Closing Date
2025-09-29Job Title: Category & Sourcing Manager (Operations) - 2 Opportunities
Location: Durrington, Worthing (Hybrid)
Contract Type: Permanent
Hours: 37 hours per week
Salary: £55,000
There has never been a better time to join our organisation as we build towards a greener future, tackling climate change, minimising our environmental impact and reducing our carbon footprint!
Job Overview
This is an exciting time to Join Southern Water's procurement department, with new investment and large scale plans, both in the Procurement Division as well as company wide; this is a great opportunity for an experienced Category Manager to get their 'teeth stuck into' this role.
You will strategically and proactively manage category spending and supply sourcing in alignment with value management strategies and demand profiles to optimise total cost of ownership.
Day to day you will:
1. Develop and implement specific demand and category strategies
2. Engage with internal customers to understand requirements, volume demands, and specifications
3. Support on all associated commercial activity to achieve value creation and minimise total cost of ownership, including executing the full sourcing lifecycle
4. Deliver against procurement and value management strategies
5. Work with Senior Category Manager as well as business leads to deliver category specific strategies, including sourcing and contracting
6. Drive cost reduction through standardisation, aggregation of demand, and actions to minimise tail spend
7. Drive continuous improvement translating external best practices, innovation, and ideas into actionable proposals and plans for the business, building them into category strategies
About You
To be right for this role, you will have experience working in a strategic Category Manager role, with experience of working in the public sector (past or present, ideally with a good understanding of the regulations affecting public spend. You will be able to 'hit the ground running' with established experience.
It's essential that you have:
8. Stakeholder management skills
9. Written and verbal communication ability and able to present confidently
10. Analytical, planning and negotiation skills
11. Experience of working multiple large-scale projects
12. In depth Category experience, ideally in engineering, construction or asset purchase & hire
13. Knowledge of UCR and ABC legislation
14. Ability to demonstrate a proactive/can do style of work
15. Continuous improvement mind-set
16. Commercial awareness and excellent analytical, planning, organisational, and problem-solving skills
It would be great if you also have:
17. Knowledge of the Public Procurement Act or a CIPS qualification.
Package
This role will be full time Monday to Friday with a hybrid approach to working between our Durrington (Worthing) office and home (office days are Tuesday/ Wednesday).
We are offering a salary of £55,000 per annum depending on skills and experience as well as other benefits including:
18. Generous pension up to 11% company contribution
19. 25 days annual leave
20. Life assurance equal to 4x salary
21. Salary sacrifice electric car scheme (after 6 months service)
22. Health Cash Plan
23. Full funded eye tests
24. Two paid volunteering days a year
25. Occupational health service
26. Discounts with over 800 popular retailers
27. Digital GP service
28. Study support may be available for job-related qualifications
29. Competitive maternity leave and flexible return to work options
30. Cycle to work scheme
Join our Procurement team and see how far your career could progress with a company committed to career progression, training and development opportunities, our customers and the environment.
Does this opportunity excite you but you’re not 100% sure if you meet all the requirements for the role? Or are you concerned that ‘normal’ office hours aren’t possible given your personal circumstances? Whilst we can’t accommodate every flexible working request, we’ll try to find a practical solution. So why not engage with us and find out more about this role?
If this role isn’t quite what you’re looking for but are keen to be contacted about opportunities at Southern Water, you can register your details here: Introduce Yourself (myworkdaysite.com)
Our customers are at the heart of everything we do, because delivering water for life is our core purpose. To achieve this, we need 24/7 support in place to resolve incidents quickly and efficiently. All our employees understand the importance of out-of-hours incident support – because when problems appear, fixing them is our top priority. That’s why our people join together and support when and however needed to make sure our customers get the service they deserve. Joining the Southern Water family means you’ll become part of our incident support team. During your interview, your manager will speak to you about any incident support rotas that apply to your position.
Privacy Statement:
Please note: If you are an existing Southern Water employee, you will need to confirm within your application that your Manager is aware of your application.
All applicants must be eligible to live and work in the UK. You will need to provide evidence of eligibility (e.g. a passport or long birth certificate and proof of NI) and current proof of address (dated within the last 3 months), will be required as part of the recruitment process. If you do not meet these criteria, your application will not be considered.
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