Assistant Procurement Manager

An exciting opportunity has arisen for an Assistant Procurement Manager to join our client, Unilever, a leading global FMCG company with Brands such as Dove, Sure, Persil & Simple, working 1 days per week in Kingston upon Thames and the remainder from home.

This is a full-time temporary role for 18 months working a 36.25 hour week, to start ASAP. This role is paying up to £44,000 per annum, pro rata, depending on experience.

*Due to the urgent nature of this role, we cannot accept any applications that have a longer notice period of 1 month!!

We are seeking an experienced Assistant Procurement Manager, who will be responsible for the sourcing strategy development, implementation, and procurement for the utilities energy procurement category for their area.

This role will be responsible to achieve our decarbonization strategy: to Scope 1, 2 and 3 (Green House Gas (GHG) emissions that the company makes directly and indirectly in all value chains) from a Procurement standpoint, in support of our business strategy covering the European region. This role forms a key business partner with Supply chain, Sustainability team and Engineering at supply chain sites.

The successful applicant will increase the efficiency of our Utilities and Decarb procurement by driving scale where it makes sense, decreasing fragmentation, pooling expertise across European regions, prioritizing higher impact spend areas, leveraging technology and data, and delivering on best practices.

Position Objectives:

• Be accountable for the implementation of the Utilities and Decarbonization Procurement strategies and best practices across EU
• Support and guide the procurement organization across EU’s Factories to meet goals and objectives in support of the overall Unilever Strategy
• Pro-actively engage with the decarbonization procurement leads and peers to understand the strategic plan in their PMU and drive best practices
• To build and maintain strong working relationships with stakeholders and user communities across Unilever business by being the critical point of contact for Europe
• Engages with key suppliers and develop an understanding of their capabilities and solutions. Be aware of industry key drivers, new technologies and new sustainability capabilities.
• Help develop and execute ongoing communications with the business for the selected sourcing strategies and progress
• Support identifying opportunities across Supply Chain and their connections with Utilities, Decarbonization, Renewable Sources
• To take ownership on and lead projects in procurement across the key areas of Partnership with Purpose (PWP), Responsible Sourcing Policy (RSP), Sustainability, Contract Lifecycle Management (CL), Savings, Cash and People & Well-Being

Business Relationship management

• Establish successful Ways of Working (WoW) between stakeholders and Procurement
• Develop and execute ongoing communications with the stakeholders for the selected sourcing strategies and progress within area of spend responsibility

Skills/Competencies

• Ability to analyse sourcing data and conceptualise sourcing strategies to identify/propose sourcing opportunities while setting Portfolio strategy or developing negotiation strategies
• Influencing skills to promote ideas and concepts back to stakeholders and budget holders in a Business Partner capacity
• Attention to detail and ability to assimilate, appraise and extract information quickly when faced with increasing data inputs
• Problem solving skills to analyse information to evaluate internal demand and external supplier information and extract critical cost opportunities
• Thorough and astute preparation and approach for external contract negotiation
• Financial understanding of the supplier cost models and lifetime cost of acquisition
• Advanced negotiation abilities to develop win-win situations with key suppliers

Essential Experience:

• Experienced (5+ years) in a procurement role from manufacturing, technical or closely related industry
• Experienced in setting up and managing complex supplier contracts
• Skilled in delivering to challenging value delivery targets
• A proven commercial operator and an excellent negotiator
• Experienced in stakeholder and supplier management
• Strong communicator with experience in working successfully in virtual team environments
• Skilled at challenging business stakeholders and driving change
• Ability to communicate effectively in the English language.

Beneficial:

• Experience in Utilities procurement areas
• Experience working with or related to decarbonization/net-zero projects
• Experience buying utilities and managing decarbonization projects. Experience in engineering and renewable technologies is a plus