Commercial manager - property and facilities management

The Met's Commercial function are responsible for delivering end-to-end commercial lifecycle management and supporting the wider business in working with third parties.

The Met spends about £800 million each year on a diverse range of goods and services and we aim to procure them in the most cost effective and compliant way, while satisfying often urgent operational needs. We proactively manage thirty large complex and operationally critical outsourced service contracts, to ensure that we receive the quality services we are paying for and achieve value for money through the entire life of the contract.

This is an exciting time to be working in commercial management for the MPS. The Met's Commercial Function is in the middle of a large-scale transformation, working to deliver the following strategic aims:

• build a world class capability and team
• engage effectively with our markets and suppliers
• improving and simplifying how we work
• delivering outcomes through commercial policy

In addition to large-scale transformation within the Commercial team, there's the unique and ever-evolving challenge of policing London. As a member of the Commercial Services team you will be directly supporting the Met's mission to make life safer for more than nine million Londoners. This means that there are more opportunities for you to get involved with making London the safest global city in a time of unprecedented change within the UK's largest police service.

The role

The Met's Commercial function has six pillars which have overall accountability for activity covering the commercial lifecycle, as well as relevant business partnering responsibilities across the wider business.

In this role you will be expected to undertake category management and support contract management activity, contributing to delivering commercial excellence for the Met. You'll be providing a customer-focused service, understanding the business need and stakeholder drivers, with the aim of becoming a trusted commercial advisor. You will also develop relationships with Met’s key and strategic suppliers, driving value-for-money and risk management excellence across the category. 

You will play an essential part in leading parts of the overall commercial lifecycle. You will own key aspects of Category Management, including strategy and policy development, understanding needs and sourcing options, and the procurement process itself. You will feed into the wider Category Management team, working with a range of team members, internal and external stakeholders to drive improved commercial outcomes for the Met.

The role is varied, and to carry out successful contract management activity, you will work to mobilise contracts, manage the delivery and performance of the contract, carry out contract changes, manage risk within the contract, and be responsible for contract transition and exit.

Key responsibilities

Your core duties will include, but are not limited to:

• strategic delivery and management within a category:
  • understand the Met's commercial strategy. Feeding into planning based on commercial approaches that deliver requirements that are in line with business needs, category strategies and market trends
  • feed into the development of category strategies and delivery of sourcing requirement within Commercial Services, as part of the team supporting business as usual and project activities
  • understand demand by forecasting and planning requirements with internal stakeholders and suppliers
  • develop and maintain category plans for key spend areas

• understand relevant sourcing options and analysis, and delivers positive outcomes through the procurement process:
  • leading on end-to-end strategic sourcing activities for the Met and serving as a subject matter expert
  • work with key stakeholders to develop a clear and agreed view of business requirements, and supporting business units in articulating their commercial requirements
  • advise and provide professional guidance throughout the sourcing process, considering and evaluating a range of sourcing models
  • lead development of commercial input into business cases, demonstrating a project's benefits, value for money and risk
  • influence and shape future procurement policy and standards across the Met
  • identify opportunities to develop collaborative partnerships with suppliers
  • provide a procurement service to the Met which delivers demonstrable value-for-money and compliant goods and services contracts. You'll be part of a team of procurement professionals on larger procurement activities, including driving productivity opportunities with existing supply base to deliver further savings
  • responsible for negotiation with third parties where necessary, and have knowledge and experience relating to commercial negotiation techniques
  • understand and be accountable for sourcing compliance and frameworks

• ensuring effective support for commercial contract and supplier management within the category:
  • actively contribute to the management of the supply chain portfolio, including the development and implementation of supply chain and supplier relationship strategies
  • act as commercial lead, managing one or more contracts, ensuring effective stakeholder management, governance, escalation, risk management, issues resolution, financial management, change control and compliance
  • develop and maintain positive commercial relationships with the supply chain to maintain and enhance performance, improve service delivery and create additional value
  • assist with the setting of commercial key performance indicators (KPIs) covering supplier performance, spend, contract compliance, VFM, risks and opportunities and gather it for reporting at governance level
  • ensure the control and delivery of all spend through compliant contracts and make available through catalogues (or as otherwise appropriate) online
  • help drive innovation in contracts to demonstrate continuous improvement. Continually analyse contracts in order to develop and drive value adding initiatives
  • on an ongoing basis, track operation demand and patterns and introduce demand management mechanisms where applicable
  • work with, and support, commercial contract managers to ensure clarity, resilience and consistency across the team and wider commercial family
  • analysing and assessing supplier risk, understanding impact on contingency and business continuity, driving value for money whilst protecting MPS risk position
  • track and own risks relating to specific contracts, taking steps to mitigate commercial risks
  • seek out and integrating with key suppliers, developing relationships at all levels to promote commercial strategies across the Met

• build and maintain key relationships across the Met and with important external stakeholders:
  • develop effective working relationships with supplier organisations to establish appropriate governance and relationship arrangements, ensuring the effective management of clarifications and change requests
  • provision of commercial advice to stakeholders on all aspects of commercial
  • engage where required, with the relevant senior business lead, ensuring that business requirements are supported by category strategies
  • internal stakeholder will include Met colleagues who are users and buyers of the goods and services within the category, and relevant business units. Met colleagues within Corporate Services, such as finance and legal, and police staff and police officer colleagues
  • external stakeholders will include Mayors Office of Policing and Crime (MOPAC) officers, partner agency staff as required and appropriate level supplier relationships

• enable and develop the Met:
  • champion procurement best practice and working with others to create a proactive and intelligent function
  • contribute to the maintenance and updating of systems throughout the procurement lifecycle
  • manage catalogues and commercial content, and may be responsible for owning key aspects of this
  • work with key stakeholders to promote the use of catalogues
  • play a role in building capability of new starters and those on development programmes, for example students
  • mentor and provide guidance to junior members of the team
  • work within a secure environment upon sensitive projects as required