Purpose of the Role:
The Commercial & Relationship (C&R) manager is responsible for building and managing relationships with the companies that supply products and services to company. They drive significant benefits to company’s cost base, whilst improving the quality and reliability of services provided by third party suppliers.
Duties and Responsibilities:
- Effective management of supplier relationships, building trust and cooperation, while maximising the value from those relationships
- Evaluate potential suppliers using criteria such as reputation, industry experience, capacity, quality standards and financial stability
- In collaboration with the business, determine appropriate key performance, SLAs and risk indicators to be used to effectively manage supplier relationships
- Lead contract negotiations, ensuring value for money and that company’s interests are contractually protected
- Define and implement policies and processes that ensure that suppliers are appropriately managed, adequate due diligence is performed to ensure data, contractual and operational risks are at an acceptable level, and suppliers perform against their contractual obligations and value is obtained
- Monitor and report on effective service delivery reliability, and quality
- Regularly review the performance of suppliers to ensure quality and value; liaise with relevant stakeholders to obtain feedback on the services; and work with suppliers on continual service improvement plans based on this feedback
- Ensure that the suppliers meet or exceed their contractual obligations by delivering quality products and services on time
- Manage supplier financials (in collaboration with the relevant business), including budgets and forecasts, invoicing and quotes, and actual spend vs budget
- Key point of contact for escalation for incidents or failing relationships, creating plans to improve or move services, working with the relevant business owner
Qualifications:
- Bachelor of Commerce in Finance
- 5 years’ experience in Supplier Management & Procurement or similar role
- CA (SA) or similar preferred
Skills/Competencies and experience:
- Minimum of 5 years’ experience in supplier management and procurement, and the related skills of budget control, performance analysis and contract management
- Comprehensive experience of driving and managing a large variety of commercial partners and suppliers
- Proven track record of building and maintaining effective stakeholder and executive level relationships both internally and externally
- Ability to build strong relationships and influence people at all levels
- Strong negotiation skills
- Experience of contract negotiations, with knowledge of contract law strongly advantageous
- Demonstrable analytical skills such that able to assimilate complex commercial proposals, financial models and contractual payment obligations
- Robust commercial and financial acumen to compile budgets, performance against them, cost reduction targets to control costs and maximise profitability
- Familiar with legal and contractual best practices
- Deep knowledge of vendor performance metrics
- Financial services background advantageous
- Good written and verbal communication skills
- Self-managed, highly collaborative and transparent, with good presentation skills
- Personable and tenacious as the situation requires