Campus Software Lead: Vendor & License Management

University of California, Merced; California (MO); Hybrid; USD 110,000 - 135,000; Full time

Job summary

University of California, Merced is hiring a Campus Software Coordinator to lead software management for the Office of Information Technology. You will build a campus software catalog, oversee provisioning and renewals, and collaborate with campus stakeholders to ensure compliant, cost-effective software across the university.

The role requires strong negotiation, contract administration, and vendor relationship skills, with the ability to translate needs into roadmap actions and monitor

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in related area and/or equivalent experience or training (required).
• Extensive experience in negotiation preparation and vendor performance management (issue tracking, service credits, escalation paths, renewal leverage, KPI/SLA monitoring); and
• Experience in building/maintaining a campus software catalog or related database, including standard metadata (owner, purpose, contract term, renewal date, pricing model, data sensitivity, accessibility status, support model) (required).
• Knowledge of software/SaaS vendor ecosystems (publishers, resellers/VARs, distributors) and common higher-education purchasing models (subscriptions, enterprise agreements, site licenses, tiered pricing).
• Understanding of vendor due diligence artifacts (e.g., security reviews, accessibility documentation, risk assessments), and how to summarize requirements and status for stakeholders.
• Established skill in relationship management, including planning and running recurring vendor and stakeholder meetings, documenting decisions, and translating needs into roadmaps and next steps.
• Ability to communicate clearly in writing and in presentation/informal conversation with both technical and non-technical audiences and produce easily digestible summaries of ticket/activity trends and vendor status.
• Ability to coordinate across multiple stakeholders to gather requirements, manage expectations, and drive consensus on standard offerings.
• Ability to develop and deliver effective stakeholder training materials and/or documentation.
• Excellent time management skills with proven ability to set and meet deadlines; able to multi-task in a fast-paced environment.
• Thorough understanding of procurement requirements in a higher education or similar (highly-regulated) environment
• Self-motivated; works well independently and as part of a team.
• Demonstrates good problem-solving abilities.
• Curious; able to learn effectively.

Responsibilities

• Vendor Management - Create and maintain campus software catalog; manage Value-Added Resellers (VAR) and associated catalog build; manage and store accessibility and security documentation for approved campus software; create and maintain reports of requested software; manage relationships with major campus vendors through regular meetings; create and maintain UC Merced software need analysis & roadmap; create and maintain stakeholder documentation for software not centrally managed.
• License & Contract Management - Manage key software vendor contracts; build and maintain software license provisioning database; manage annual renewals and co-terms; maintain and manage OIT software renewals data; create and maintain regular reporting for campus and OIT leadership on current spend and tail spend to inform strategic planning; manage new provisioning and renewals for internal OIT software (i.e. ServiceNow, Jira, Airtable); manage new provisioning for campus enterprise software (i.e. Adobe CC, Zoom Webinar, Microsoft dd-Ons, etc.).
• Software Process, Strategy, and Relationship Building - Rebuild and champion campus software procurement process to enable efficiency and policy compliance; partner with campus procurement to understand and contain distributed software spend across campus; collaborate with key campus stakeholders such as Procurement, Information Security, Accessibility, and Risk Management; collaborate with key external stakeholders such as UC Office of the President and other UC system contacts.

Skills

Vendor management

Contract management

Software catalog

SaaS ecosystem

Vendor due diligence

Relationship management

Communication

Stakeholder coordination

Training materials

Time management

Procurement in higher ed

Self-motivated

Problem solving

Curiosity

Education

Bachelor's degree in related area or equivalent experience/training

Job description

University of California, Merced is hiring a Campus Software Coordinator to lead software management for the Office of Information Technology. You will build a campus software catalog, oversee provisioning and renewals, and collaborate with campus stakeholders to ensure compliant, cost-effective software across the university.

The role requires strong negotiation, contract administration, and vendor relationship skills, with the ability to translate needs into roadmap actions and monitor