Buyer III

Aquent is partnering with a global enterprise, a leader in manufacturing innovation and excellence. This organization is at the forefront of its industry, constantly pushing boundaries and delivering high-quality products worldwide. Joining this team means becoming part of a legacy of innovation and contributing to a future built on efficiency and strategic growth.

Are you a data-driven analytical powerhouse with a passion for supply chain optimization? We are seeking a highly skilled and motivated individual to join a dynamic team, playing a pivotal role in transforming complex data into strategic sourcing decisions. In this role, you will be instrumental in optimizing the supply chain, driving significant financial impact, and ensuring operational continuity across an extensive network. Your analytical prowess and strategic insights will empower category leaders, streamline processes, and ensure robust, audit-ready procurement practices, directly contributing to the company's success and market leadership.

This role supports the full sourcing lifecycle, from pre-bid data preparation to post-award implementation. You will be a shared analytical and execution resource for category leaders, reducing administrative workload while strengthening sourcing speed, accuracy, governance, and continuity. Your contributions will directly impact efficiency, cost savings, and strategic decision-making.

Key Responsibilities

• Sourcing Event & Bid Execution: Support Logistics and Pallets sourcing events from project intake through award implementation, including extracting, consolidating, cleansing, and validating historical data (spend, shipment, volume, supplier, pricing). Create bid-ready baselines, scope files, pricing templates, and administer eSourcing RFQs, managing supplier invitations, communications, and response tracking. Validate supplier submissions for completeness and accuracy, preparing quotation comparisons, bid summaries, and fact-based award recommendations.
• Baseline Creation, Price Analysis & Scenario Modeling: Build and maintain current-state baselines using validated prices, volumes, and total-cost components. Perform comprehensive price variance, year-over-year, market-benchmark, and invoice-to-contract analyses. Develop intricate scenario models by supplier, site, region, mode, and part number, utilizing advanced Microsoft Excel tools to model total landed cost, freight impacts, and other critical financial elements. Identify and resolve data anomalies to ensure accurate bid outcomes and clearly document assumptions for validation.
• System & Master Data Administration: Create, update, or coordinate the creation of material part numbers, including descriptions, units of measure, and purchasing data. Maintain purchasing information records (PIRs), source lists, pricing conditions, and other procurement master data. Execute approved price updates in systems like SAP, verifying alignment with commercial agreements, and perform data checks to identify discrepancies or missing information. Support issue resolution involving purchase orders, pricing mismatches, and blocked invoices by coordinating with relevant teams.
• Logistics Data, Rate & Contract Management: Maintain centralized logistics rate files, lane pricing, and contract trackers. Coordinate requests for various transportation rates (ocean, air, truckload, LTL, drayage, parcel) and validate freight rates, fuel schedules, and accessorials before distribution. Support carrier and freight-invoice analysis, documenting and escalating discrepancies.
• Pallet & Packaging Analytical Support: Maintain pallet and packaging pricing files by plant, supplier, and part number. Analyze pricing changes, commodity adjustments, freight impacts, and capacity. Prepare supplier comparison models and sourcing scenarios to evaluate award structures. Support post-award system updates and validation of invoiced or purchase-order pricing.
• Administrative & Project Coordination: Perform or coordinate procurement support activities, including bid setup, template preparation, quote validation, and event administration. Monitor open actions, expiring pricing, and implementation dependencies, communicating issues and recommended next steps to category leaders. Prepare standard reports, dashboards, and process documentation, maintaining standard work and version control. Coordinate data requests and validation with category leaders, plant teams, Logistics, Distribution, and suppliers. Lead working sessions to resolve data gaps and clarify bid requirements, tracking milestones, risks, and deliverables across multiple concurrent workstreams.

Must-Have Qualifications

Education & Experience:

• Bachelor's Degree in Supply Chain Management, Business, Finance, Economics, Analytics, Operations, Logistics, Engineering, or a related field.
• Minimum three (3) years of experience in procurement, strategic sourcing, supply chain, logistics, purchasing operations, financial analysis, master data, or a related analytical function.
• Demonstrated experience analyzing complex pricing files, spend data, bids, or operational datasets using advanced Microsoft Excel functionality (XLOOKUP/INDEX-MATCH, SUMIFS, pivot tables, Power Query, conditional logic, data validation, charts, sensitivity analysis, error checking).
• Demonstrated experience creating defensible baselines, evaluating supplier quotations, and developing scenario or total-cost models.
• Hands-on experience with procurement or materials-management transactions in systems like SAP, including material creation, PIR or pricing updates, source lists, purchase orders, or procurement reporting.

Technical & Analytical Skills:

• Ability to build defensible baselines, bid-comparison models, total-cost models, scenario analyses, and savings calculations from complex and imperfect data.
• Strong attention to detail with demonstrated ability to reconcile data across systems and identify inconsistencies.
• Working knowledge of strategic sourcing processes, competitive bidding, RFQ administration, supplier evaluation, award analysis, and implementation controls.
• Proficiency with SAP procurement and materials-management transactions.
• Familiarity with transportation pricing structures, lanes, modes, fuel, accessorials, routing guides, carrier rate cards, and freight-invoice validation.
• Familiarity with pallets, packaging materials, part numbers, specifications, units of measure, minimum order quantities, supplier lead times, and commodity-driven price changes.

Soft Skills:

• Strong organization and prioritization skills with the ability to manage multiple deadlines and large datasets without sacrificing accuracy.
• Clear written communication, disciplined follow-up, and comfort working with suppliers and cross-functional stakeholders.
• Ability to work independently within defined processes while escalating decisions that require leadership approval.
• Continuous-improvement mindset with the ability to simplify files, standardize work, and document processes.
• Demonstrated discretion when handling confidential supplier pricing, bid results, contracts, and internal business information.

Nice-to-Have Qualifications

• Experience administering eSourcing RFQs or competitive bid events; Jaggaer experience preferred.
• Experience supporting transportation, pallets, packaging, MRO, manufacturing, distribution, or other indirect procurement categories.
• Experience working in a multi-site manufacturing or distribution environment and coordinating with international or shared-service teams.
• Experience with Power BI, Power Query, or other analytics and visualization tools.