Job Summary

As a Category Manager, you are part of the Global Indirect Procurement team responsible for strategic sourcing of goods, and services for your designated categories.  You will serve as a business interface, along with your assigned Business Sourcing Partner/s, between your business unit customers as applicable for the categories you manage You will work with your Business Sourcing Partner(s), your designated business unit customers to manage sourcing demand and customer requirements for your designated categories and business units. You will focus on assisting your Business Sourcing Partner(s)in developing sourcing strategies for assigned spend categories, as well as the execution of sourcing projects and contract negotiations that are deemed to be strategic in nature. You will also be responsible to identify new opportunities together with the Business Sourcing Manager as well as service improvements with your internal customers.

To be successful, you will need to be extremely organized; able to collaborate and partner in a complex environment; have good communication and facilitation skills; and be a motivated self-starter

Essential Functions:

Sourcing

• Execution of strategic sourcing projects in designated business units, working with the business unit customers, and Business Sourcing Partners which includes but is not limited to drafting of agreements, Requests for Information (RFI), Requests for Proposal (RFP) and Request for Quotation (RFQ) documentation with limited direction using traditional or e-sourcing applications.
• Works with the internal customers as well as the Business Relationship Manager to define detailed business requirements with designated business units, prioritizing business requirements and taking them through approval process
• Developing and maintaining local, regional and global sourcing strategies for designated categories/areas of spend
• Ensuring Sourcing Managers as well as Contracting and Sourcing Analysts follow the category strategy
• Participates in post sourcing project reviews and project evaluations
• Implements change management strategies within designated business units to increase utilization of best practices sourcing and procurement solutions
• Participates in standardized relationship management processes globally for designated business area(s)

Job Requirements

• Develops an understanding of the designated business unit market strategy and in coordination with the Business Sourcing Partners, proactively identifies individual spend category strategies that will allow to meet aggressive cost reduction targets
• Assists the Business Sourcing Partner in business unit capacity and demand planning forecasting customer business unit demand for GSS services
• Negotiation of global preferred supplier agreements
• Maintains the contracting database and feeds the SRM system

Sourcing Operations

• Provides feedback on procurement processes and work streams
• Creates and approves work orders, tracks and reports status of sourcing projects
• Creates and maintains Category cards detailing overall category strategies, preferred vendors and business unit requirements for PR2PO execution
• Reviews procurement requests outside category card guidelines and approves waivers when applicable
• Has deep process skills; an understanding of process costs, and the ability to work with operations and the tactical sourcing team to ensure effective operations and agreed upon service levels.
• Propose efficiencies improvement through Robotic Process Automation

Education

Requirements:

Ability to develop and analyze business cases, spend analytics, and financial models

Ability to translate data into convincing information

General technical knowledge of indirect spend catagories, with experience on IT specific categories such as Hardware, Software and Telecom

Experience conducting strategic sourcing for indirect spend categories        

Strong Project Management skills with the ability to lead and prioritize activities

Strong Collaboration and Interpersonal skills

Effective written and verbal communication and influencing skills (both internally with customers, and the supplier community

Proven negotiations skills

Ability to collaborate and partner with designated business unit customers

Knowledge of productivity and service level measures and methodologies

Leads category, sourcing strategy and demand planning discussions, using group facilitation strengths and experience

Ability to accomplish results through others, particularly by establishing relationships, effective controls and monitoring processes

Significant prior experience in all elements of sourcing and category management for indirect services, including professional services and

Education & Experience:

A minimum of 8 years of experience as an individual contributor and a minimum of 5 years as a people manager is required.

An MBA/Bachelor of Arts or Sciences Degree required, or equivalent experience.

Demonstrated ability to manage multiple, critical projects is required