Strategic Sourcing and Procurement Manager
About The Position
A Strategic Sourcing & Procurement Manager at Bright Machines strengthens and scales our procurement and supplier management capabilities. This role exists to build foundational supplier programs, improve procurement execution, and raise the bar for how sourcing and buying support engineering, manufacturing, and program delivery. This is a senior individual contributor and people leadership role and a key partner to the Director of Supply Chain. You will operate with significant autonomy, owning critical supplier-facing systems while also rolling up your sleeves to execute when needed. This role is well-suited for someone who can move fluidly between strategy, process design, and hands-on buying in a fast-moving startup environment.
Requirements
- 8â12+ years of experience in strategic sourcing, procurement, or supply chain roles in manufacturing or technology environments
- Proven experience building or materially improving supplier management programs
- Strong understanding of procurement operations, negotiations, and execution tradeoffs
- Demonstrated ability to drive process improvement in ambiguous, fast-moving environments
- Comfortable operating at multiple levels, from detailed execution to system design
- Clear communicator with strong cross-functional instincts
Nice To Haves
- Experience supporting automated manufacturing, robotics, or complex assemblies
- Exposure to supplier audits, factory qualifications, or global supply bases
- Experience leveraging data, automation, or AI-enabled tools to improve procurement workflows
- Experience with NetSuite or similar ERP systems
Responsibilities
- Supplier Management & Governance
- Strategic Sourcing & Buying
- Procurement Process Improvement
- People & Interface Management
- Systems, Data, and Automation
- Design and implement a comprehensive supplier management program, including onboarding standards, qualification criteria, and performance expectations
- Build and own supplier scorecards across quality, delivery, cost, and responsiveness; lead QBRs and define escalation paths for performance gaps
- Partner with Quality, Engineering, and Operations on factory audits, capability assessments, and supplier risk evaluations
- Lead strategic sourcing initiatives for key commodities and suppliers, including supplier selection and negotiations
- Step in as a hands-on buyer as needed to support execution, continuity, or peak workload periods
- Establish sourcing standards and best practices that improve consistency without slowing the business
- Assess procurement and planning workflows end-to-end; identify gaps, inefficiencies, and failure modes, and implement improved processes
- Define and deliver clear-to-build procurement readiness reporting for major programs, providing leadership with accurate visibility into material status, risks, and mitigation actions
- Partner closely with Planning, Operations, Finance, and Program Management to improve execution outcomes and drive initiatives requiring sustained focus
- Directly manage San Franciscoâbased procurement and logistics roles, while providing best-practice guidance to buyers and planners without formal reporting-line authority
- Maintain clear separation of ownership and accountability for the Guadalajara supply chain team, reporting to the Mexico-based Supply Chain Manager
- Improve procurement visibility through better use of systems, data, and reporting; identify and drive automation of manual or error-prone workflows
- Partner with internal teams to pilot tools and approaches that improve efficiency, scalability, and control
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What This Job Offers
Job Type
Full-time
Career Level
Mid Level
Education Level
No Education Listed
