My name is Sophie, mother of two with an adorable husband (thanks to Proforce this wouldn’t have happened). I work for Australia’s largest baking company, Tip Top Bakeries, managing our biggest customer, Woolworths, and oversee a $230M Retail Sales Value portfolio annually. I sell more than two million loaves of bread a week with iconic brands like Tip Top, Golden, and Abbotts Bakery. The best part of my role is the ability to bring my authentic self to work every day whilst having fun! Reflecting on my career, I’ve spent 6.5 years at Goodman Fielder and 7 years at Tip Top Bakeries across 9 different roles and 4 major customers. These experiences have shaped me into a well-rounded sales leader with exposure to Field Sales, Category, Customer Brands, and Retail Sales. My first role through Proforce (Contractor Administrator) gave me the foundations of organisation, corporate communication, team spirit, and confidence. It also introduced me to project work, such as implementing the ordering portal for bread contractors. This role marked the beginning of both my Proforce journey and my path as a leader. Insights to Action: At Goodman Fielder, as Shopper Activation Manager, I applied a simple but powerful insight: the number one basket item with salad dressings is lettuce. With single-minded focus, I built a strong off-location program, aligned promotions, and engaged the field team dedicated to salad season. The result was a successful push-pull DC strategy that delivered incremental seasonal sales. Driving Efficiencies: When I joined Tip Top as Shopper Marketing Manager, the field team’s biggest frustration was excess point of sale (POS). It created manual handling risks, wasted travel time and complicated execution. I led a project team to design a modular POS suite—base bins, interchangeable headers, reversible skins, theatre kits and adjuncts. We shipped POS direct to stores, marking cartons orange so they stood out on back docks. This drove a +20% sales uplift versus stores without displays. More importantly, one field team member told me I had changed his life by making the job safer and reducing time on the road, a humbling reminder of how leadership decisions affect real people. Thought Leadership and Commercial Acumen: As Business Development Manager and later National Account Manager, I developed pricing models, led large-scale negotiations, and executed promotional strategies with Aldi and Woolworths. I focused on three-way wins through joint business planning, including the successful renovation of Private Label bread. Growth Mindset: Packaged bread had been in decline for a decade but by working closely with Woolworths, we have begun to stabilise decline through right range, right order, right planogram and trusted brand activations such as Woolworths Collectibles. While challenges remain, new initiatives like the Woolworths Out Of Stocks program continue to capture quick wins and move the portfolio forward. My ambition is to see Tip Top become Australia’s favourite bakery through collaboration with Woolworths and delivering consistent growth. As a sales leader of tomorrow, I strive to empower those around me, create three-way wins, and continually building myself.,