Middle & Back Office Vendor and Licensing Specialist

About RS Group

Across the industrial design, manufacturing and maintenance worlds, we’re the digital destination for product and service solutions to help our customers with the maintenance, repair and operation of their businesses. We provide global access to an unrivalled range of over 750,000 stocked industrial products. Each day our team of experts deliver solutions to resolve our customer’s challenges across design, procurement, inventory and maintenance. We consistently strive to deliver the best possible service to all of our customers and challenge ourselves to provide a seamless procurement experience.

We are one team. We deliver brilliantly. We do the right thing. We make every day better. These are our values. They unite our c.9,000 global colleagues and differentiate us from our competition. They are a mix of how we work today and how we must step up for the future. Most importantly, it is one set of values shaped by our people, for our people.

Together, we can make great things happen. Aim for amazing and beyond.

This role sits within our Technology function as part of the Middle & Back Office transformation program. With the team transitioning to new technologies, it offers an excellent opportunity to work across both existing processes and legacy technology stacks, while also gaining exposure to the future “to-be” landscape. No two days are the same, one day the team may be helping to shape the future through strategic discussions and transformation initiatives, and the next the team could be supporting the resolution of critical P1 issues, collaborating with both internal teams and external partners.

About the Role

Role Purpose

This role is accountable for Middle & Back Office application contract management portfolio. This role is also accountable for ensuring we have a clear lifecycle plan for our applications so that we avoid applications becoming end of life or out of support, and that the relevant business owner approves any risk associated with an application becoming end of life.

This role is accountable for managing contract renewals for a portfolio of applications globally underpinning our Middle & Back Office platforms. You will play an integral role ensuring our application and services are operating within their licensing entitlements with active management of future capacity needs and managing their respective contract renewals. The portfolio of applications will evolve to meet the needs and growth of the RS Group business across EMEA, APAC and the Americas.

The role also provides hands-on operational oversight of managed service suppliers for Middle & Back Office applications, ensuring contractual service obligations, SLAs and commercial commitments are met.

Responsibilities

• Maintenance of the policies, standards and processes needed to support the contractual renewal process and working closely with Finance to ensure proactive budget forecasting.
• Ensure that all supporting documents are executed in a timely manner to support the contract renewal framework.
• Responsible for shaping Investment proposals, raising purchase orders and ensuring a consistent process for invoice approvals.
• Budget management of the operating costs for Application services including being responsible for the monthly and annual forecasting of these budgets.  
• Responsible for the compliance and governance of managing vendor licence agreements & entitlements through our service partners covering usage, renewals & license rationalisation.
• Responsible for the financial management and controls for the relevant contract costs including invoice approvals, and the identification and delivery of any appropriate service credits.
• Collaborate with Service Design and Integration (SD&I), the application support partners, technology teams, PMO (Project Management office) to ensure contracts and financial data is captured, documented and correctly managed when new services are introduced into Middle & Back Office teams.
• Support Keep the Lights program by working with the Technology Delivery teams to ensure these and any other projects requiring changes to Application services are successfully delivered to time, cost and quality.
• Responsible for the effective management of financial data, knowledge, operating procedures etc. related to Middle & Back Office application services, and the maintenance of appropriate service catalogues or portfolios.
• Identify and implement appropriate cost saving opportunities related to contract renewals
• Ensure that vendors provide quotes in a timely fashion, engaging procurement where needed to support contract renewal negotiations.
• Initiate Continuous Improvement activities leveraging internal teams and external partners to reduce costs and bring greater efficiencies where possible, particularly where Transformation activities are within the service partners contract. This includes familiarity with emerging best practice, automation, tooling etc, as well as engagement with internal or external benchmarking exercises.
• Interface and initiate necessary collaboration between Technology teams, 3rd party support teams and service support partners to deliver key outcomes. 
• Maintain financial reporting for Middle & Back Office application services, aligned to IS&T standards
• Act as a point of contact for Managed Service suppliers for Middle & Back Office applications when needed.
• Support the monitoring of supplier performance against SLAs, OLAs and contractual commitments, escalating issues to the Managed Services Manager where required.
• Work with the Managed Services Manager and our suppliers to support incident trends, service risks and demand changes from a commercial and contractual perspective.
• Work with the Managed Services Manager to capture any service changes, scope variations and transformation activity are captured contractually and aligned to commercials.
• Support service review forums through preparation of commercial, licensing and contract performance data when needed.

Key relationships

• The role will need to work with Technology, whilst collaborating closely with Procurement and Finance
• The role will also need to work closely with architecture teams so that the strategy is clear for each application
• There will be a requirement to liaise with key stakeholders at all levels of the RS Group organisation to highlight the lifecycle management position of the Application services within Middle & Back Office. 
• In particular:
  • Middle & Back Office Leadership
  • Managed Services Manager
  • Technology Service Managers
  • Finance and Procurement teams
  • Architecture and Engineering teams
  • Infrastructure & Operations
  • Project Management Office and Business Change
  • Risk and Information Security
  • Third party application and managed service suppliers

How I make a difference in this role

To make a real impact in this role, it will be essential to develop a strong understanding of the overall strategy and clearly identify which applications/services must be retained, as well as those that can be rationalised or decommissioned.

Candidate Requirements

Essential Skills & Experience

• Strong written and verbal communication skills in English
• Ability to work with stakeholders across business, technology, and external vendor

Desirable Skills & Experience

• Strong negotiation and commercial Skills
• Experience or background in finance, procurement or vendor management
• Bachelor’s degree (or equivalent experience)

Essential Qualifications (Must be evidenced at offer stage)

• GCSE Qualifications (Grade C/4 or above, including English and Maths)

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