Senior Tendering & Proposal Manager

Senior Tendering & Proposal Manager## About the JobWe are looking for an experienced **Senior Tendering & Proposal Manager** to lead end-to-end tendering, proposal, estimation, and commercial activities within a technical/project-based environment.This is a senior leadership position responsible for managing a **team of 10–15 professionals**, overseeing complex tenders and RFQs, developing competitive commercial proposals, strengthening customer and supplier relationships, and driving tender conversion and profitable business growth.The ideal candidate will bring strong commercial acumen, hands-on tendering expertise, excellent negotiation skills, and a proven track record of managing the full tender lifecycle—from RFQ receipt through submission, negotiation, award, and post-award follow-up.## Key Responsibilities* Lead the complete **tendering and proposal lifecycle**, including RFQs, cost estimation, proposal preparation, submission, clarification, negotiation, award, and post-award handover.* Lead and manage a **Tendering & Proposal team of approximately 10–15 members**, ensuring effective workload allocation, quality, and timely delivery.* Monitor customer and procurement portals to identify new RFQs, tenders, and business opportunities.* Review tender requirements, technical specifications, scopes of work, commercial terms, and submission requirements.* Coordinate with internal stakeholders to obtain the technical, operational, and commercial information required for proposals.* Review and approve proposals prior to submission, ensuring they are accurate, compliant, competitive, commercially viable, and submitted within deadline.* Prepare and review detailed **cost estimates and pricing models**, considering materials, manpower, logistics, services, overheads, and other commercial factors.* Identify commercial risks, assumptions, exclusions, qualifications, and deviations within proposals.* Negotiate with suppliers on pricing, discounts, payment terms, lead times, and other commercial conditions.* Evaluate suppliers based on price, quality, technical compliance, delivery capability, and commercial terms.* Build and maintain strong relationships with customers, suppliers, and key business stakeholders.* Follow up proactively on submitted quotations and tenders to obtain feedback, understand opportunity status, and support conversion.* Participate in customer negotiations and support the successful award of commercially viable contracts.* Coordinate awarded orders with relevant internal teams to ensure timely execution and delivery.* Monitor post-award activities, including customer documentation, delivery confirmation, **Goods Receipt Notes (GRNs)**, order closure, and invoicing requirements.* Follow up on **Calls of Order (COOs)** under ongoing **Long-Term Purchase Agreements (LTPAs)** to support recurring business.* Establish and continuously improve tendering processes, templates, workflows, controls, and best practices.* Monitor team and tendering performance against key commercial and operational KPIs.## What We're Looking For* Bachelor's or Master's degree in **Engineering, Business Administration, Supply Chain Management**, or a related discipline.* **10–15+ years of relevant experience** in tendering, proposals, estimation, commercial management, procurement, sales support, or related functions.* Strong experience within a **technical, engineering, industrial, contracting, or project-based environment** is highly preferred.* Proven experience managing the **full tender lifecycle**, from RFQ receipt through commercial evaluation, submission, negotiation, award, and post-award follow-up.* Demonstrated experience preparing and reviewing complex cost estimates and commercial proposals.* Strong supplier negotiation and vendor-management experience.* Proven experience in customer-facing commercial negotiations and relationship management.* Previous experience **leading and developing a tendering/proposal team**, ideally of approximately 10–15 employees.* Strong commercial judgment with the ability to balance competitive pricing, risk, profitability, and customer requirements.* Ability to interpret technical specifications, scopes of work, contractual requirements, and commercial terms.* Excellent analytical, negotiation, communication, and stakeholder-management skills.* Strong attention to detail with the ability to manage multiple tenders and competing deadlines simultaneously.* Proficiency in **Microsoft Office, particularly Excel and Word**.* Experience using **online procurement and tendering portals**.## What Success Looks LikeSuccess in this role will be measured through:* On-time and compliant tender submissions.* Tender-to-order conversion rate.* Gross margin and profitability of awarded business.* Revenue generated through tendering activities.* Quality and accuracy of proposals.* Supplier savings and quotation turnaround time.* Development of new RFQs and commercial opportunities.* Customer engagement and retention.* Timely execution and delivery of awarded orders.* Timely GRN receipt and order closure.* Growth of recurring orders under LTPAs.* Overall performance and effectiveness of the Tendering & Proposal team.The Ideal CandidateYou are a commercially minded tendering leader who combines **technical understanding, strong financial judgment, negotiation expertise, customer orientation, and people leadership**.You are comfortable managing complex and high-value tenders, negotiating with customers and suppliers, leading a sizeable team, and taking ownership of opportunities from initial RFQ through successful award and delivery.If you have a strong track record in **tendering, proposals, estimation, and commercial management** and are ready to take ownership of a high-impact function, we would be interested in hearing from you.