Route Development Manager

Job Title: Route Development Manager

Reports to: Head of Air Freight Commercial Center

Location: YYZ

DHL Global Forwarding (DGF) is a leader in managing the flow of goods and information across global supply chains, utilizing air, ocean, and ground transportation, customs brokerage services, and dedicated warehousing and distribution centers.

As part of Deutsche Post DHL, the world’s leading logistics provider with operations in over 220 countries, we are committed to excellence and growth.

Join our team as a Route Development Manager at DHL Group! In this pivotal role, you will  Lead and execute Air Freight Route Development strategies, plans, and initiatives to drive profitable growth, optimize trade lane performance, and enhance network competitiveness across country, regional, or global scope.

The role combines strategic route portfolio leadership with deep analytical expertise in trade lane development, route economics, market intelligence, and commercial-operational alignment.

The position acts as the primary focal point for identifying, evaluating, prioritizing, and implementing route opportunities while ensuring alignment between Sales, Pricing, Carrier Management, Gateway Operations, Product, and Customer Operations teams.

The role is responsible for governing route development activities, driving execution of strategic initiatives, and enabling data-driven decision making that supports revenue growth, service excellence, and margin protection.

Key Responsibilities:

Route Development Strategy & Governance



* Lead the Route Development Management (RDM) agenda for assigned regions, countries, or trade lanes.


* Define trade lane priorities, route opportunity roadmaps, and route portfolio strategies aligned with business objectives.


* Translate regional and global route development priorities into actionable execution plans with clear ownership, governance, milestones, and performance metrics.


* Support regional and global route governance forums through data-based recommendations and decision-ready business cases.


* Benchmark route development performance and implement scalable best practices across countries and teams.

Trade Lane Analysis & Route Economics



* Conduct advanced trade lane analysis utilizing market intelligence, customer demand trends, route economics, carrier capacity, gateway capabilities, and competitive benchmarks.


* Analyze route performance indicators including:
+ Conversion rates
+ Gross Profit per file
+ Capacity utilization
+ Paid-out quality
+ Consolidation ratios
+ Transit time reliability
+ Service performance
+ Exception trends


* Identify opportunities for network optimization, route redesign, consolidation improvement, and margin enhancement.


* Develop and maintain route development dashboards, databases, scorecards, and performance reporting tools.

Commercial & RFQ Support...