Buyer- Procurement Services - Asplundh Tree Expert Co

Buyer 

The Buyer is part of the Procurement Services team, and this role is integral to the balance between the strategic and tactical facets of the Procurement team and will play an important role in ensuring that the strategic solutions of Sourcing are finding strong and sustained utilization through the Procurement ends of the department.  The Buyer will be given autonomy to craft solutions necessary to get the job done within the protocols and policies of the department and broader enterprise. The Buyer’s workday may be filled with various activities, including supporting purchasing needs, participating in tactical and strategic sourcing efforts, or working with suppliers to resolve open action issues.  The Buyer’s role is a very active role, and will be given many opportunities to solve problems, build relationships with various levels of operational leadership, and develop skills for progress into more of the senior and/or strategic sourcing elements of the department.

Job Type: Exempt

Pay: Salary 

Are you a real go-getter looking for an amazing opportunity with a nationwide full-service-utility contractor offering competitive wages and incredible benefits? Keep reading because this job might be for you!

Since 1928, Asplundh has been dedicated to safe, efficient, and innovative line clearance services for the utility industry. Reliable, uninterrupted power is an important service provided by the world's electrical utilities and Asplundh has the expertise to help keep the power flowing. Diversification over the years has opened up vegetation management services to other specialized markets such as municipalities, railroads, pipelines, helicopter vegetation services, and departments of transportation.

A family-owned and operated corporation headquartered near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Asplundh has grown to employ over 33,000 service professionals throughout the United States, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand.

Benefits:

• Benefits Available and vary per position and location.

Essential Functions & Responsibilities:

Procure to Pay

• Establish and track open Purchase Order process with suppliers, improve Purchase Order backlogs, along with any other aspects of fulfillment.
• Generate, confirm, and modify purchase orders; proactively identify potential fulfillment challenges and make appropriate recommendations to remediate the situation.
• Follows up in a timely fashion with suppliers on late deliveries, obtain shipping confirmations/proof of delivery as required.
• Follows up on orders to ensure that product is shipped and delivered by expected delivery date.
• Meet with internal Strategic Sourcing Team to review order fulfillment issues, make recommendations for adjustments, and determine corrective action to remedy any out-of-stock situations.
• Utilize the Procurement system (Coupa) to complete the Requisition-to-PO process on behalf of department colleagues or stakeholders.
• Support Accounts Payable with supplier billing issues or other needs relative to invoicing and Purchase Order payments.

Strategic Supplier Management

• Oversee, manage, and develop relationships with suppliers, new and long incumbent, within the Buyer’s area of commodity management.
• Ensure the Procure-to-Pay process is well understood by the supply base under management, as well as by the business as necessary, and be prepared to document any unique process elements or exception-based review/approval elements.
• Support and/or conduct quarterly business reviews with suppliers under management. Meetings should be a mixture of backward- and forward-looking assessments with a focus on developing better and stronger values for both sides.
• Support the creation and delivery of training material for the department and business about the supply base offerings, respective to suppliers under management. Create quick reference guides, announcements, bulletins, and other communication documents that help build deeper understanding of the value of each supplier.
• Source to Contract
• Read, understand, and follow sourcing guidance and guidelines within the Buyer’s area of category management.
• On occasion, conduct requests for quote, requests for information within the Buyer’s area of category management.
• On occasion, participate in a team responsible for conducting requests for proposal; Participation may include the pre-RFX activities such as spend analysis, market research, customer requirements definition, as well as RFX event tasks such as building the event, launching the event, supporting response generation, evaluation, and award.
• Support non-catalog and unique requests from various stakeholders that require low to moderate complexity (3 bids and a buy) in resolving within the Buyer’s area of category management.
• On occasion, support contract actions which might include document preparation, light negotiating, legal review requests, and final package load into Contract module.
• With support from Business Analyst group and our analytics tools, analyze spend patterns within Buyer’s area of category management looking for opportunities at creating savings for the business, particularly in areas of price negotiations, price arbitrage, volume leveraging, improved delivery times and costs, as well as quality to need optimization.

Desired Skills and Experience

• Bachelor’s degree required. Exceptional knowledge, experience & skill may be considered in lieu of education.
• Minimum of 6 years Procurement/Buying experience in direct materials.

• Possess proficiency with Excel, along with a good understanding of MS Word, PowerPoint, Outlook, and PowerBI. Ability and willingness to learn and support various business-oriented software & systems.
• Prior work in the indirect spend areas of MRO (Tools & Supplies, Office, Safety), Services (Facility Management, Professional, Administrative, Technology, Business Outsource), and Subcontractors is a preferred but not necessary.
• Thorough understanding of purchasing procedures and policies
• Ability to work independently as well as in a team environment.
• Experience with eProcurement Systems such as Coupa, Ariba, Zycus, GEP, etc. are a plus.
• Strong analytical, verbal, and written communication skills necessary to interact with numerous stakeholders across a variety of businesses and departments.
• Proven self-starter with a track record of managing multiple complex tasks with the ability to work within a matrix organization and track tasks and deadlines. A sense of ownership over work and responsibilities is strongly preferred.
• Identifies and communicates to management process improvements that reduce workloads or improve quality for his/her assigned area(s) of responsibility.
• Strong problem-solving and critical-thinking skills and an ability to identify problems, design, and articulate solutions, and implement.
• The Buyer should possess basic procurement negotiating skills to secure the best value on price, terms, and delivery.
• This position has no direct reports so being able to manage through influence is critical to the success of the role.

Pre-Screen

• Upon offer, employees may be required to complete and pass a pre-employment drug screen, background, and/or MVR check.

License & Certifications:

• Valid driver's license required.

Physical Requirements:

• Rarely: Walking, Kneeling, Squatting, Crawling, seeing distant, Climbing on/off truck, climbing, depth perception, Color Vision, Lifting, Carrying, Pushing, Pulling, Climbing Ladders, Balancing, Lifting up to 10lbs, Lifting 10lbs to 50lbs, Lifting over 50lbs.
• Occasionally: Standing, Stooping, Body Twisting, Gripping, Reaching, Range of Motion, Climbing Stairs.
• Frequently: Sitting, Sense of Touch, Manual Dexterity, Speaking Clearly, Reading, Hearing-Speech Range.
• Constantly: Seeing.

About Us:

As a full-service utility contractor, Asplundh performs tree pruning and removals, right-of-way clearing and maintenance, vegetation management with herbicides, and emergency storm work and logistical support. Asplundh is the parent company of Asplundh Infrastructure Group whose subsidiaries provide overhead and underground line construction, planning and design, meter reading and AMR/AMI installation, electrical testing, and street lighting/traffic signal services. Asplundh also operates Rotor Blade Airborne Utilities Management, overhead electric distribution, and transmission lines using MD 500 helicopters.

Individuals must be able to perform the essential functions of the position with or without reasonable accommodation.  Individuals with a disability who desire a reasonable accommodation should contact the ADA Coordinator at 1-800-248-8733, ext. 1339.

An Equal Opportunity Employer.