Vendor manager

Apply on JLP Jobs - the official careers website for John Lewis Partnership, John Lewis & Partners, and Waitrose & Partners.

About the role

As a Vendor Manager you'll lead the management of strategic supplier relationships that are critical to the performance of Transformation and Technology (T&T) in supporting our business. By building strong and long-lasting relationships with our strategic suppliers, you'll be able to influence supplier performance, collaboration, drive innovation, cost efficiency and long-term value. You will play a key role in developing and managing our relationships with the most important T&T suppliers. You will work cross-functionally, manage multiple stakeholders up to Executive level and will be integral to defining and implementing supplier strategies that drive value. You will need to ensure contractual commitments are executed, meet the needs of the business and that stakeholders are aligned. This role would suit someone who thrives on establishing and leading supplier relationships, is comfortable challenging the status quo and can successfully influence stakeholders at all levels.

At a glance

Contract type - Permanent (multiple vacancies).

Working Pattern - This is a hybrid working role, therefore your time will primarily be split between working from home and the London/Head Office. There will also be an expectation to visit other locations including the suppliers' UK offices as the need arises.

Our Vendor management team currently works from the office once a week to connect and on an ad-hoc basis to attend key meetings; frequency is dependent on business needs. Otherwise, engage with stakeholders in the frequency and location that optimises the working relationship to successfully enable you to do your role most effectively.

Key Responsibilities

• You will be a key contributor to the sourcing strategy and the Vendor Management strategy for Transformation & Technology, and you will also create individual strategies for the vendors you have responsibility for.
• You will understand all touch points (established and potential) that your portfolio of vendors have across the Partnership, the stakeholders they work with and their level of performance. You will make connections between those areas to support the accountable vendor relationship owner.
• Using these strategies to influence the approach from Partners at all levels within Transformation & Technology, confidently directing and challenging behaviour as required.
• Support the procurement team in commercial discussions with strategic vendors in your portfolio on behalf of the vendor relationship owner.
• Manage Change control and Statements of Work in collaboration with the procurement team for your strategic suppliers.
• Work with Risk Management and provide updates to them as part of the ongoing management of risk.
• Implement and run service and commercial governance boards.
• Work with the delivery team to support a smooth exit when moving services to another vendor.
• Facilitate sharing of knowledge and best practices within the field of commercial vendor management.
• Work with Chief Transformation & Technology Officer (CTTO) Performance teams to ensure appropriate vendor billing and charge-back to John Lewis Partnership Business Units.
• Support dispute management and major incident assurance.

Essential skills / experience you'll need

• Experience in senior stakeholder influence, both internally and externally.
• Proactive, a self-starter and highly motivated to drive value and improvement from assigned suppliers.
• Exposure to working with large-scale outsource operations.
• Understanding of delivery (including management of change) to complex contracts and the different approaches in an outsource environment.
• Involvement in delivering value from large-scale contracts.
• Excellent organisation, project management, prioritising, presentation and influencing skills.

Desirable skills / experience you may have

• Relationship management skills.
• Negotiation experience/skills.
• Experience of working in an IT function would be advantageous.
• Presentation and communication skills.

Next Steps

• The application form consists of a CV upload, followed by application questions. Please save the application questions to Google docs before entering on Workday.
• Once you've submitted an application the next steps of the process, if successful, will include 2 levels of interviews.
• You'll be asked about any adjustments you might need to support the recruitment process. Please let us know, and we'll discuss it with you.

The partnership

We're the largest employee owned business in the UK and home of our cherished brands, John Lewis and Waitrose. We're not just employees, we're Partners, driven by our purpose to build a happier world. We're ruthlessly focused on being brilliant at retail and continue to innovate, adapt and diversify. We never knowingly undersell on price, quality and service in John Lewis and passionately serving food-lovers in Waitrose.

As Partners we all share the responsibility of ownership and its rewards, using our voices to contribute to our success, working together through the good and challenging times, holding true to our behaviours and treating everyone with kindness and respect. We all own making the Partnership somewhere we belong, embracing our differences and creating an environment where we're free to be ourselves and can thrive. Growing ourselves individually, and as a collective. As Partners, we make all the difference.

Important points to note: It's important to note that some of our roles are subject to pre-employment vetting (which may include DBS checks for successful candidates). If required, you'll be informed and provided with information about vetting during the recruitment process and we encourage you to complete any vetting documents quickly to avoid delays. Any DBS checks required will be carried out by a third-party registered body and financial probity checks may also be required for some of our roles.

We occasionally close vacancies early in the event we receive a high volume of applications, and therefore, we recommend you apply early. If you require a reasonable adjustment due to a disability which means you may need longer to complete your application please contact us as soon as possible.

We want all of our Partners to have a good work-life balance and we support flexible working. This might mean flexible or compressed hours, job sharing or shorter hour contracts, where possible. Please discuss this further with the hiring manager during your interview.