Job Description

About the job

About the team

The mission of our Global Procurement & Transportation Organization is to create value and strategic advantage for Alcoa in pursuit of its overarching priorities and vision to reinvent the Aluminum Industry for a sustainable future. We build strategic relationships through optimum stakeholder engagement models that deliver best-in-class results in cost improvement, risk management, sustainability and various business contributions through a capable high-performing organization that leverages business partnering, commercial acumen and market perspectives. We are committed to providing a diverse work environment in which everyone is included, treated fairly and with respect, proudly being a most balanced gender team at Alcoa.

Global Spend Category Management

The Global Function Programs and Execution Team is a commercial / sourcing expert team accountable to commercially manage a group of key strategic spend categories within Alcoa. The team leverages People & Talent, Knowledge, Governance, Processes and Markets to deliver commercial value by leading the development of commercial programs, commodity & category strategies, identifying global and regional synergies, optimizing purchasing leverage, managing supplier relationships, and appropriately communicating these commercial conditions to support our collective goal of delivering value and strategic advantage for Alcoa.

Key Challenges of the Global Refractory and Fabrication Sourcing Manager

The Procurement Refractory and Smelter Fabrication Sourcing Manager manages a complex commodity environment. This Global Sourcing Manager leads successful strategy development, execution, and implementation of commodity/spend category strategies. The primary scope of this role will include all Refractory Bricks, Steel fabrication for Pot Rooms sourcing initiatives, with a global focus and an approximated spend of 50M USD per year, as well as global sourcing initiatives in that space. This role also includes responsibility for Spent Pot Liner initiatives in The European region due to the close connection with the Refractory supply chain and similarity of internal stakeholders and market players. The Sourcing Manager works with customers and suppliers, on a global and regional basis, to drive savings, contract utilization and continuous improvement, while reducing the risk of doing business. 

The key pillars of this role are:

• Commodity Strategy Development: Work with cross-functional team, including operational and resource unit stakeholders, to prioritize an evolving portfolio of high-value process improvement and sourcing initiatives within those Indirect commodities Globally. Serve as a full partner to the business in evaluating and challenging the status quo to surface value opportunities. Lead the aggregation, normalization, and analysis of spend data to identify potential value opportunities. Work with primary and secondary Market Intelligence to identify opportunities arising from commodity trends, best-value country sourcing, emerging technologies, and market conditions. Ensure proper sequencing, resourcing, and business support for value capture initiatives.

• Sourcing and Contracting: Drive sourcing projects emerging from commodity strategy. Define goals, including roles and responsibilities of stakeholders. Surface and incorporate business requirements into sourcing plans and RFP strategies. Enhance competition by leveraging spend and qualified new suppliers. Coordinate and lead negotiations through use of high-yield negotiation tools. Help stakeholders understand trade?offs and benefits of negotiation strategies/outcomes. Develop global/regional contracts that are commercially sound and provide optimum protection of company assets. Develop comprehensive implementation with stakeholders and end users. Quantify and report both identified and implemented sourcing project results. Be the Procurement face to the supplier market, connecting with outside trends, technologies to bring cost savings and other value added to Alcoa business. Develop alternative supply sources across the globe to reduce cost, bring innovation and drive productivity, taking in consideration the Total Cost of Ownership.

• Supplier Relationship Management: Foster relationships with suppliers to create short-term and long-term value for the company. Lead global business reviews with strategic suppliers to ensure performance against contracted obligations and business unit expectations. Anticipate and minimize performance issues via use of key performance indicators (KPIs). When performance issues emerge, identify root causes and drive for efficient resolution of issues at hand by working across both internal and external stakeholders

Other basic activities include:

• Manage current contract portfolio, supply chain risks, cost savings opportunities and assist with implementation and on-going management of new sourcing initiatives.

• Conduct complex market and internal data analysis to ensure supplier performance and quickly identify opportunities.

• Manage internal and external (supplier) business relationships to gain a comprehensive understanding of business requirements.

• Negotiate all elements of assigned supplier relationships to ensure lowest total cost of procurement, including product cost, various commercial terms and performance metrics.

• Make use of high-yield negotiation tools including GAIN negotiations, eAuctions, summits, and Best-Value Country Sourcing.

• Master the contracting process (negotiation, contract preparation and administration) for assigned categories.

• Identify metrics, tools, and processes to optimize sourcing and supplier activities and efficiencies and work collaboratively with team members to prioritize and drive implementation.

• Lead cross functional teams in the development of comprehensive sourcing, commodity, and spend category strategies that include opportunities for process improvement and cost savings that contribute to achieving superior results. Note: Critical to this process is in creating a strong and influential partnership with CoE Smelting Team and other key stakeholders to evaluate and challenge the status quo. A key element of this role is engaging business stakeholders to get their buy-in for implementation of commodity or cross site sourcing strategies

• Become subject matter expert in the supply market for assigned commodity area(s). Advise current and future market trends. Maintain a current understanding of industry best practices and technology trends by engaging in primary and secondary market intelligence.

This role requires:

Project management and negotiation skills
High flexibility to adapt to changing business environments, initiatives, and customer needs
Strong communication and presentation skills
High degree of analytic capabilities and critical thinking skills to provide written and verbal analysis based on factual data
Financial analysis capabilities
Strong Negotiation skills
High social skills
Autonomy, Integrity, Customer-Focus

The role reports into the Global Function Programs and Execution Team which has the objective of leveraging commercially the spend, expertise, internal contacts, market and best practices across the Alcoa footprint.

Qualifications

Bachelor of Arts or Sciences in Business, Finance, Engineering, or Supply Chain Management 
5 years relevant work experience
High level of both written and verbal proficiency in English language

Preferred Qualifications:

Knowledge of Supply Chain and Strategic Sourcing is an advantage
MBA or Master's Degree from an accredited institution is a differential