Senior Sales Manager, Energy Equipment & Oilfield

Sales department
Houston, TX, US
Remote

If you have built a mature ocean freight book across energy equipment and oilfield infrastructure, turbines, compression equipment, motor parts, electrical conductors, valves, drilling-related machinery, this role places that book inside an operating environment calibrated to the project cadence of energy supply chains.

About Skypace

Skypace serves shippers whose freight programs depend on consistent execution across repeated ocean movements, multiple service providers, and constant commercial pressure on cost, timing, and space allocation. For these companies, performance is shaped by how systematically pricing, allocation, and milestone visibility move alongside the shipment itself.

Skypace demonstrates a global operating environment where this coordination is built into the workflow as a structural standard. Shippers, carriers, drayage providers, and internal teams operate through a shared data structure that accumulates context, supports timely decisions, and preserves the operational record across the shipment lifecycle.

Today, this model supports more than 150 customers across 18 countries through direct integrations with top 10 ocean carriers, among them MSC, Maersk, CMA CGM, COSCO, and Hapag-Lloyd. The operating environment optimizes shipper performance across freight cost, communication discipline, error reduction, booking speed, and visibility into how each participating party performs against commitment.

Operational data accumulates as a clean, structured record that supports continuous process improvement today and becomes foundational as supply chains integrate AI-driven decision agents into planning, execution, and exception handling.

How the operation runs

Skypace operates on a proactive monitoring discipline. Milestones are tracked through live data across the entire shipment ecosystem. Deviations in schedule, cost, or capacity surface within the operating environment, and the next operational action is initiated by Skypace before the client encounters the problem.

The instant-quote and online booking engine compresses commercial response time from days to minutes. Carrier MQC commitments hold during peak season, which is the period when allocation decides whether a shipper's seasonal cycle preserves its margin or absorbs unplanned cost.

The quote engine surfaces every accessorial at the quote stage, including peak surcharges, GRI, port congestion fees, drayage components, and specialty equipment charges where applicable. The number the client sees at quote stands on the invoice. Pricing integrity is treated as a commercial discipline, not a service feature.

Why this role exists

This role leads senior commercial coverage of Skypace's energy equipment and oilfield portfolio out of the Houston Gulf Coast, across gas turbines and turbo-propellers, compression-ignition engines, machinery parts, insulated wire and conductors, and the related equipment categories that move on project schedules into and out of US energy infrastructure. Senior coverage at Skypace combines portfolio activation, retention discipline, and operational influence over how Skypace handles project-cargo coordination, heavy-lift logistics, and the documentation cadence that energy procurement teams require.

What the role holds

The role manages a transitioning portfolio with a full Year 1 sunset rate on every originated account. Sunset rates continue across Year 2 and Year 3+ even when day-to-day account management transfers to operations. A 90-day transition plan is co-designed before signing, accounts mapped by project type, equipment category, project cadence, and required operational documentation.

Beyond portfolio retention, the role leads strategic energy-equipment account development across EPCs, OEM equipment manufacturers, and oilfield service supply chains. Cross-functional input on platform development includes how Skypace surfaces project milestone visibility, heavy-lift coordination touchpoints, and customs entry timing for capital equipment with project-specific tariff treatment.

Mentorship of one or two junior sales representatives typically begins month nine to twelve, once the senior's own portfolio is established. The role represents Skypace's protection of senior commercial interests through transparent attribution, locked sunset rates, and freight audit defense across the lifecycle of every originated relationship.

You are the right candidate if

You bring 7+ years of ocean freight sales experience covering energy equipment, oilfield logistics, or project cargo for EPCs, OEMs, or oilfield service organizations operating out of Houston or the broader Gulf Coast.

You hold a book that has compounded through retention, a meaningful share of annual gross profit comes from accounts owned for twenty-four months or longer.

You operate with the operational fluency of a senior project-cargo commercial professional: heavy-lift planning, RoRo versus container economics, port crane and inland transport coordination, customs entry for capital equipment, classification accuracy under USHTS, and the freight audit logic that protects energy procurement budgets.

You hold decision-maker access at the top of your accounts, supply chain VPs, project logistics directors, OEM commercial leads, not procurement intermediaries alone.

You can describe, at operational specificity, how energy procurement teams measure forwarder performance, and what pattern of work supports retention across multi-year project cycles.

Compensation

Base salary: $150,000 – $200,000. Final base reflects portfolio size and transition plan, finalized before signing

Commission Year 1: 15–20% of gross profit, no cap. Rate determined by portfolio scope and ramp commitment

Sunset rates: 12% (Year 2), 7% (Year 3+). Locked attribution across the lifecycle of originated accounts

Annual bonus accelerator: 10% of GP on three highest GP months. Distributed by February 1 of the following year

Phantom equity: up to 2.0% across four tranches. Tied to gross profit milestones, separate plan document

Title progression: Senior Sales Manager → Director of Sales. 12-month review against portfolio growth and commercial leadership

Benefits: medical, vision, dental (50% employer-paid) + 401(k). Full-time W-2 employment

Job application form

Candidate Assesment
Given the high volume of applicants, we truly appreciate those who recognize the value of the supply chain transformation that Skypace brings as both a forwarder and a technology partner for our clients. Based on your experience and understanding of the position, please share your thoughts on how you believe your career and professional experience would evolve if you joined Skypace in this role.

Required Screening Questions

1. Describe one project-cargo retention event in the last 18 months, a situation where heavy-lift coordination, customs entry timing, or project milestone slippage created risk to the relationship, and the operational sequence you led brought the client back. Specificity of the operational sequence is what we evaluate. 2. Describe one commercial change you would make to a forwarder's energy-equipment commercial model if you ran it for one quarter, and the operational evidence that informs that view.
If you have any questions for our team after reviewing the role and Skypace, feel free to leave them below (optional).
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