Procurement Business Partner

Key Responsibilities and Accountabilities:

• Responsible for the delivery of all key sourcing activity, including RFX, RFP, supplier negotiations and contracting, ensuring compliance with Lowell policies and minimum standards
• Responsible for the Design, implementation and execution of category strategy/plan for key business areas
• To ensure that contractual arrangements are aligned with supplier and relationship strategies to deliver maximum commercial benefit to Lowell whilst adequately protecting Lowell from adverse risk exposure
• on-boarding and exit of suppliers, change management requests and ongoing supplier management issues and disputes
• Stakeholder engagement and management - To work in a way that positively engages the support of stakeholders, influencing peers to promote and implement the procurement related strategies, endorse professional procurement involvement and standard practices.
• To have a keen insight and understanding of business requirements and overall business strategy on a 1-3 year horizon
• Perform market analysis regularly, highlighting any areas of concern or opportunity to capitalise
• Work closely with Supplier Relationship Manager to mitigate risk, identify opportunities and grow strategic supplier agenda
• Support the ongoing development of Lowell procurement & supplier management processes and tools

Experience, Skills and Qualifications:

• Demonstrable experience of procurement in Professional / Financial Services
• Demonstrable experience in IT sourcing and contracting
• A thorough understanding of procurement tools and techniques
• A demonstrable knowledge of strategic sourcing and techniques to deliver continuous cost savings and add value
• A good understanding of supply chain risk and mitigation strategies including legal risk, commercial risk, Corporate Responsibility risk, fraud risk and business continuity risk.
• Sufficient understanding of contract law to be able to review agreements
• Understanding contract law sufficiently to be able to spot risks, gaps and opportunities and to be able to ensure supplier delivery to the required cost and quality

Skills and Qualifications

• MCIPS preferred but not essential
• Proficient in MS office applications ie. Excel, Word, Powerpoint