IT Vendor Manager

International Paper•Memphis, TN

1d•$101,000 - $134,000•Onsite

About The Position

As an IT Vendor Manager, you will operate at the intersection of technology, finance, risk, and operations to ensure IP maximizes value from its strategic technology vendors. The most critical of these vendors is IP’s Managed Services Provider (MSP), where you will play a key role in the oversight and management of this partnership. You will balance hands-on governance with strategic oversight by bringing structure, transparency, and data-driven insights to vendor management. This position requires influencing partners across the organization, driving accountability with external partners, and continuously evolving vendor management practices to deliver business value and drive service improvement.

Requirements

Bachelor’s Degree (preferably in computer science, business IT, or another technical field)
8+ years of IT experience
Robust vendor management experience with ability to deliver actionable feedback and negotiate resource changes
Ability to manage disputes, build consensus, and collaborate between stakeholders
Must have exceptional communication, analytical, and influence skills as the position regularly interacts with internal and external senior leaders
Comfortable with quantitative analysis, evaluating vendor performance, and holding the vendor accountable
Experience and comfort holding others accountable, which will include vendors and internal stakeholders
2+ years working on vendor financial management (budgeting, forecasting, cost optimization)
4+ years of experience focusing on IT vendor management, partner management, supplier governance, IT operations, or enterprise technology operations
Experience with negotiation skills
Strong eye for detail and ability to identify root causes
Good understanding of procurement processes.
Understanding of legal frameworks, concepts, and language that may be in contracts.
Experience leveraging tools to manage vendor financial performance, such as SAP ERP / S4 Hana, SAP BW, SAP Ariba, and/or others.
Experience leveraging tools to manage contracts and entitlement data such as Sirion CLM, ServiceNow HAM, ServiceNow SAM, and/or others.
2+ years of experience using ServiceNow for vendor lifecycle governance, with exposure to modules such as: Software Asset Management (SAM), Vendor Management Workspace, Service Level Management (SLM), Performance Analytics (PA), IT Service Management (ITSM)
Experience creating dashboards and reports with visualization tools, such as ServiceNow, PowerBI, Microsoft Fabric, and/or others.

Nice To Haves

Experience building and managing large vendor contracts
Understanding of general IT controls, applications controls, and change management methodologies

Responsibilities

Develop the strategy and principles for the management of IT vendors—including both the MSP and all other vendors.
Develop processes, documentation, training, and tools that promote good vendor management practices.
Serve as a consultant to internal partners on vendor selection, performance, and vendor management practices.
Drive an annual refresh of the vendor strategy and vendor segmentation in partnership with key internal stakeholders.
Serve as the owner for the MSP partnership; oversee, manage, and measure the performance of the MSP.
Develop and execute the governance plan for the MSP, which includes appropriate controls and meetings (e.g. WBRs, MBRs, QBRs) to review service performance, ensure contract compliance, and provide visibility.
Support vendor governance of IT strategic vendors, facilitating vendor relationship activities where identified as a critical engagement point.
Drive end-to-end vendor lifecycle governance and stakeholder adoption of IT VMO practices.
Develop and provide training or consultation on processes for the IT organization including integration points with the PDP process.
Manage vendor contract data in the appropriate system(s) to ensure accurate data to support contract renewal monitoring, notifications, and access to key contract terms.
Maintain alignment of outsourced services with business priorities.
Develop metrics to manage the performance of the MSP’s performance of IT services and support (i.e. SLAs and KPIs).
Oversee MSP performance management, including SLA compliance.
Deliver coordinated feedback from all stakeholders to MSP leadership.
Monitor KPIs and resolve vendor performance or service quality issues proactively.
Serve as the escalation point for the MSP partnership and where necessary, lead remediation and escalation management for operational or performance concerns.
Perform vendor financial oversight of the MSP contract, including oversight of spend, budgeting, and invoicing.
Develop and maintain vendor reports, scorecards, and dashboards.
During M&A activities, execute license transfer activities and identify vendor contract synergies.
Drive service improvement and cost management.
Develop strong relationships with internal and external stakeholders.
Partner with internal stakeholders to gather feedback and ensure MSP vendor performance aligns with business expectations.
Provide leadership and expertise to support decision-making and resolve contract disputes.
Participate in appropriate governance meetings across IT teams to observe and gather feedback of vendor performance.
Partner with internal stakeholders to create strong contractual documents (e.g. SOWs, MSAs, PSAs, etc.) for the MSP and IT strategic vendors.
Monitor overall IT vendor portfolio and make recommendations to reduce risk (e.g. market consolidation, vendor over-dependency, predatory vendors).
Manage and provide assistance of publisher or third-party software audits including collection, assessment, review, approval and communication of results.
Manage and provide assistance of publisher software usage awareness activities through education and assess for compliance.