Category Specialist - Health

Category Specialist - Health

The Company

Set up by the Department of Health in a unique partnership with technology experts Sopra Steria, NHS Shared Business Services (NHS SBS) provide essential corporate back office services to other NHS organisations.

NHS SBS is the market leader in corporate services with around 40% of the NHS using one or more of our products. With unrivalled knowledge and experience, we provide high-quality, value-for-money finance, procurement and employment services to the NHS, helping them overcome any challenges they face in the back office.

We work closely with NHS organisations all over the country to replace outdated, time-consuming and error-prone paper processes, with affordable digital systems and more efficient ways of working, and in addition to our core services, we are designing and developing innovative digital technologies and piloting brand new ways of working, which further improve efficiency and quality, and better support the NHS workforce to deliver elite patient care.

The Day Job

NHS SBS requires a Category Specialist to join our growing procurement team. The Category Specialist will be responsible for providing procurement solutions and oversee the project delivery to our clients.

This is a great opportunity for someone looking for strategic and advisory procurement role within a successful and expanding team.

Key Responsibilities:

• Oversee, quality assure and deliver complex procurement advice and processes (legal process, scoping, briefing, tendering, selection, evaluation, contract negotiation and management of suppliers) across the health category.
• Leading a team in the delivery of health advice and procurement project delivery to customers.
• Develop contracting and negotiating strategies with business owners and external stakeholders.
• Autonomously manage health related procurement projects from end to end supported by the relevant legal procurement rules and regulations and oversee delivery by more junior members of the team.
• Provide clear and professional advice around procurement and contracting.
• Developing contract documentation where required.
• Delivering training, workshops and presentations to senior stakeholders, procurement teams and client managers.
• Develop effective evaluation methodologies which deliver against client objectives.
• Identify business opportunities through client relationships and wider networking.
• Work with the wider commissioner and strategic sourcing procurement teams to support their projects with robust financial decision making and evidence.
• Experience working in a procurement team and have knowledge of contract and supplier management processes.
• Strong and recent knowledge across the health procurement category.
• Track record in creating and executing Category Management strategies, with ability to lead negotiations and deliver cost savings.
• Experience of dealing with outsourcing agreements and having managing these relationships from a commercial and contractual perspective.
• Advanced IT literacy skills and an experienced user of supply chain tools (such as Ariba/Jaggear/Bravo/Atamis/Coupa)
• Experience of creating and developing meaningful procurement solutions for customers.
• Excellent relationship building and client management skills.

Essential Skills:

Desirable Skills

• Holder of CIPS accreditation or working towards CIPS qualification
• Project and Programme Management Professional Qualifications (e.g. Agile, Prince2 or equivalent)
• Relevant health sector experience

If you are interested in this role but not sure if your skills and experience are exactly what we're looking for, please do apply, we'd love to hear from you!

Location: Flexible with travel
Clearance level: N/A
Internal Recruiter: Tom Meredith
Salary: Up to GBP60,000
Benefits: GBP5,400 Car Allowance, 25 days annual leave (with the option to buy additional days), private medical, life assurance, pension, and generous flexible benefits fund.

Although this role is advertised as full-time, we support different ways of working and can offer a range of flexible working arrangements. So, if you're interested and need to work flexibly, we encourage you to apply and talk to us about what might be possible.