Vice President of Commercial Operations

The Vice President of Commercial Operations is a strategic leader, responsible for overseeing and driving the strategic direction, profitability and operational excellence of the Company’s Finished and Intermediate Product Sales and Trading, Crude and Feedstock Procurement, and Logistics assets and efforts including truck, rail, pipeline and terminals.

This role requires deep industry expertise, leadership, technical grasp of communications and the ability to adapt to dynamic markets and regulatory conditions.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities

• Responsible for all Big West Oil commercial efforts including crude, NGL and feedstock procurement, finished product and intermediate sales, heavy oil sales, biofuels procurement, RINs, trucking and rail logistics, and all trading around Big West Oil assets.
• Management of all commodity inventories, terminal and pipeline contracts and relationships
• Supervise and coordinate efforts of the Big West Oil Commercial Team. Responsible for team development, communication of company objectives, goals and strategy, cross training, establishment of career paths, setting effective individual and team goals, holding team meetings to maximize coordination, conducting regular effective evaluations, facilitate training and depth.

• Responsible for development and execution of all commercial strategies and initiatives.

• Identify and evaluate opportunities to grow Big West Oil, LLC through targeting complimentary business opportunities, acquisitions, trading opportunities and effective asset utilization (including rail cars, tanks, terminals etc).

• Coordinate with Refinery Operations and Engineering and Optimization and Planning and LP Modeling Group to ensure effective joint effort in accomplishment of all Big West Oil objectives.
• Ensure the Commercial Team has all the resources and tools needed to perform at a high level including effective Contract Administration support, development of transparent reporting tools, analysis, automation, and long-term planning calendar and logistics reports and tools.
• Responsible for the effective development and maintenance of all commercial relationships.

• Maximize margins and net-back on daily refined production.
• Negotiate formula and index-based contracts with strategic customers including brokers, jobbers, and end users.
• Scheduled product pipeline shipments and deliveries of approximately 10,000 bpd via the Northwest Pipe into Idaho and the UNEV pipeline
• Responsible for daily wholesale product “rack” prices for Big West supply Markets and racks
• Execute pipeline trades, in-tank sales, buy-sell agreements, and product exchanges with both refiners and terminal position holders.

Education and Experience Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in Business, Accounting, Economics or Marketing
• 10+ years’ experience in petroleum procurement, marketing supply and/or trading
• Thorough understanding of product and crude specifications, logistics, and valuation
• 7+ years management experience

Knowledge, Skills and Abilities Requirements

• Excellent written and verbal communication skills required
• In depth knowledge of the required specifications and characteristics of petroleum products and crude oil
• Must have comprehensive understanding of both local, regional and macro market movements and drivers
• Must understand where petroleum products and crude moves, at what pricing, via which logistics and to which refiner/end user
• Must be able to work well under stressful situations and deal effectively when conflicts arise
• Strong MS Excel and Access skills