Mike Rice

I have served on the board of Directors for a number of logistics operators and European transport providers in the last Twenty Years.

I am passionate about coaching, mentoring, and building high performing teams. I strive for excellence and have had particular success in transforming teams, sites, and businesses into successful, high performing organisations.

I have a personal, provable, sales track record of wining over £1.3bn in contract logistics sales so far in my career.  These are projects where I have conceptualised a solution to a clients key business issues, worked with the client to refine a business proposal, negotiate a contract, and then lead the implementation.

I have developed, proposed, negotiated, and implemented supply chain operations across several verticals, described by clients as “World Class” (Pret a Manger) and “First Class” (Dnata) or “World Leading” (Geith), or platforms that won global “best in class” awards from the client within a year of implementation, in the UK and Europe.  

My experiences with Norbert Dentressangle, ACS&T, Pret a Manger and Bidvest showcase my ability in supply chain management, supplier management, demand forecasting, consolidation and vendor managed inventory. 

The creation of Vendor Managed Inventory schemes, transport consolidation networks, and purchasing teams underpins my ability to create commercially astute logistics operations, providing benefit to all stakeholders.

My consulting and solution solving ability is borne from my ability to gain a deep understanding of business process, the rudiments of the vertical in which a business operates, and my ability to conceptualise robust business solutions.  My commercial ability and consulting skills are further enhanced by the experiences gained as both Managing Director of Gwynedd Shipping Group (Shipping, Road Transport ,Warehousing) and Country Manager of Eurogate Logistics Group (Freight Forwarding), where I have additionally honed my leadership experiences and skillset.

Further, in a number of the above companies I have developed strategic business plans, based on a detailed understanding of my business’s capabilities and development potential along with a detailed understanding of target markets.

I believe have a unique set of skills and experiences which would bring considerable value to a a new organisation in either a commercial/ sales or operational role.

I do hope you find my details of interest and I would be very willing to discuss my skills and experiences further at your convenience. 

Using my ability to conceptualise supply chain issues, my networking ability, and my passion for coaching and mentoring, I found a niche home as a Business Development Director for Norbert Dentressangle Logistics UK.  I built the team from two FTE to over 70, including solution design, sales and implementation project management, winning more business in the UK than the rest of the group combined for three successive years.

As I moved to a hybrid operational/ commercial role with Bidvest, I won a significant “game changing” project with Pret a Manger, replacing three other suppliers and providing a single route to market for all categories in the UK and France.  I led a cultural turn a round which saw throughput, accuracy, and on time in full delivery statistics reach levels that the client described as “World Class”.

As an interim consultant I worked with a number of Amazon DSP's, both in start up and continuous improvement projects; I then worked with businesses supplying last mile delivery operations to DPD/ Fedex and Yodel

I took the role of Group Managing Director with a Shipping/ Road Transport and Logistics group, aware that the business was already in significant distress.  Using my analytical skills, commercial ability, and operational understanding, I worked with various stakeholders in establishing the gravity of issues within the business.  Once the business issues were fully understood I worked with internal and external stakeholders on executing a programme of operational and commercial projects which restored the business to operational profitability.  I then worked intensely with a global leading team of restructuring experts on the commercial sale of the business.

In my latest role, I have restructured the UK business unit.  Working with all operators, leaders and stakeholders in the business, I led a team to process map existing operations and financial performance.  Again working with a range of FTE and stakeholders, I led the team to devise a Business Management System which gave transparency of all activity within the operation, allowing compliance to process to be measured, increasing quote accuracy, and profitability.  As a result of the increased transparency, I was then able to eliminate c. £500k of fixed costs, and reduce the over capacity of resource within the team.  As a result of the restructure, the UK business unit can now be managed via a dashboard. 

BA (Hons), Economics & Social History, The University of Liverpool, 1996-96

Post Graduate Certification in Business Management and Administration, The University of Leicester, 1997-99