Job Purpose

As the Senior Procurement Manager for External Manufacturing, you will be responsible for all strategic planning and sourcing activities for your assigned categories across the Kraft Heinz North American Zone (U.S. and Canada). You will use your experience and knowledge to build comprehensive strategies at the category level and implement the strategy through the sourcing process. The role drives value for Kraft Heinz by supporting program compliance through supplier and contract management. You will drive a sustainable strategy that actively seeks to reduce and control costs while growing efficiencies for the business. You will also collaborate closely with partners at External Manufacturers, the various Business Units, Operations, Legal, Finance, Quality, and Global Procurement teams to provide innovative new solutions to meet business objectives. Success in this role requires a professional who can focus on balancing outstanding service to internal business clients while improving value through our external manufacturing partnerships.

Essential Functions & Responsibilities

• Lead mid to executive-level clients and supplier relationships on an ongoing basis to ensure customer satisfaction.

• Lead sourcing and category management for a wide portfolio of sophisticated and critical categories to Kraft Heinz, including identifying and assessing potential new external manufacturing partners for business viability, including financial, quality, and product manufacturing feasibility.

• Establish and deliver performance goals for a portfolio of categories representing a significant amount of spend.

• Lead strategic sourcing projects for supplier selection/optimization to implement Category Management vision and strategies.

• Handle Supplier Relationships and conducts Supplier Business Reviews, including being the primary point of contact for performance and risk issues.

• Develop and handle supplier base for specific categories.

• Lead discussions with critical suppliers around long-term objectives and strategies, ongoing market trends, innovation and technology advances, and potential investment decisions.

• Support major supplier issues and work with team members to identify and drive resolutions.

• Identify business needs at the sourcing and category project level in the following areas: Assurance of Supply, Quality, Service, Cost, and Innovation (AQSCI).

• Develop a multi-year category vision and strategy based on the data, insights, and business requirements.

• Build and maintain strong business relationships to increase influence over total category spend.

• Identify and evaluate potential value-generating projects based on complexity, resources, risk, implementation time, and estimated financial impact.

• Facilitate supplier collaboration with the assigned set of critical suppliers to demonstrate their capabilities to achieve continuous improvement and bring innovation to the business.

• Lead a prioritized portfolio of projects for the category in the near and long term.

• Lead the supplier selection and RFx award process and subsequent negotiations in partnership with department leadership.

• Implement the supplier selection process by identifying and developing suppliers capable of delivering products that meet or exceed KHC requirements, including upcoming innovation and sustainability commitments.

• Perform highly sophisticated contracts following Kraft Heinz's Procurement policies and processes.

• Actively understand category dynamics (current market, pricing, cost drivers, industry, and supplier variables) through trade groups, publications, etc., and communicate changes to applicable business partners.

• Run Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) at the category level through collaboration with Data Analytics, accountable for measuring and reporting value delivery.

• Enable continuous process improvement and cost reduction.

• Ensure the strategic sourcing process is robustly applied to all sourcing projects.

Expected Experience & Required Skills

• Bachelor's degree in supply chain management, finance, business, or related field; MBA preferred. Candidates with extensive relevant experience will be considered instead of a degree.

• Possess at least 5 to 7 years of experience in Procurement, preferably in external manufacturing procurement, with relevant category expertise.

• Strong written, verbal, and analytical skills and interpersonal and presentation skills.

• Effective negotiator and influencer with demonstrated examples with internal stakeholders and external suppliers/partners.

• Strong business acumen with the ability to understand and explain Procurement results and variances to non-Procurement audiences.

• Proven project management and solid analytical and consultative skills; able to make sound, data-driven business decisions. Prior experience with business case development and multi-workstream project management is critical to success in this role.

• Experience in developing long-term business strategies and confidence when doing so.

• Possess extensive experience in the sourcing life cycle process and have a strong grasp of the tools needed to complete the process.

• Ability to multi-task, attention to detail, organized, outstanding customer service skills.

• Judgment to handle confidential information and complicated business situations; ability to lead and influence others; project management, problem-solving, leadership, and team-building skills.

• Advanced proficiency in Microsoft Office Suite (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook) and understanding of source-to-pay tools (SAP, Ariba, Workday, etc.).

Kraft Heinz is an Equal Opportunity Employer that prohibits discrimination or harassment of any type. All qualified applicants are considered for employment without regard to race, color, national origin, age, sex, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity or expression, disability status, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law. Applicants who require an accommodation to participate in the job application or hiring process should contact NATAI@kraftheinz.com .