​​IT Procurement – Portfolio Lead

Job Title: ​​IT Procurement – Portfolio Lead

Department: Procurement

Profession- Supply Chain 

Work Location: Bangalore, India

ABOUT UNILEVER

With 3.4 billion people in over 190 countries using our products every day, Unilever is a business that makes a real impact on the world. Work on brands that are loved and improve the lives of our consumers and the communities around us. We are driven by our purpose: to make sustainable living commonplace, and it is our belief that doing business the right way drives superior performance. At the heart of what we do is our people – we believe that when our people work with purpose, we will create a better business and a better world.

At Unilever, your career will be a unique journey, grounded in our inclusive, collaborative, and flexible working environment. We don’t believe in the ‘one size fits all’ approach and instead we will equip you with the tools you need to shape your own future.

ABOUT PROCUREMENT 

Part of the Global Business Operation family, Procurement is responsible for over 30B Euro of material and services spends globally with more than 60,000 suppliers, over half of them in MBS. Getting the right services and materials, sustainably sourced and ensuring responsible procurement is critical to ensuring our brands with purpose grow. Our teams work closely with the business to understand stakeholders' needs, bring innovation to meet changing consumer, employee and customer needs, and drive financial value for Unilever through competitive buying. We’re at the forefront of digital procurement, bringing new tools and analytics to drive data-based decisions.  Procurement launched Lighthouse Strategy to support Growth Action Plan as illustrated below: 

ABOUT IT Procurement 

Global IT Procurement, part of Global MBSIT Power of One Portfolio, manages an annual spend of ~1.3B Euro with a supplier base of about 3,000.  The team has mission of ‘be the trusted advisory team to enable sustainable competitive business solutions and value thru mastery of IT industry and supplier knowledge, total cost of ownership, bold priority, and efficiency.  It operates under ‘Together we Grow Higher’ culture which includes Empower, Empathy, Constructive Challenge, Fulfillment and Have Fun.

Key Responsibilities:

Global Strategic Sourcing IT Portfolio Lead is responsible for development and implementation of the sourcing strategy for Data Platform and 1UL Markets.  Total spend adding up to around 80mE p.a.  This role is part of the global IT procurement leadership team.   

This is a newly created role in global IT procurement to shape the structure, process and sourcing strategy to meet D&A and 1UL market IT architecture vision.  The Portfolio Lead needs to be able to understand D&A and 1UL market business needs, link the existing processes, IT Data platform/product strategies and Portfolio sourcing strategies to form the best sourcing solutions and structures to the 1UL markets.      

He/she will increase efficiency by driving scale where it makes sense, decreasing fragmentation, pooling expertise across geographies, prioritizing higher impact spend areas, leveraging technology and data, and drive performance that unlocks GAP Acceleration Plan for Unilever. 

The role will foster and build a culture of collaboration and agility to enable an efficient project rollout. It will ensure close alignment in strategy with GDT, 1UL Market CDIOs, Finance partners, Legal partners, MBS PaaS core team and IT Procurement Portfolio Leads and Market Leads by defining and utilizing a robust support network for the whole team and providing clarity on the ways of works and roles and responsibilities.

Experience Required:

Qualification/experience 

• 12+ years of procurement experience, including proven and deep experience preferably in IT procurement, alternatively in related field or indirect procurement portfolios 

• Strategic sourcing, portfolio strategy expertise, with experience in managing complex portfolio/category, at global or multi-regional level 

• Expert in negotiation and contracting  

• Understanding of supply market, value chain, and FMCG knowledge. Knowledge of Cloud Computing, Network, Infrastructure, portfolios and supply markets would be a strong plus. 

• Experience in strategic supplier relationship management 

• Experience in large-scale project management  

• Demonstrated and proven leadership capabilities to guide a virtual global team 

• Experience in shaping and guiding transformational business process reengineering, with experience driving Change Management initiatives.  

• Knowledge of and passion for sustainability, including social sustainability 

 General Skills & Competencies 

• A thought leader 

• A collaborative team player 

• Strategic thinker 

• Being able to work with strategic suppliers in an open and truly partnership approach, while still strongly representing Unilever’s interests 

• Ability to work under pressure and in a complex global environment balancing a broad spectrum of stakeholder requirements 

• Comfortable working in conditions of ambiguity, and guiding through constant change 

• Able to create and drive adoption and execution of a shared vision and strategy for change.  

• Ability to interact with senior stakeholders effectively and efficiently to understand their needs and deliver effective balanced solutions 

• Delivers change whilst managing the interface between “day to day” and improvement projects.  

• Passion for continuous improvement  

• Fluent in English, strong verbal and written communication skills, including creation and delivery of effective presentations 

• High financial and business acumen 

• Strong in selling ideas and concepts 

• Inspiring, motivational, and accountable people leader, able to lead remote and cross-cultural teams and connect people and ideas 

• Strong in project and time management for complex global projects 

• Stakeholder management and people skills  

• Passion and practical creativity 

• Tenacious and resilient in the pursuit of challenging goals 

Travel:

Avg. 15% International travel is required.

Contacts:

Internal:

Procurement: 

• CPO and UPLT 

• MBS VP and MBS LT 

• Sourcing teams 

• Supplier Operations in UniOps 

• Procurement S&I  

Business partners: 

• Unilever Digital and Technology Team 

• HR  

• Finance 

• Legal 

External: 

• External Partners 

• Advisors and benchmarking organizations 

Reporting Chanel:

• Reporting into Procurement Director, Global IT  
• Individual Contributor 

D&I statement:

Equal Opportunity Employer: Unilever is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, national origin, or any other basis protected by applicable law, and will not be discriminated against based on disability. 

Unilever embraces diversity and encourages applicants from all walks of life. This means giving full and fair consideration to all applicants and continuing development of all employees regardless of age, disability, gender reassignment, race, religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation, marriage and civil partnership, and pregnancy and maternity.