Sun King

Off-grid solar home systems provider

Country Training Manager

Corporate & Technical TrainingUpdated on Nov 13

Full-timeLusaka, ZambiaNo salary listed

About the Job

Requirements

At least 6 years of experience in sales training, learning and development, or sales management, including at least 3 years managing teams, ideally including other managers or trainers, in solar, electronics, telecommunications, fast-moving consumer goods, or an agent-distribution business.
A proven record of building and running training programs that improved country or regional sales metrics, rather than merely attendance.
Experience managing multilayered field teams across a country or several regions and driving results through those teams.
Strong technical knowledge of Solar Home Systems, and inverters where relevant, with the ability to demonstrate products and troubleshoot basic issues.
Strong data skills and fluency with learning management systems, business-intelligence dashboards such as Looker, and field or customer relationship management applications.
Commercial acumen and the ability to translate a commercial target into a training strategy and cascade it into team scorecards.
Willingness to travel at least 60–70% across Zambia.
Fluency in English.
A bachelor's degree is required.

Responsibilities

Own Zambia's annual training plan and strategy, aligned with country sales targets, product launches, seasonality, and regional training priorities.
Translate regional and headquarters training strategy into disciplined country-level execution across every region and market.
Set and enforce country-wide standards for onboarding, certification, refresher training, demonstration quality, sales pitches, load calculations, and objection handling.
Own the country's blended-learning model across classroom instruction, field coaching, microlearning, and learning management system content.
Lead, coach, and performance-manage the country field training team, including Zonal Training Managers and Regional Mentors; hold monthly one-to-ones with every direct report and maintain dated coaching logs.
Run and oversee train-the-trainer cycles and calibration to maintain consistent facilitation, product, and coaching quality across the team.
Build a documented quarterly development plan for each bottom performer, and recruit, onboard, and develop trainers as the country scales.
Carry country-level accountability for reactivation rate, certified-agent conversion, face-to-face coverage and quality, and job-knowledge standards across every region and line.
Run country business reviews, spot-checks, and gap-closing activities to diagnose and correct underperforming regions and teams early.
Own team execution, data quality assurance, and field discipline, including field-application record compliance, team field-time ratio, and regular quality spot-checks on reported work.
Own the country training dashboards in Looker, Kazi Plan, and Litmos, and use the data to identify performance gaps and deployment needs.
Submit a monthly country training dashboard to the Regional Training Manager and run quarterly training-needs analyses using sales, repayment, and customer-complaint data.
Correlate training cohorts with business outcomes, including sales uplift, collection-score improvement, lower returns, and stronger customer retention.
Own one to two quarterly strategic targets cascaded from the Regional Training Manager, tied to the country's core commercial metric, and cascade key results into Zonal Training Manager and Regional Mentor scorecards.
Partner with country commercial managers, zonal and regional business managers, and area business managers to diagnose skill gaps constraining revenue and design targeted interventions for underperforming teams.
Lead high-value certification and sales clinics on priority commercial topics, including product cards and conversion.
Represent training in the country management team and work with Sales, Risk, Operations, Programs, and Marketing to align training with the commercial agenda.
Feed structured field insights about customer confusion points and product feedback to regional and headquarters product and marketing teams.
Promote Sun King's standards of integrity, professionalism, and customer experience across the country field.

Desired Qualifications

A Zambian language, such as Bemba, Nyanja, Tonga, or Lozi, is a strong plus.
Certifications in training, facilitation, or instructional design are a strong plus.

Location: Lusaka

About the role:
The Country Training Manager owns the entire training and capability function for Sun King Zambia and is accountable for turning it into measurable commercial performance across the country. You translate regional and HQ training strategy into country-level execution, monitor the field training team, and ensure that every regional mentor, area business manager, agent, and technician can pitch correctly, demonstrate product functionality, screen and educate customers, and sell and help Sun King's solar home systems and wider product portfolio.

This is a country manager role, not a delivery role. You lead through your training team rather than by running sessions yourself, and you are judged on outcomes: the contribution of trained-agent cohorts to reactivation, certified-agent conversion, face-to-face coverage and quality, and knowledge standards across Zambia. Roughly 70% of the role is running a disciplined, data-operational training machine; the remaining 30% is a strategic commercial mandate, cascaded from the regional training manager and tied to the country's core commercial metric, that you convert into training targets for your team.

1. Country Training Strategy & Ownership

Own Zambia's annual training plan and strategy, aligned to country sales targets, product launches, seasonality, and regional training priorities.
Translate regional and HQ training strategy into disciplined country-level execution across every region and market.
Set and enforce country-wide standards for onboarding, certification, refresher training, demo quality, pitch, load calculation, and objection handling.
Own the blended-learning model across the country: classroom, field coaching, microlearning, and LMS content.

2. Team Leadership & Capability Development

Lead, coach, and performance-manage the country field training team (Zonal Training Managers and Regional Mentors), holding monthly one-to-ones with every direct report and keeping a dated coaching log.
Run and oversee train-the-trainer cycles and calibration so facilitation, product, and coaching quality stay consistent across the team.
Build a documented development plan for each bottom performer every quarter, and recruit, onboard, and develop trainers as the country scales.

3. Country Performance & KPI Delivery

Carry country-level accountability for reactivation rate, certified-agent conversion, face-to-face coverage and quality, and job-knowledge standards, ensuring every region and line delivers.
Run country business reviews, spot-checks, and gap-closing so underperforming regions and teams are diagnosed and corrected early.
Own team execution, data QA, and field discipline: high field-app record compliance, a healthy team field-time ratio, and regular quality spot-checks on reported work.

4. Data, Analytics & Reporting

Own the country training dashboards (Looker, Kazi Plan, Litmos) and use the data to find performance gaps and see where to deploy the team.
Submit a monthly country training dashboard to the Regional Training Manager and run quarterly training needs using sales, repayment, and customer-complaint data.
Correlate training cohorts to business outcomes: sales uplift, collection score improvement, lower returns, and stronger customer retention.

5. Strategic Commercial Enablement

Own one to two quarterly strategic targets cascaded from the regional training manager, tied to the country's core commercial metric (for example, collections), and cascade the key results into zonal training manager and regional mentor scorecards.
Partner with country commercial managers, zonal and regional business managers, and area business managers to diagnose the skill gaps constraining revenue and design targeted interventions for underperforming teams.
Lead high-value certification and sales clinics on priority commercial topics, including product cards and conversion.

6. Stakeholder & Cross-Functional Leadership

Represent training in the country management team and work closely with Sales, Risk, Operations, Programs, and Marketing to align training to the commercial agenda.
Feed structured field insights back to regional and HQ product and marketing teams: customer confusion points and product feedback.
Speared Sun King's standards of integrity, professionalism, and customer experience across the country field.

6+ years in sales training, L&D or sales management, with at least 3 years managing teams (ideally including other managers or trainers), in solar, electronics, telecoms, FMCG or any agent distribution business.
A proven record of building and running training programs that moved country or regional sales metrics, not just attendance.
Experience managing multi-layered field teams across a country or several regions and driving results through those teams.
Strong technical knowledge of Solar Home Systems (and inverters where relevant), with the ability to demo and troubleshoot the basics.
Highly data, and fluent with LMS platforms, business-intelligence dashboards (Looker) and field or CRM applications.
Commercial acumen: able to translate a commercial target into a training strategy and cascade it into team scorecards.
Willing to travel 60-70%+ across Zambia.
Fluent in English; a Zambian language (Bemba, Nyanja, Tonga or Lozi) is a strong plus.
Bachelor's degree required; certifications in training, facilitation or instructional design are a strong plus.

About the Company

Sun King

Off-grid solar home systems provider

Sun King designs, manufactures, distributes, and finances solar home energy products for off-grid communities in Africa and Asia. Its range includes solar lanterns and solar home systems with inverters and storage that can power lights, radios, phones, and household appliances, all financed through a pay-as-you-go model with small mobile money installments after a low upfront payment. The company differentiates itself with an end-to-end approach—handling product design, manufacturing, distribution, and financing—supported by a large field-agent network and strategic acquisitions like PayGo Energy to expand into clean cooking. Its goal is to increase energy access by helping households leapfrog kerosene and unreliable grids, aiming to reach millions of homes and businesses, including over 2 million in Ethiopia by 2030.

Company size: 1,001-5,000
Company stage: Debt Financing
Total funding: $864.9M
Headquarters: Chicago, IL
Founded: 2008

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