Senior Category Manager

Senior Category Manager

Department: Procurement

Employment Type: Permanent - Full Time

Location: Pune

Description

To lead, develop and execute category strategies across high-value direct and indirect spend categories with a total spend exceeding £200 million annually.

The Senior Category Manager will be responsible for delivering measurable commercial outcomes, influencing business decision-making through data-driven insight, challenging demand and spend behaviours, and supporting the continued development of procurement capability, governance and supplier management across the organisation.

This role requires a commercially driven and entrepreneurial individual who can operate effectively in a fast-paced and evolving environment, balancing immediate value delivery with longer-term capability development. The successful candidate will have the ability to identify and create opportunities, build stakeholder relationships where none currently exist, and establish Procurement as a trusted business partner

Key Responsibilities

Category Strategy & Leadership

• Develop and maintain category strategies that optimise cost, quality, risk, resilience and supplier performance.
• Align category strategies to business priorities and future organisational requirements.
• Challenge business demand, specifications and legacy approaches to ensure expenditure delivers maximum value.
• Build and maintain category plans, opportunity pipelines and sourcing strategies across assigned spend areas.
• Lead category governance and performance review activities with key stakeholders.

Commercial Delivery & Value Creation

• Deliver measurable commercial value through cost reduction, cost avoidance, supplier optimisation, demand management and risk mitigation initiatives.
• Lead complex sourcing, negotiation and contracting activities across strategic categories.
• Develop and execute multi-year category plans aligned to business objectives.
• Support robust value tracking and reporting in partnership with Finance and business stakeholders.
• Drive sustainable commercial outcomes rather than one-off procurement events.

Stakeholder Management & Influence

• Build strong relationships with senior stakeholders across the organisation and act as a trusted commercial advisor.
• Proactively identify, engage and develop relationships in areas where Procurement has limited or no existing presence.
• Establish credibility and trust through commercial expertise, delivery and effective partnership.
• Influence expenditure decisions through insight, market knowledge and commercial expertise.
• Challenge existing ways of working and spend behaviours where appropriate.
• Facilitate alignment across business functions to support procurement and category objectives.
• Increase Procurement visibility, engagement and commercial influence across the organisation.
• Support the development of commercial awareness and procurement engagement across the business.

Supplier & Market Management

• Develop supplier strategies that improve performance, service quality, resilience and innovation.
• Lead strategic supplier relationships and commercial negotiations.
• Monitor market trends, emerging risks and opportunities within assigned categories.
• Support effective contract management and supplier governance activities.
• Ensure key suppliers are aligned to business objectives and performance expectations.

Data, Insight & Analysis

• Leverage spend data, market intelligence and commercial analysis to identify opportunities and risks.
• Translate data into actionable recommendations and category strategies.
• Utilise total cost of ownership, cost modelling and benchmarking techniques where appropriate.
• Present clear and concise insights to business stakeholders and senior leadership.
• Direct and prioritise analytical support resources to maximise category and business outcomes.
• Work closely with shared procurement data analysts to ensure analytical activity is focused on the highest-value commercial opportunities.

Procurement Capability & Continuous Improvement

• Operate effectively within a developing procurement environment, helping shape practical and scalable ways of working.
• Identify opportunities to improve procurement processes, governance, reporting and category management disciplines.
• Demonstrate a proactive and solution-focused approach to delivering outcomes despite ambiguity, competing priorities or imperfect information.
• Support the ongoing development of procurement capability across the organisation.
• Contribute to the continuous improvement of procurement tools, data and reporting capabilities.
• Act as a change agent, helping stakeholders adopt improved commercial and procurement practices.

Governance, Compliance & Risk

• Ensure compliance with procurement governance requirements, sourcing frameworks and delegated authority limits.
• Identify and mitigate commercial, operational, contractual and supplier-related risks.
• Support audit, assurance and governance activities where required.
• Promote transparency, accountability and appropriate commercial controls across procurement activities.

Skills, Knowledge and Expertise

• Significant Procurement and Category Management experience with a proven track record of delivering value across direct and/or indirect spend categories.
• Experience managing complex, multi-category portfolios within large, international or geographically dispersed organisations.
• Demonstrated success leading strategic sourcing, supplier management and commercial negotiation activities.
• Proven ability to build stakeholder relationships and establish credibility in environments where Procurement engagement is limited, developing or immature.
• Demonstrated success identifying opportunities, creating demand for procurement support and influencing business decisions through relationship development and commercial insight.
• Strong stakeholder management skills with the confidence to influence and challenge senior decision-makers.
• Proven ability to operate independently, take ownership and deliver results in a dynamic environment.
• Strong analytical capability, with the ability to translate data into commercially compelling recommendations.
• Experience working with analytical resources and translating business requirements into actionable insight.
• Experience operating successfully within a growing, transforming or evolving organisation where processes, governance and ways of working were being developed or enhanced.
• Demonstrates an entrepreneurial mindset, identifying opportunities, overcoming obstacles and delivering results with limited structure or direction.
• Comfortable balancing strategic thinking with hands-on execution.
• Strong communication, influencing and relationship-building skills.
• Bachelor's degree in Business, Supply Chain, Engineering, Finance or a related discipline.
• CIPS, CPSM or equivalent professional qualification desirable.
• MBA or postgraduate qualification advantageous but not essential.