View Vacancy - Senior Trade and Investment Adviser- Civil Aerospace

MAIN PURPOSE OF JOB :

Background: This role is an exciting opportunity to work in the global aerospace economy, valued at more than $ 700 billion on the civil side and growing year on year. UK is the second largest aerospace cluster in the world and the largest in Europe. India is a thriving economy with significant aspirations for being a major civil aerospace player.   Both UK and India have a long history of collaboration and presents sizeable business opportunity to aerospace companies from both countries. India, with its burgeoning civil aviation sector and a significant order back log for more planes will see a very robust growth in the sector. You will be one of the senior members of staff in the Department for International Trade (DIT) India, with an objective of working alongside the sector lead to identify opportunities for UK business and identify wider collaborative opportunities for the UK in the aerospace industry in India.

You will be a Senior Trade Officer in the Aerospace team of the Department for International trade (DIT) with an objective of identifying export opportunities for UK companies in the three key sub-sectors: sales, supply chain, MRO and training across India. The aerospace team has individual team members located in the two main hubs: Bangalore and New Delhi. You will be responsible for developing the sales element of the campaign (in co-ordination with the Senior Sector Lead) with UK located OEMs and primes (including AIRBUS, R-R and the airline companies ) some of whom have their Indian headquarters in New Delhi, as well as wider operations throughout India. You will be expected to travel to other similar clusters across India and also to work with and support your colleagues in the team to deliver against the team’s objectives and targets. You will also be responsible for establishing and maintaining relations with the relevant industry related departments of the Government of India in New Delhi.

You will bring with you, or demonstrate how you would quickly acquire, an in-depth knowledge of the sector. In consultation with the Senior Sector Lead, you will contribute to the sector strategy and turn this into long-term potential business opportunities as per the- strands identified in the business plan. To do so, you will identify and build relationships and pipelines of validated projects for UK companies’ particularly large or high-value deals which would require UK government support or involvement to secure. You will work with DIT’s aerospace team in the UK and in other markets to bring UK companies to India and support them to win business, delivering towards the UK government’s export targets.

You will represent the UK government and industry in the aerospace sector; you will be expected to gain access to the most senior levels within Indian industry and government, if necessary working with the High Commissioner, Deputy High Commissioners and other senior staff as appropriate and also, with Ministers and senior officials from the UK Government.   You will be a self-starter who can demonstrate a long-term strategic thinking; plan and manage short, medium and long term delivery models; identify, grow and make effective use of stakeholders.  You will work with colleagues within DIT in India and elsewhere, with other UK government colleagues (in India and the UK), Indian government departments, industry and other multipliers (trade associations, etc.).

ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES :

Validate, plan and deliver the strategy for the aerospace sector across India in close coordination with the Sector Lead. Identify, validate and deliver a pipeline of high value projects and opportunities; plan and deliver activities to connect UK companies to these opportunities and provide bespoke support to them in order to win business. In doing so, meet DIT’s internal targets for pipeline development, export wins, return on investment and customer satisfaction/quality).

In close coordination with the aerospace team, build and manage senior level relationships with key Indian and UK business, stakeholders and partners within the sector, across one-HMG team and in the UK to support objectives and deliver value for UK business.

Create and innovate models to engage with stakeholders, raise the profile of the sector and sub-sector through activities & events planned and managed by DIT, other Government departments and associated marketing teams.

Develop engagements, contacts with key senior Government functionaries and with relevant trade bodies to deliver on policy and regulatory aspects. .

Contributing to wider corporate UK government objectives in India, including supporting Ministerial/VIP visits, events and deliverables as appropriate.

WHAT WE DO:

The Department for International Trade works with UK based companies to ensure their success in international markets through exports. We encourage and support overseas companies to look at the UK as the best place to set up or expand their business. Improving trade and investment links with India is a UK Government priority. The Indian Government is opening up major opportunities (e.g. huge defence purchases with `Make in India’ programmes, Defence offsets and the surging growth in the civil aviation sector) and there is a determination to see a major expansion in bilateral trade and investment.

This job has been created to reflect a decision by DIT to create greater senior capacity within the team, enabling greater strategic direction and focus on individual sectors where significant opportunities exist for the UK. We are targeting these opportunities through strategic campaigns which are programmes of activity designed to unlock individual business / investment opportunities for the UK; our focus is on high value opportunities. We also support individual UK businesses with market access issues and Government lobbying. India has a lot of UK Ministerial/VIP attention and on average we host an incoming Minister/VIP every month.

The team is spread across nine cities in India and currently consists of about 100 people. You will join a high-performing, hybrid team of supportive colleagues made up of UK-based and locally engaged staff.

WHAT WE WANT FROM YOU

The job is a fantastic opportunity to make a real impact on the DIT’s role and links with India. We will give you the freedom and space to develop within your sector and build your networks, we will support you too with opportunities to get the right learning and development, career development and opportunities to travel across India and to the UK. But you will need to be collaborative and flexible too to fit in with the network’s ethos; and, importantly, focussed on delivering results and contributing to the wider corporate efforts especially around Ministerial/VIP visit programme. To be successful :

• You will have an in depth understanding of the civil aerospace sector, both in India and the UK, and a strong network on the ground, and use your good analytical skills to apply this to identifying significant market opportunities for UK business and then supporting them to turn these in to contracts.
• You will need to be strategically aware to identify emerging opportunities in your sector, and to what is happening in the UK in your sectors and to emerging investment opportunities.
• You will have strong interpersonal skills and be a credible team leader capable of setting the direction for yourself and those around you and of gaining their trust and respect - and doing so while working within a virtual team located across India.
• You will have experience of developing productive relationships with senior decision makers in UK and Indian businesses and with stakeholders and partners, and of using these to deliver your objectives.
• You will need to be collaborative and flexible and able to manage yourself and the demands on you.
• You will have good project management skills to create and deliver campaigns; and excellent English written and verbal communication skills. You will be expected to produce written work in to a high standard.

Graduate/post graduate. Candidates without the required educational qualifications but with exceptional practical experience will be considered.

Experience:

• Minimum of 5 years of relevant commercial/business experience.

• An in-depth understanding of the sector and a strong network in the sector are essential.

• Strong analytical and problem skills to search out significant opportunities for UK business.

• Tried and tested project management skills.

• Excellent interpersonal, team working and people management skills. Experience of dealing with senior level decision makers Indian national and state government. You will need to show a solid track record of dealing with senior level decision makers in the business world.
  

• Excellent written and spoken English.