Category Buyer Travel

Objectives of the Position

• Responsible for purchasing activities of Travel Procurement within Asia Pacific (focus on China/Malaysia/Singapore /HK Regional and SSC offices ) targeted at gaining optimum commercial conditions at the required level of supply security.
• Work together with global category team and shared service center buyers in a way that encourages collaboration and leverages the team’s ability to ensure that the purchasing category delivers agreed targets and service standards, on time and within budget.
• The travel procurement activity broadly covers TMC/Air/Train/Hotel and associated local conveyance etc.

Main Areas of Responsibilities

Category buyer for Travel Procurement

Plan to Strategy - Responsible for contributing to strategy:

• Provide input of internal customer needs and market knowledge (e.g. supply market structure and dynamics, strategies of suppliers, pricing structures, local specifics, opportunities and threats)
• Support Group Lead on strategy development (e.g. strategic goals, strategic options, implementation plan)
Strategy implementation & follow-up: tackle action items, deliver progress report to Group Lead.

Sourcing to Contract:

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• You will constantly demonstrate your negotiating skills - confident, cost-conscious and quality-conscious in RFQ’s and price negotiations.
• Negotiating contracts with local/regional travel suppliers and service providers as part of the Global Travel Procurement Team
• Cooperation with regional procurement units, global procurement, and the regional travel management of the service units in order to implement synergies and requirements in the procurement of travel services.
• Implementation of travel policies and processes in regional procurement strategies in Asia/Pacific
• Coordination & control of travel procurement activities in Asia/Pacific as well as management of problem solutions and special situations for the region
• Proactive risk management in the regional travel procurement environment
• Analysis of market- and demand development in the Asia/Pacific region

Others:

• At request of Category Manager, align resource allocation for Local Procurement Representative with Hub Management and provide guidance to Local Procurement Representative in selected cases
• Execute Supplier Management according to boundaries and action plan defined by Group Lead, manage relationships with key suppliers, evaluate supplier performance, drive supplier innovation
• Execute Risk Management approach with appropriate actions
• Reporting of Performance results

Supplier Relationship Management

Actively manage the portfolio of suppliers for defined categories, strengthen partnership with key suppliers and continuously manage supplier performance. Included activities:

• Establish contacts with the management of key suppliers to acquire information on service offerings and market trends and to enable timely settlement of issues
• Actively monitor the supplier landscape in Asia Pacific with a specific focus to China and build up new suppliers to enable them to meet BASF’s standards and requirements in future, to ensure reliable supply at competitive prices and to manage supplier and price risks
• Ensure that suppliers meet the general and country-specific requirements and standards by aligning with internal Business Partners, EHS, Global/Regional Procurement and other relevant internal and external parties

IBP Management

• Map the Key IBP’s , collaborate with the requirements and provide solutions , and integrate the expenses management systems with the travel portal, popularize the BASF hotel management portal, publish key results to local management.

Job Requirements

• Master's or diploma degree in economics, business travel management, business administration or comparable qualification
• Ideally more than 8 years of professional experience in purchasing of Travel services
• Knowledge in contracting of Travel Services with good knowledge of contract design and negotiations as well as legal principles and basis of compliance at Procurement
• Several years of experience in different areas of the travel industry with a focus on the procurement of travel services (negotiation, contracting, SRM, ...)
• Familiarity with common MS Office applications as well as confident handling of SAP R/3 and SAP Ariba