Summary
Overview
Work History
Education
Skills
Websites
Activities
Leadership Experience
Quotes
Professional Highlights
Timeline
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Daniel Stephen

Daniel Stephen

Summary

Hi, I'm Daniel. I’m a driven commercial leader with a consistent track-record empowering high-growth startups and established businesses. I’m a versatile problem-solver, specializing in strategy & operations and building partnerships. I guide companies through the development and execution of high-impact strategies to achieve high growth and build foundations for long-term profitability, and ensuring a sustainable P&L. My key strengths lie in: (i) analyzing and identifying the problems that matter most, (ii) ideating, stress-testing, and formulating effective solutions, as well as (iii) fostering collaboration across internal stakeholders and building friendships with global brand partners – all while employing effective communication and data-centric methods in an agile manner.

Overview

6
6
years of professional experience

Work History

Senior Category Lead

Lazada
11.2020 - Current
  • Optimized P&L of the Groceries, Non-Food & Alcohol categories (~10% of business): Led growth and profitability plans, brand-partner relations, and led projects across functions: Analytics, S&P, Marketing, BD, Ops, Supply chain, Finance, Legal
  • Led teams of 5 category managers and 11 account managers, securing top KPI achievement for self and team and recovering market share (+2pp YoY) while ensuring profitability
  • Led key growth projects to reinvigorate a 10-yo business: (i) Managed a new launch team of 10 and established ways of working to scale the Groceries business through a new vertical, contributing to 1.48x growth YoY; (ii) Led brand partnerships and crafted a strategic partnership plan, securing agreements with top brand partners that grew margins +1.4pp to achieve new profitability peak and winning exclusivity commitments, e.g
  • TWG, APB, Nestle, KimberlyClark, Walch; (iii) Spearheaded RedMart-wide assortment review, contributing 3x growth in no
  • Selling sellers; (iv) Crafted and led strategic projects across functions e.g
  • New business, competitive share, covid response, and initiated key product improvements e.g
  • Supplier services, promo tools, acquisition; (v) Spearheaded new targeted growth initiatives for the categories; (vi) Developed management dashboard with analytics team to improve management of all categories.

General Manager and Head of Demand Planning

Grab
09.2019 - 10.2020
  • Managed P&L for 80% of business for the largest Cloud Kitchen in Indonesia in its two biggest markets - Jakarta and Bandung
  • Oversaw: (a) Merchant Growth (end-to-end from acquisition), (b) Go-To-Market & Demand Strategy (promo, traffic, customer lifecycle, analytics), (c) Commercial Strategy (USPs, monetization, product, marketing), (d) Led Product Roadmap (product owner and led new features, A/B tests), (e) Financial (Capex, Opex), (f) Ground Operations (SOPs, Quality Management, VOC)
  • Won growth and profitability goals, with a team of 13 and coordination across all functions: (i) Grew Revenue by 2.8x within the first Quarter of joining and drove 4.5x growth since; (ii) Improved EBITDA by 2.7x to be on track with profitability target and achieved dominant market share (est
  • 55% 2020 Sep); (iii) Led launches of ~20 Kitchens across cities and drove new product offerings and features with Tech team, e.g
  • All In One, Dark Stores, Private Labels; (iv) Deployed machine learning to improve targeting and kitchen processes; (v) Spearheaded merchant management structure, improved NPS score by 25%
  • Headed Demand Planning for GrabKitchen Indonesia: (i) Established demand planning and CRM SOPs and structures, and led growth analytics and strategies that were scaled for 5 cities, securing strong growth in DAU, AOV, ARPU etc.; (ii) Designed localized merchant campaigns, A/B tests, OM, and created structure for most cost-efficient promos leading to 2.7x GMV growth and 15% cost reduction within 1Q; (iii) Formulated partnership plan executed by Merchant team, locking 90% commitment and +7% Revenue; and (iv) Ideated and managed Product Roadmap
  • Initiatives were scaled for GrabFood.

Senior Associate in Project Management

Shopee
11.2017 - 08.2019
  • Worked with CCO and led formulation of category management structures, growth plans, and playbook for Category Managers, and designed growth initiatives (e.g
  • Assortment, merchant mix, pricing etc.) across seller groups
  • Kickstarted growth plans for Shopee Mall Indonesia, and co-developed Joint Business Planning structures
  • Led pitches and negotiations with executives of top brands e.g
  • Samsung, P&G, Levi’s, and secured Shopee ID’s first commission commitments
  • Established Shopee's first seller operations program (Master Seller), with end-to-end seller guidelines and trainings to optimize fulfillment and sales, impacting more than 1,000 of Shopee's top sellers and led to regional scaling of program
  • As Project Lead for Electronics, developed growth strategies for the category
  • Managed Top brands Samsung, Xiaomi, HP and led retail partnerships, notably closing deal with Samsung and set process to achieve the first profitable retail model
  • Proposed and spearheaded: (i) Key monetization initiatives, e.g
  • Shopee’s first commission model and merchant fees; (ii) New features: Stock management, Listing improvements, Brand features etc.; and (iii) Campaign voucher collection frameworks.

Education

Bachelor of Social Sciences, Political Science -

National University of Singapore (NUS)

A-level -

National Junior College

O-level -

Catholic High

Skills

  • Risk Mitigation
  • Raw Material Spend
  • Asset Management Performance
  • Supplier Contracts

Activities

NUS Mountaineering, Chairperson, 2011 – 2012, Led >50 peers in planning and executing expeditions

Leadership Experience

Adam Khoo Learning and Technologies Group, Project Director and Coach, ~1 Yr

Quotes

  • You need only see the smiles on your customers’ faces to know how successful your business is
  • To solve any problem, one must first ask the right questions

Professional Highlights

  • Delved into uncharted operational challenges at Shopee’s start-up phase, created playbooks that transformed complex processes, and spearheaded new tech solutions (excel tools as MVP) that optimized productivity and growth. These were scaled as app features
  • Led growth-optimization projects throughout my last 6 years in Shopee, Grab, RedMart and Lazada, leading assortment, pricing, promotion, partnership and monetization initiatives that set important foundations for these tech companies and the sector. Over 8 years, I had the chance to learn, lead and build partnerships with global brands across diverse categories, including FMCG, Groceries, Electronics, Fashion, Beauty, Tech
  • Headed the demand planning team of Grab’s new vertical, created structures for CRM that improved the efficiency and effectiveness of customer acquisition and retention, and oversaw the successful launches of its cloud kitchens in Indonesia
  • Led a new business unit of >10 people for Lazada during the pandemic to serve untapped demand in online groceries, and in times of increasing competition post-pandemic, I specialized in programs that deepened partnerships, retained and captured market share
  • My background as a tech policy consultant in Southeast Asia for 2 years (Indonesia, Singapore, Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Cambodia) helps me appreciate the unique socio-political sensitivities of each country to better navigate my commercial strategies accordingly

Timeline

Senior Category Lead

Lazada
11.2020 - Current

General Manager and Head of Demand Planning

Grab
09.2019 - 10.2020

Senior Associate in Project Management

Shopee
11.2017 - 08.2019

Bachelor of Social Sciences, Political Science -

National University of Singapore (NUS)

A-level -

National Junior College

O-level -

Catholic High

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