Purpose of the Role
To support the delivery of a professional and consistent category management capability for Savills' Soft Services category, driving year on year improvements in service and cost savings/avoidance in nominated areas.
To provide commercial support in relevant service line management to external and internal clients, supporting new initiatives; support the development of appropriate strategies for the Soft Services category; analysing business needs.
To support the development and implementation of group-wide policies, processes and procedures for strategic and operational service line management; maintaining, utilising and developing all systems and eProcurement tools where relevant.
Specifically:
- Supporting the category managers across the service lines and alignment with the relevant categories for soft services
- Adoption of core Service Partner+ ways of working
- Soft Services point of contact for issues and query resolution
- Supporting performance improvement and effectiveness opportunities across soft services
- Team player with good problem solving skills
Key Responsibilities
Service Line Definition and strategies: support the development of the appropriate Soft Services category strategy, aligned with business needs. Ensure services are adequately specified to facilitate consistent service delivery and performance levels across the Soft Service category including relevant statutory requirements, legislation, SLAs and KPIs.
Support the development and execution of annual operations plans (including optimisation plans, mobilisation, cost reduction plans, service improvement plans and Service Partner development / performance management plans).
Supplier Identification and Evaluation: support the category manager to identify, evaluate, and manage suppliers and contractors during the initial stages of engagement; fostering strategic partnerships to ensure the highest levels of service, quality, and competitiveness.
Contract Negotiation: support negotiations with relevant service partners including the preparation of analysis to support negotiating positions. Bring commercial analysis to the Service Partner selection, negotiation and drafting of contracts to promote value, lower costs and higher service levels and adhere to company procurement and supply chain policies.
Market Analysis: support the category manage to conduct category-related market research and analysis; research new products, sourcing approaches and services, industry dynamics and the competitor landscape, emerging technologies and best practices in sourcing, incorporating relevant advancements into Savills' sourcing strategies.
Process Improvement: implement process improvements; support the category manager to assess and optimise soft category sourcing processes, including service partner portfolio; development of soft service line strategies; maintenance of catalogues; tendering and service partner selection and contract management procedures; ensuring efficiency, compliance, and transparency. Identify sourcing best practices and opportunities to leverage digital tools and technologies for process automation.
Risk Management and Compliance: identify, escalate and support the category manager to mitigate material category-related risks and issues, including sustainability-related risks and those related to dealing with smaller Service Partners. Act at all times in compliance with legal, regulatory, and ethical requirements.
Cross-functional collaboration: collaborate closely with internal stakeholders, including Service Partner + colleagues, finance, operations, site teams, legal, and sustainability teams, to align Soft Services sourcing strategies with overall business objectives and needs; and promote effective communication and collaboration. Provide support to in-house and consultancy service offerings where required.
Performance Monitoring: support the implementation of key performance indicators (KPIs) and metrics based on our KPI library for all framework agreements and contracts. Support the Service Partner performance review process as appropriate; supporting Service Partner Performance Management colleagues as they monitor relevant SLAs and KPIs and as they introduce initiatives to enhance partnerships with service partners.
Systems and data integrity: support the maintenance and integrity of related technology systems and data, proactively and constructively highlighting opportunities to improve the performance and integrity of our systems and data.
Point of contact for query resolution for the Soft Services category, working collaboratively across the team to help identify root causes of category management issues and to support the category managers and the business on their resolution. Continually liaise across the Service Partner+ team, the business and colleagues to address queries, clarify issues and maintain positive relationships.
Category Management query resolution: Work closely with Category Management team to help resolve complex queries, adopt standardised approaches and ways of working and ensure that all process (and system) documentation is accurate and up to date.
Reporting: deliver core category management reports and develop more specialised category management reports to provide insight, dashboard views and trend analysis
Policies: Alignment and compliance to category management and wider Savills policies. Operating in accordance with these policies.
Continuous learning: remain informed of wider changes across Savills and best practice ways of working.
The above is not an exhaustive list of duties and you will be expected to perform different tasks as necessitated by your changing role within the organisation.
Skills, Knowledge and Experience
Essential
- Experience: 1-2 years of experience in procurement, strategic sourcing, or supply chain management. Ability to work across multiple categories.
- Team player and collaborative worker: providing support to the category managers and support of category management service line support.
- Project Management: Well-organised with a ability to manage multiple activities simultaneously, and meet deadlines.
- Negotiation Skills: some experience of contract management.
- Analytical Skills: analytical and problem-solving abilities.
- Communication Skills: good verbal and written communication skills, including the ability to effectively communicate procurement concepts to internal and external stakeholders at all levels.Relationship Building: good interpersonal skills with the ability to build and maintain good relationships with internal and external stakeholders, includi