Category Manager, Network Services

TELENOR PROCUREMENT COMPANY PTE. LTD.; Singapore; On-site; SGD 80,000 - 120,000; Full time

Job summary

A global telecommunications leader is seeking a Category Manager for Network Services based in Singapore. This role involves managing category strategies, negotiating contracts, and collaborating with stakeholders to enhance procurement effectiveness. Candidates should possess solid experience in procurement and contract management, particularly in Network Services.

Qualifications

• Minimum 5 years in a procurement / contract management / vendor management role.
• Experience in Network Services area preferred.
• Proficient in data analysis using Excel and relevant tools.

Responsibilities

• Perform end-to-end category management to support group strategy.
• Analyze and calculate procurement costs, implementing strategies to decrease expenditure.
• Negotiate purchase contracts, ensuring compliance with organizational needs.

Skills

Negotiation

Stakeholder Management

Analytical Skills

Communication

Education

Bachelor degree in supply chain management, telecommunication or business administration

Tools

MS Excel

Tableau

ThinkCell

Job description

Telenor Group is the world’s leading telecommunications company across the Nordics and Asia with 211 million subscribers and 81 billion NOK in revenues. We are committed to responsible business conduct and driven by the ambition of empowering societies. Connectivity has been Telenor’s domain for more than 160 years, and our purpose is to connect our customers to what matters most.

Telenor has a leading Nordic position in mobile, broadband and TV services, as well as substantial activities in subsidiaries and joint venture operations, including mobile financial services and online classifieds in the Asia region. Worldwide, Telenor Group and our operations’ teams are 11,000 people strong.

Telenor Procurement Company (TPC), established in 2017 and based out of Singapore, operates as a subsidiary of the Telenor Group. We deliver Global Category Management as a service to the Telenor Business Units and beyond, taking full responsibility for the end-to-end Sourcing process and performance of global spend categories. Functioning as one Global Procurement team across all Telenor markets, we enable Telenor’s strategic ambitions by becoming a centre of expertise in the pursuit of efficient operations. TPC seeks qualified procurement professionals that are comfortable working in a global setup in the fast-paced Telecom field.

For more information, please visit our website: https://www.telenor.com/about/our-companies/other-units/telenor-procurement-company

About the role

As the Category Manager, Network Services you will be part of the Networks team and you will report to the Head of Network Services Category. You will work closely with both Telenor Group Function and all of the business units. The objective of this position is to perform end-to-end category management to support overall group category strategy and demand management. As the Category Manager you will be responsible for handling the category’s end to end sourcing strategy. The successful candidate will be able to appraise and improve our sourcing activities by analyzing the company’s spending, supplying partnerships and new possibilities, including determining sourcing strategies, sourcing execution, contract negotiation, contract management as well as supplier management processes.

Main tasks include :

• Comprehensive understanding of the Network Services category, manage the category portfolio and contribute to end to end category strategy development and perform analysis to support category strategy work
• Generate and implement efficient sourcing and category management strategies
• Analyze and calculate costs of procurement and suggest methods to decrease expenditure
• Prepare and lead TCO analysis, negotiate of purchase contracts with vendors to meet quality, cost and delivery requirements as per organization needs, track the movements of supplies, bring Innovation in negotiation strategies and secure profitable deals
• Manage resources and stakeholders in a sourcing process from a global and matrix environment and Optimize sourcing procedures to attain maximum efficiency
• Collaborate and align with functional stakeholders, legal to secure agreement on scope, specification, contract terms, cost model, and processes
• Liaising with the Global Procurement Teams from different Business units, the group functions for supply market analysis, listing leverage points, creating Issues Lists, Demand & Portfolio Management for the Network Services Category
• Estimate risks and apply risk mitigation techniques
• Develop and prepare periodic reports, review and assess progress, savings, and targets on all procurement activities
• Oversee effective implementation of category contracts, manage contracts and price book iterations relevant to the category and handle dispute with the category suppliers
• Anchor the Transformation Initiatives under vendor agnostic network services contracts such as managed services, tools, network equipment services
• Foresee business risks related to role, highlighting to leadership and work towards mitigating risks in best manner

Profile

The successful candidate in this role, it is believed that you should be an experienced professional eager to develop yourself within strategic sourcing. You should have an academic understanding of strategic sourcing and category management. The successful candidate should enjoy and be proficient in contract negotiations, networking and stakeholder management. Furthermore, the successful candidate must be result oriented, demonstrating excellent collaboration abilities and with confidence be able to communicate both internally and externally and continually build new relationships.

Other attributes will be:

• Have strong business knowledge in telecommunications landscape
• Deep insight into end to end Sourcing process and strategies, understand the vendor market
• Strong ability to communicate and interact effectively (verbal, presentation, facilitation & listening modes of communication) across organizational and cultural boundaries, internal and external
• Strong analytical, systems thinking and problem solving capabilities
• Understanding of market dynamics and solid business judgement with ability to make good decisions
• Able to work with a high degree of execution power and passion
• Demonstrate commitment, maturity, flexibility and speed in response to challenges
• Knowledge of sourcing techniques and demand management & demand forecasting methods
• Familiar with contract setup activities such as specification definition, contract T&C setup
• Strong project management and leadership skills
• Comfortable with figures and in collecting, analyzing and interpreting data
• Highly creative and innovative mindset
• High level of integrity and ethics

Qualification and Experience Requirements

• Bachelor degree in supply chain management, telecommunication or business administration
• Minimum 5 years in a procurement / contract management / vendor management role preferably with experience in Network services area
• Proficient in use of MS Excel, performing data analyses and co-relation using and processing tools, e.g. ThinkCell., Excel or Tableau to be Able to produce and draw conclusions based on the analysis
• Proven work experience as a sourcing category or Procurement manager
• Familiarity with sourcing and contract management and relevant software
• Contract management experience with well conversant with legal, commercial and contractual implication of clauses