:

• Driving commercial performance and profitability.
• Supporting strategic account growth.
• Managing commercial risks and contractual obligations.
• Optimising margins and identifying cost-out opportunities.
• Supporting transformational change across the business.
• Enhancing commercial capability within Key Account teams.

The Senior Commercial Manager also serves as a change agent, helping shape the future of the Commercial Management function and supporting Cornerstone's ambition to be recognised as a market-leading commercial organisation.

Key Responsibilities

Commercial Leadership

• Lead all commercial management activities across a portfolio of major accounts.
• Drive commercial strategies that maximise account value and profitability.
• Support business development and customer growth opportunities.
• Ensure commercial requirements of strategic customers are successfully delivered.

Account Performance & P&L Management

• Own commercial accountability for:
• Revenue growth
• Margin optimisation
• Cost reduction initiatives
• Contract performance
• Change management activity
• Identify opportunities to improve commercial outcomes across customer portfolios.

Contract & Commercial Governance

• Maintain oversight of contractual obligations and commercial risks.
• Ensure key contractual clauses are understood and applied appropriately.
• Lead commercial discussions within governance and review forums.
• Deliver high-quality business reviews with clear risk and opportunity management.

Negotiation & Customer Engagement

• Lead or support complex customer negotiations.
• Participate in senior customer meetings alongside multifunctional teams.
• Manage difficult commercial discussions while protecting business interests.
• Develop creative commercial solutions that meet customer and company objectives.

Leadership & Capability Building

• Coach and develop Key Account Management teams.
• Support teams in developing strong commercial proposals.
• Share commercial best practice across the business.
• Support succession planning and people development.
• Deputise for the Head of Contract & Commercial Performance when required.

Business Change & Transformation

• Lead commercial improvement initiatives.
• Drive process enhancements across the Commercial function.
• Challenge existing ways of working and identify innovation opportunities.
• Support the continued evolution of Commercial Management within Cornerstone.

Market & Commercial Insight

• Monitor market trends and competitor activity.
• Provide insight into commercial structures, contracts and deal strategies.
• Partner with Commercial Marketing teams to strengthen market positioning.
• Identify opportunities to improve competitive advantage.

What They're Looking For

Core Technical Requirements

• Extensive Commercial Management experience.
• Experience managing large and complex customer contracts.
• Strong commercial and financial acumen.
• P&L ownership and improvement experience.
• Contract management expertise.
• Commercial risk management capability.
• Growth strategy and account expansion experience.
• Strong understanding of change management within commercial environments.

Leadership Requirements

• Proven leadership experience within Commercial Management.
• Experience developing high-performing teams.
• Ability to coach and mentor commercial professionals.
• Strong capability in leading cross-functional teams.
• Experience driving organisational change.

Customer & Stakeholder Expertise

• Significant customer-facing experience.
• Ability to operate effectively in both pre-sales and in-life contract environments.
• Strong relationship-management skills.
• Experience engaging with senior stakeholders and executives.

Key Competencies

Commercial Acumen

• Deep understanding of commercial models and contractual frameworks.
• Ability to identify opportunities that enhance revenue, profitability and customer value.
• Strong commercial decision-making capability.

Strategic Thinking

• Able to balance short-term commercial priorities with long-term business goals.
• Identifies future growth opportunities and develops actionable strategies.
• Anticipates risks and develops mitigation plans.

Negotiation & Influence

• Exceptional negotiation skills.
• Able to navigate complex commercial discussions.
• Influences senior internal and external stakeholders effectively.
• Comfortable challenging perspectives and driving consensus.

Leadership & Coaching

• Inspires high-performing teams.
• Develops commercial capability in others.
• Promotes accountability and continuous improvement.
• Leads through influence and credibility.

Change & Innovation

• Challenges the status quo.
• Leads transformation initiatives.
• Creates innovative commercial solutions.
• Drives efficiency and business improvement.

Executive Presence

• Comfortable presenting at C-suite level.
• Communicates complex ideas with clarity and confidence.
• Demonstrates gravitas and credibility in high-profile situations.

Likely Interview Focus Areas

Commercial & Contract Management

• Tell us about a complex commercial contract you've managed.
• How have you improved profitability across a customer portfolio?
• Describe your approach to contract governance.
• How do you manage commercial risk in large-scale agreements?

Leadership

• How have you developed a high-performing commercial team?
• Tell us about a time you led significant business change.
• Describe your leadership style when managing senior stakeholders.

Customer & Negotiation

• Tell us about a challenging commercial negotiation.
• How do you maintain customer relationships while protecting commercial interests?
• Describe a situation where you influenced a difficult stakeholder.

Strategic Thinking

• How have you identified and delivered growth opportunities within an existing account?
• What methods do you use to improve margin performance?
• How do you balance customer requirements with business objectives?

Ideal Candidate Profile

The ideal candidate will have:

✅ Extensive Commercial Management leadership experience

✅ Significant experience managing large, complex contracts and customer accounts

✅ Strong negotiation and influencing skills

✅ Track record of improving commercial performance and profitability

✅ Experience leading multifunctional stakeholder groups

✅ Proven success driving business change and process improvement

✅ Ability to operate confidently at Executive and C-suite level

✅ Strong people leadership and coaching capability

✅ Strategic commercial mindset with strong business acumen