We are looking for an ambitious, self-driven individual to lead our Global Personal Care Procurement Strategy as part of the External Contract Manufacturing (ECM) team.
As a Global Category Specialist, you will play a key role in building a connected community across Personal Care Procurement and ECM operations teams, deploying global category strategies, and developing a resilient, cost-effective supply chain through data-driven analytics, stakeholder management, and strategic supplier relationships.
This role will support multiple Personal Care product categories, with a particular focus on the North America segment.
Key Responsibilities
Category Strategy & Governance
- Help position the organization as a leader in External Contract Manufacturing through collaboration across multiple supply chain functions.
- Develop a strong understanding of Personal Care market dynamics, industry trends, supplier landscapes, and benchmarking, with a focus on North American business needs.
- Support the development and implementation of global procurement strategies, ensuring alignment with local, regional, and global requirements.
- Develop fact-based recommendations and actionable insights to build a resilient, competitive, and cost-effective supply base aligned with business and product requirements.
- Drive efficiency by reducing complexity, improving processes, and promoting standardization and best practices across categories.
- Collaborate with cross-functional stakeholders across Procurement, Planning, Logistics, Transportation, Manufacturing, Quality, and Safety to deliver strategic objectives.
- Build and support strategic supplier partnerships that deliver measurable value, innovation, continuous improvement, and competitive advantage.
- Govern and implement category strategies and procurement processes while maintaining a strong continuous improvement mindset.
- Conduct regular category reviews and updates based on changing market conditions, business requirements, and supplier performance.
Stakeholder Engagement & Change Management
- Establish trusted relationships and create a culture of accountability, collaboration, and shared ownership among stakeholders impacted by ECM strategies and objectives.
- Influence stakeholders at multiple levels of the organization to drive alignment and successful execution of procurement initiatives.
- Contribute to cross-functional and global teams in the development and execution of Personal Care procurement strategies and strategic initiatives.
- Conduct market benchmarking, supplier intelligence, and competitive analysis to support initiative prioritization, supplier selection, and negotiation strategies.
- Support change management initiatives and help drive adoption of new procurement strategies, processes, and ways of working.
Commercial Leadership & Risk Management
- Identify opportunities to reduce single-source dependencies and improve supply continuity and resilience where applicable.
- Lead and support RFx events and sourcing initiatives to achieve optimal outcomes across cost, quality, service, innovation, capacity, and risk.
- Partner with ECM Procurement team members to manage and execute commercial strategies, contract terms, and supplier negotiations.
- Use data, market intelligence, benchmarking, and total-cost analysis to develop effective negotiation strategies and achieve competitive commercial outcomes.
- Identify and proactively manage supply, commercial, and supplier risks across assigned categories.
- Promote the development and sharing of procurement best practices across regions and teams.
- Ensure compliance with applicable procurement policies, ethical standards, governance requirements, and codes of conduct.
Qualifications
- Bachelor's degree in Supply Chain, Engineering, Business, Procurement, or a related field.
- 5+ years of experience in Procurement, Strategic Sourcing, Supply Chain, Category Management, or a related business function.
- Demonstrated experience in Strategic Sourcing, Category Management, and Stakeholder Management.
- Experience developing and executing multi-year category strategies and supplier relationship strategies.
