Customer Account Executive Review

My role was a customer account executive role, which is effectively an Account Management role on a small account. This involves communicating with an external customer/buyer to aligning pricing, promotions, product range and funding, and ensure that the products I am responsible for show up brilliantly in-store. A key aspect of this is collaborating with internal teams, building a category and brand story to sell and execute key business priorities and new products in store in a way that is profitable for both Unilever and the customer.
The key areas that this involves on a day to day basis are:
- Sales performance analysis (external and internal)
- Sales Forecasting (external and internal P & L)
- Communication with the customer/buyer and negotiation
- Executional planning (promotions, in-store media, new products)

I was very pleased with the responsibility that I was given in this placement. After demonstrating that I had developed the key skills necessary, I was trusted to take ownership of my account from plans through to execution, and to communicate and negotiate externally.

I have had some fantastic opportunities to both develop new and existing skills. My P & L and data analysis skills have improved massively, due to both the training that I received and the opportunities to put those skills into practice under pressure. The same goes for communication and negotiation/selling skills; I have had fantastic training in this area, and have been given opportunities to land key business priorities with my customer.

I had excellent support and guidance during my placement. My line manager was extremely supportive, communicative, and committed to my development and to helping me push outside of my comfort zone. At a wider level, I was very pleased with the willingness of colleagues in my wider team to help with any questions or development points that I had.

The company culture was positive, and the general atmosphere was friendly yet focused. I certainly felt that there was a performance driven culture that people were responding very positively to despite some pressure, and I appreciated the effort that went into recognition of the work that people are doing and how they contributed to the business as a whole.

I enjoyed it a lot, due to the responsibility that I was given with my role, the development opportunities that came from that, and the relationships that I built with the people in the company.

Yes