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Head of Procurement Global Indirect Categories

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Job Family Group: Procurement & Supply Chain Management Group
Job Description:
Join our Castrol team as Head of Procurement Global Indirect Categories! This is a role within the Castrol organisation and the successful candidate will become part of the Castrol ring-fence. If you are part of the ring-fence, it is expected that your employment will move with Castrol to new ownership.
The role provides strategic leadership for key categories at Castrol and is accountable for end-to-end management of indirect procurement. The category teams directly influence delivery of the business financial plans and the overall value delivery of procurement, and are accountable for ensuring a safe, risk managed, sustainable and competitive supply chain.
The Head of Indirect Categories is responsible for:
- Building and leading the new, global Indirect Procurement organisation
- Ensuring business continuity across all indirect categories
- Delivering global category strategies and Source to Contract operational excellence
- Managing category teams to protect the supply chain while maximising value and minimising risk
You will lead the global category and sourcing teams of 40+ people (7-10 direct reports). You will be responsible for about USD 0.8b global spend covering categories such as Marketing, HR, Real Estate, Facilities Management, Travel, Engineering, CAPEX & Maintenance and their sourcing & contracting activities.
Key Accountabilities:
-
Category Strategy Leadership:
- Leads the category team developing and implementing procurement strategies, which ensures their category operates highly effectively.
- Provides guidance and challenges the team to formulate innovative strategies that drive value.
- Leverages advanced methodologies, such as systems thinking.
- Ensures their strategy is highly aligned to business and regional needs.
-
Category Excellence:
- Demonstrates data led ownership of the end-to-end performance of the category, working with stakeholders to develop category management plans.
- Cultivates purposeful partnerships and robust supplier relationships to navigate business challenges and unlock triple bottom line (people, profit & planet) value.
-
Transformational Leadership and Change Management:
- Leads major change initiatives, which deliver value through ensuring supplier performance.
- Oversees orchestration of change.
- Employs digital tools and uses strong communication to encourage adoption.
-
Team Leadership:
- Builds high performing teams of experts with strong technical skills by fostering a culture of collaboration, excellence, and continuous improvement.
- Builds category knowledge across the wider procurement organization to ensure strategy execution.
- Develops the team’s technical capabilities to deliver operational excellence.
- Nurtures accelerator skills; curiosity in external markets, digital fluency, data-driven insights, and strong collaboration.
- Establishes an environment of psychological safety.
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- Supplier & Stakeholder Management:
- Uses storytelling to communicate with internal and external partners, respectfully challenging to achieve the right outcomes, resolving conflict and focusing on priorities.
- Leads and influences through complexity and ambiguity, manages relationships in multi-discipline, multi-cultural environments.
- Builds deep relationships, bringing market insights and championing supplier value.
- Becomes a trusted advisor and critical partner.
What you need to be successful:
- Degree or equivalent professional qualification (Supply Chain & Procurement preferred) or equivalent relevant professional experience
- 15+ years of relevant work experience
- Experience in managing global indirect procurement activities across a number of categories
- Extensive leadership experience with the ability to lead end-to-end sourcing and contracting
- In-depth understanding of advanced category management principles, coupled with experience in developing and deploying category strategies to drive value
- Fluency in English
- Industry experience within FMCG, manufacturing, industrial, energy, or chemicals preferred
- Understanding of how to ensure strategies flow through to execution
- Excellent commercial competence and awareness of external market dynamics
- Understanding of working in and navigating complex multi-national businesses
- Ability to evaluate and drive innovative solutions and manage risk
- Ability to translate business requirements into a strategic category plan, leading the team to apply data tools and analyze complex data sets
- Critical thinking to make strategic decisions
- Exceptional senior stakeholder networking and influencing skills
- Proven capability in supplier performance, including building strategic partnerships
- Regular interaction with external suppliers and representing Castrol externally are expected
- Effective change management including engagement and storytelling abilities
- Persevering through organizational complexity and resistance to change


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At bp, we support our people to learn and grow in a diverse and ambitious environment. We believe that our team is strengthened by diversity. We are committed to fostering an inclusive environment in which everyone is respected and treated fairly. There are many aspects of our employees’ lives that are meaningful, so we offer benefits to enable your work to fit with your life.
Travel Requirement:
Up to 25% travel should be expected with this role
Relocation Assistance:
This role is not eligible for relocation
Remote Type:
This position is a hybrid of office/remote working
Skills:
- Agility core practices
- Agility core practices
- Agility tools
- Business Acumen
- Business Requirements Analysis
- Category Management
- Category spend profiling
- Category Strategy
- Commercial Acumen
- Communication
- Cost modelling
- Digital Fluency
- Indirect Purchasing
- Indirect Sourcing
- Influencing
- Leadership
- Negotiating
- Negotiation planning and preparation
- People Leadership
- People Management
- Procurement
- Procurement Strategies
- Product and market intelligence
- Source to Contract
- Sourcing strategy
Legal Disclaimer:
We are an equal opportunity employer and value diversity at our company. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, gender, gender expression, sexual orientation, age, marital status, socioeconomic status, neurodiversity/neurocognitive functioning, veteran status, or disability status.
Individuals with an accessibility need may request an adjustment/accommodation related to bp’s recruiting process (e.g., accessing the job application, completing required assessments, participating in telephone screenings or interviews, etc.). If you would like to request an adjustment/accommodation related to the recruitment process, please contact us.
If you are selected for a position and depending upon your role, your employment may be contingent upon adherence to local policy. This may include pre-placement drug screening, medical review of physical fitness for the role, and background checks.
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