Job Title:   Market Category Specialist, Marketing – Customer

Organization: Diageo

Duty Station: Kampala, Uganda

About Organisation:

Diageo is the world’s leading premium drinks business with an outstanding collection of beverage alcohol brands across spirits, beer and wine. These brands include Johnnie Walker, Crown Royal, J&B, Windsor, Buchanan’s and Bushmills whiskies, Smirnoff, Ciroc and Ketel One vodkas, Baileys, Captain Morgan, Tanqueray and Guinness.

About the Function

Our Procurement team is at the forefront of innovation, consistently seeking new ways to help our business, people, and beloved brands thrive. We are committed to maximizing the £12 billion+ we invest annually, ensuring premium quality while fostering sustainable value and growth. Together, we are shaping services, partnerships, and innovations to meet future needs.

Delivering exceptional end-to-end value across our supply chain, our procurement team offers innovative supplier solutions. We are advancing our ‘Society 2030: Spirit of Progress’ initiative with suppliers and agency partners to create a more sustainable world. Wherever you choose to develop your career within Diageo, you’ll find support and inspiration in our inclusive culture.

Job Summary:

• As a Market Category Specialist within Marketing (specifically BTL), you will deliver procurement outcomes for Diageo through effective business partnering and collaboration across Procurement. Key responsibilities include:
• Applying strategic procurement excellence by creating or supporting category strategies using Diageo’s best practices.
• Leading or supporting sourcing activities for experiential and POS-related spend procured in market.
• Supporting end-to-end execution of marketing category strategies alongside global professionals.
• Developing subject-matter expertise for specific spend categories.
• Working dynamically across categories in flexible resource pools to drive accelerated career development.
• You will actively participate in a global community of procurement professionals in one or more spend categories—joining regular meetings, aligning around strategy, developing capabilities & expertise, and sharing best practices.

Key Duties and Responsibilities:

General

• Applied expertise. Build and grow expertise Below the Line (BTL) Marketing category, including understanding of supply markets, suppliers, stakeholders and how to negotiate supply and demand.  Become a subject-matter expert and share with others in a global community of category professionals.  Apply expertise and standards to identify and win new value for Diageo.
• Category excellence. Lead development of best in class market data and knowledge, category strategies and sourcing events by applying Diageo standards for category excellence.  Contribute to improvement of existing and development of new tools & techniques.

Category strategy

• Business partnering. In close alignment with category managers, develop and grow relationships with stakeholders, partners and suppliers for deeper insights into needs and capabilities; articulate requirements and deliver insights for greater value from stakeholder collaboration.
• Strategy development. For one or more spend categories, support development and evolution of category strategies by (1) capturing, articulating and confirming business requirements; (2) researching and analyzing market dynamics; and (3) assessing opportunities and proposing solutions.
• Best in class capabilities. Generate insights and opportunities from internal and external benchmarking, develop cost models to consider scenarios with suppliers and stakeholders and build & evolve analytics capabilities that allow regular review and improvement of strategies.
• Strategy execution. Support end to end execution of category strategies across geographical and organizational boundaries.  Track and monitor progress against performance goals, providing detailed, monthly KPI data (including reconciliation to category team tracking projects, savings, supplier performance, etc.).  Work in close collaboration with other Market colleagues aligned behind relevant strategies and facilitate escalations.
• Support to Global CoEs. Support Global CoEs with strategy development, including for CM4 (global agreements), CM3 (above-region leverage) and CM2 (above-market leverage), as required.  Especially, ensure that Market and local market data and requirements are addressed fully.

Sourcing

• Market sourcing. Execute sourcing activities for Below the Line related service. – Experiential, POS etc.
• Market contracting. For relevant sourcing projects, support effective planning, preparation and application of the Negotiation Toolkit.  Support category managers in negotiating and closing Marketing contracts.  Execute contracts into the system.  Handle contracts and contract compliance (Diageo stakeholder compliance and Supplier compliance) through contract lifecycles.

Risk management

• Mitigate strategic risks. As part of category strategy execution, identify, record and follow-up risk mitigations in line with category strategies and best practice.
• Mitigate sourcing risks. Identify corporate, supply, supplier and other risks associated with sourcing activities, put mitigations in place and execute them, engaging all relevant stakeholders, partners and suppliers to ensure the mitigations are successful.
• Apply and improve tools & techniques. Apply Diageo best practice standard, ensuring the most recent and relevant approaches are always applied; use formal governance and peer review to ensure the quality and efficacy of risk management; contribute to development of standards.

Supplier relationship management

• Supplier relationship. Establish standards, ways of working and trust relationships with market suppliers and agencies in relevant categories; ensure Diageo best practices are applied and that there is a good foundation for strong performance, risk mitigation and rapid resolution of issues.
• Supplier performance. Set KPIs, driving consistency across suppliers and markets, improving the value of data generated and applied and liaise with Supply sites for resolution of called out issues.
• Supplier development. In line with Procurement strategic supplier strategies, collaborate with suppliers to unlock breakthrough opportunities for the business; stimulate supplier capabilities to generate ideas for the future.

Leadership Capabilities

• Win through Execution: Adapt plans in changing environments scanning simplification opportunities.
• Inspire through Purpose: Creatively think outside the box taking thoughtful risks amplifying Diageo’s purpose.
• Shape the Future: Challenge status quo developing ambitious plans driving collaboration towards shared visions.
• Invest in Talent: Encourage diversity stretching yourself & others at Diageo.

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Qualifications, Skills and Experience:

• Graduate or equivalent qualification and member of professional body, e.g., CIPS
• Minimum 2 – 3 years’ experience in Procurement, Experiential Marketing agency, Marketing, Below the Line Marketing, FMCG Commercial or other relevant role.
• Demonstrated performance in projects and in cross-market teams, experience developing and implementing Marketing category and procurement strategies, handling and negotiating with suppliers
• Strong analytical and financial awareness including a strong understanding of AOP requirements and financial goals & value drivers relevant to the categories in scope
• Track record of generating insights to influence decision-making; good commercial acumen
• Good systems knowledge (esp. SAP, PRDM, M/S Office, E-collaborate or similar systems & tools)
• Strong verbal, written and presentation; strong social skills
• Proven track record of consistent performance and delivery
• The Preferred candidate is person with strong BTL agency experience willing pivot to a Marketing procurement role leading sourcing and category management for BTL related spend.