Purpose & Overall Relevance for the Organization:

• Plan and develop strategies to ensure that FW Materials Sourcing contributes to the overall profitability of adidas
• Ensure a best-in-class and competitive supplier portfolio for every material category
• Lead and drive the implementation of data-driven sourcing best-practices and advanced materials costing approaches

Key Responsibilities:

• Ensure a balanced and competitive supplier portfolio for every material category, taking into account multiple factors like cost competitiveness, innovativeness, quality and speed
• Define the materials sourcing strategy and sign-off the portfolio strategy per material category jointly with the VP Materials Sourcing
• Ensure and track the implementation of the material category specific portfolio strategy in line with the overall materials sourcing strategy [e.g., onboarding or phase-out of suppliers)
• Own commercial relationship to all T2 suppliers across locations and material categories
• Establish standardized, advanced and data-driven materials costing approaches and procedures across material categories, e.g., should-be costing or comprehensive cost breakdowns for material categories
• Collaborate with the head of Materials Operations and VP Materials Sourcing on translating strategic portfolio decisions into operative actions across
• Lead the seasonal Buffer Management process for materials and collaborate with Finance and T1 Costing to set the material buffer
• Ensure together with the Sr Director FW Materials Sourcing that the materials strategy defined by the BUs/Horizontal teams and the materials sourcing strategy are always aligned and transparent to the Brand, Horizontal and Sourcing
• Define and continuously improve the seasonal material price negotiation process, including system tasks such as price uploads as well as a comprehensive savings tracking
• Lead the seasonal price negotiations and set targets for the material categories
• Collaborate and align sourcing strategy with stakeholders
• Steer and ensure the implementation of the defined portfolio strategy and supplier reactions with all stakeholders, e.g., no new developments with suppliers that will be phased-out
• Ensure the accurate and continuous tracking of market data for raw materials, currencies, and other cost factors to enable the comprehensive analysis of material cost
• Ensure that general price trend information as well as cost indications for new developments are shared with stakeholders where appropriate
• Ensure and guide the application of advanced procurement techniques, e.g., tendering of materials
• Develop business reporting capabilities that enable effective tracking of supplier performance measures as well as a comprehensive analysis of adidas materials spend
• Manage the Quarterly Business Reporting process including material localization, turnover, and complexity reporting
• Communicate seasonal savings to Finance

Key Relationships:

• T2 suppliers
• Materials operations
• Materials technology incubation
• Costing
• Finance
• BUs
• Horizontal teams

Knowledge Skills and Abilities:

• Excellent interpersonal and communication skills, able to lead a team and communicate at senior management level
• Excellent project management skills
• Strong business sense and analytical skills
• Strong negotiation and costing skills
• Excellent presentation and communications skills (written and verbal)
• Ability to drive initiatives and change
• Strong knowledge of Footwear industry and manufacturing methods
• Good knowledge of MS office, especially PowerPoint and ExcelFluent in English both written and spoken

Requisite Education and Experience / Minimum Qualifications:

• University degree in Business Administration, Finance or Procurement preferred
• 7-10+ years professional experience in footwear manufacturing, preferably in Costing or Materials function.
• Fluent in English, knowledge of another language (ideally Mandarin, Vietnamese, Bahasa, or German) an advantage
• Knowledge of athletic footwear industry and/or project management preferred

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