Procurement & Corporate Solutions Manager in Chertsey

With around 550,000 employees in 55,000 client locations in 30+ countries, Compass Group has a broad and diverse footprint. The decentralised operating model is considered a competitive advantage enabling a client-oriented culture with innovation at the front line. This stimulates creativity and to support this, the group builds and aligns appropriate operating frameworks, solutions and leads on best practice sharing. Our Group leadership team is motivated to create significant advantage using digital & data solutions in both front and back of house, which leads to our desire to strengthen group-wide technology and data capabilities across key strategic pillars to drive significant Growth & Performance commercial outcomes.

Role Purpose: The Procurement & Corporate Solutions Manager is responsible for supporting the end-to-end lifecycle of the Procurement & Corporate Digital, AI and Analytical Solutions and Products. You will work closely with various business stakeholders, 3rd party vendors, and technical teams, to assist in defining and delivering to Procurement & Corporate Solutions vision, strategy, and roadmaps. This role combines strategic vision with hands-on delivery, ensuring solutions are secure, scalable, accessible, and aligned with business needs, maximising solution value. Strong management and analytics skills and clear communication are essential for this role, along with the ability to build sustainable and productive working relationships with Group business, market and solutions colleagues.

Key Accountabilities:

• Solution Strategy and Vision: Developing and communicating a clear vision and strategy that aligns with the Compass goals, business and market needs for the Procurement & Corporate Solutions Portfolio.
• Solution Development and Roadmap: Collaborating with cross-functional teams (business, key Markets, Group stakeholders, delivery engineering, partners) to define requirements, prioritize features, and manage the solution development lifecycle.
• Data & AI Solution Architecture & Governance: Follow the strategic direction for Group and International Region data and AI tech architecture, providing technology thought leadership and establishing best practices. Follow data governance, quality, security, and privacy standards for all data and AI initiatives. Ensure solutions are designed to scale and share among markets and define the required resources to support each solution through its lifecycle. Collaborate with the Solutions Data Platform team to ensure standards are deployed and adhered to.
• Solutions DevOps: Oversee the solution development process, from ideation to launch to operations, ensuring that solutions are delivered on time and within budget.
• Stakeholder Management: Engaging with Procurement & Corporate stakeholders across business, key Markets, Group stakeholders, including customers, sales teams, executives, and partners, to gather feedback and ensure alignment on solution goals and progress.
• Performance Monitoring and Optimization: Define and track key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure success and track solutions performance to make data-driven decisions to optimize the solutions and improve value delivered.
• Market Research and Analysis: Conducting market research to understand customer needs, competitive landscape, and industry trends to inform solution decisions.

Role Scope:

• Procurement & Corporate Solution Strategy: Responsible for defining the solution strategy, roadmap, and features to achieve company's goals, business priorities and market opportunities.
• Solution & Product Development: Drive the development of Procurement & Corporate solutions by working closely with product owners, engineering and architecture teams to ensure that the solutions meet business needs goals.
• Feature prioritisation: Prioritise solution and product features and enhancements based on user feedback and business objectives in line with strategy.
• Customer and Market Insights: Gather and analyse customer and market insights to make informed decisions about solution features and development improvements.
• Cross-functional Collaboration: Collaborating with various teams across the organization to ensure that solutions are developed and launched successfully.
• Stakeholder Management: Engage with Group, Market, and Business stakeholders to gather feedback and ensure alignment on Procurement & Corporate solutions strategic goals.
• Continuous Improvement: Gather feedback from users and stakeholders to continuously improve Procurement & Corporate solutions features and performance.

Expected Role KPIs:

• Procurement & Corporate Solutions portfolio delivery in line with commitments - time, quality and value.
• Stakeholder satisfaction levels and solutions adoption.
• Solutions capabilities uplift.

Skills, Knowledge & Experience:

• Core Skills & Knowledge:
• Good understanding of digital, data & AI value opportunities in large corporations.
• Good understanding of Procurement and Corporate Finance & Performance processes.
• Ability to inspire cross-functional teams to achieve common goals.
• Strong analytical, problem-solving, and decision-making skills.
• Deep understanding of business needs and a passion for delivering exceptional digital experiences.
• Clear communications capability to hold an audience and influence change.
• Practical and pragmatic individual who can help demystify the complex world of data, digital & AI.
• Confident self-starter with both short term delivery and strategic focus.
• Adapts leadership style to stakeholder group, whilst remaining authentic.
• Ability to manage multiple priorities at once.
• Functional Skills & Experience:
• FTSE 100 / Fortune 500 or similar experience with graduate level education.
• Good working knowledge of digital, data & analytics & AI technologies and cloud platforms.
• Very strong product and project management experience.
• Strong experience in agile and devops delivery - experience of using Azure, Fabric, Data Platform & DevOps preferred.
• Experience in designing and implementing cloud-based data and AI solutions with strong understanding of AI/ML concepts, frameworks, and lifecycle management.
• Proficiency with data integration, ETL, and data pipeline tools.
• Proven experience of designing and leading the implementation of data governance, security, and privacy best practices.