Director, Global Strategic Sourcing, Vendor Performance & Governance – GWW - US

The Director, Global Strategic Sourcing, Vendor Performance & Governance provides enterprise leadership for vendor compliance, supplier and transportation carrier performance management, strategic sourcing, and supplier risk management.

The primary responsibility of this position is to establish and lead a comprehensive vendor compliance, supplier performance, and transportation carrier performance program that improves execution, strengthens accountability, reduces operational and financial leakage, and protects customer service. The Director will define supplier and carrier requirements, establish performance standards, implement scorecards, lead corrective action programs, govern chargeback and cost recovery processes, and create clear visibility into supplier and carrier performance across the organization.

The Director will also lead selected strategic sourcing initiatives and support the development of category and supplier strategies that improve total cost of ownership, strengthen supply continuity, reduce risk, and create sustainable enterprise value. This includes market analysis, supplier selection, competitive sourcing events, negotiation, contracting, supplier onboarding, and strategic supplier relationship management.

Vendor Compliance  & Governance

• Develop and lead the enterprise Vendor Compliance Program, including its strategy, governance structure, policies, standards, operating procedures, and performance expectations.

• Establish clearly defined supplier requirements related to purchase order execution, order confirmation, delivery performance, appointment compliance, packaging, labeling, product quality, documentation, invoicing, data accuracy, and other applicable operating standards.

• Create and maintain the vendor compliance manual, supplier guidelines, standard operating procedures, and supporting documentation.

• Ensure vendor requirements are measurable, operationally attainable, clearly communicated, and consistently applied across suppliers, categories, and distribution locations.

• Establish decision rights, ownership, approval processes, exception management, and escalation protocols for vendor compliance matters.

• Partner with Legal, Finance, Procurement, Supply Chain, and Operations to incorporate appropriate supplier requirements, service levels, reporting obligations, remedies, and compliance provisions into supplier agreements.

• Lead supplier and internal stakeholder education regarding vendor standards, policy changes, compliance responsibilities, and performance expectations

Strategic Sourcing & Category Leadership

• Lead end-to-end global sourcing initiatives including market intelligence, supplier selection, RFx execution, and complex negotiations.

• Develop multi-year category strategies focused on total cost of ownership (TCO), supply resilience, innovation, and sustainability.

• Apply advanced sourcing methodologies including should-cost modeling, clean-sheet analysis, and global benchmarking.

• Lead enterprise-level negotiations and supplier contracting across key global categories.

Supplier Performance Management

• Design, implement, and lead an enterprise supplier performance management framework that provides objective, timely, and actionable visibility into supplier execution.

• Establish supplier scorecards, performance standards, reporting schedules, and governance processes aligned with business, customer, financial, and operational requirements.

• Define and govern key supplier performance indicators, including On-Time In-Full, fill rate, purchase order acceptance and confirmation, delivery and appointment adherence, lead-time compliance, product quality, packaging and labeling compliance, invoice accuracy, data accuracy, supplier responsiveness, corrective action completion and effectiveness, and overall vendor compliance.

• Establish consistent metric definitions, data sources, calculation methodologies, performance thresholds, reporting frequencies, and ownership.

• Develop supplier segmentation models based on supplier criticality, spend, risk, performance, operational impact, and customer importance.

• Align supplier governance and review requirements with the appropriate supplier segment.

• Lead supplier performance reviews, executive business reviews, and accountability discussions for strategic, critical, and underperforming suppliers.

• Identify trends, emerging risks, recurring issues, and performance gaps requiring corrective action or executive intervention.

Transportation Carrier Performance Management

• Establish and lead an enterprise transportation carrier performance management framework covering inbound, outbound, dedicated, parcel, less-than-truckload, truckload, and other applicable transportation services.

• Define and govern carrier scorecards, service expectations, data standards, review cadence, and escalation protocols in partnership with Transportation, Distribution, Finance, Procurement, and Business Technology.

• Measure and manage key carrier performance indicators, including on-time pickup, on-time delivery, tender acceptance, appointment adherence, transit-time performance, claims frequency and severity, damage rates, accessorial charges, freight invoice accuracy, tracking compliance, responsiveness, and corrective action closure.

• Lead carrier performance reviews and executive business reviews for strategic, critical, and underperforming transportation providers.

• Partner with Transportation and Finance to identify avoidable freight cost, accessorial leakage, service failures, claims exposure, and recovery opportunities.

• Establish corrective action and escalation processes for recurring carrier performance failures, including root-cause analysis, recovery plans, accountable owners, milestones, and sustained performance validation.

• Promote continuous improvement with carriers to improve reliability, reduce damage and claims, strengthen appointment performance, and enhance end-to-end customer service.

Supplier Accountability and Corrective Action

• Establish a disciplined supplier accountability process for addressing performance deficiencies, recurring compliance failures, and unresolved operational issues.

• Develop standardized processes for supplier corrective action requests, root-cause analysis, remediation planning, escalation, validation, closure, and sustained performance monitoring.

• Require suppliers to submit timely corrective action plans with clearly defined causes, actions, accountable owners, milestones, completion dates, and measurable outcomes.

• Lead supplier accountability discussions when performance falls below established service, quality, delivery, invoicing, data, or compliance requirements.

• Partner with internal stakeholders and suppliers to remove barriers, resolve performance gaps, and implement sustainable improvements.

• Establish escalation criteria for critical, recurring, or financially significant supplier failures.

• Engage appropriate internal and supplier leadership when corrective actions are delayed or ineffective.

• Monitor corrective actions through completion and validate that implemented changes have produced sustained performance improvement.

• Identify systemic issues affecting multiple suppliers, categories, or operating locations and lead broader process improvement initiatives.

• Maintain clear documentation of performance issues, root causes, corrective actions, financial impact, and final resolution.

Chargeback Administration and Cost Recovery

• Provide strategic leadership and governance for supplier chargeback and cost recovery programs associated with vendor non-compliance.

• Establish clear, objective, contractually supported, and consistently applied chargeback policies.

• Identify sources of operational and financial leakage resulting from supplier non-compliance, including receiving delays, missed appointments, shortages, damaged or nonconforming products, improper packaging or labeling, special handling, inaccurate documentation, invoice discrepancies, and other avoidable supplier-caused expenses.

• Partner with Finance, Procurement, Distribution, Transportation, and Business Technology to establish reliable processes for documenting, validating, approving, communicating, and recovering applicable costs.

• Establish appropriate controls for chargeback issuance, exceptions, disputes, credits, recovery, and financial reconciliation.

• Develop and govern a supplier dispute resolution process that supports fairness, transparency, commercial relationships, and timely resolution.

• Monitor chargeback issuance, disputes, recoveries, open balances, credits, aging, and trends.

• Provide leadership with visibility into compliance-related costs, recovery performance, recurring supplier issues, and operational improvement opportunities.

• Ensure chargeback data is used to identify root causes and improve supplier behavior, rather than functioning solely as a financial recovery mechanism.

• Lead initiatives to reduce the underlying events that create operational costs and supplier chargebacks.

Digital Procurement, Analytics & Transformation 

• Champion Supply Chain digitization, leveraging ERP, analytics, and supplier collaboration platforms.

• Drive adoption of data-driven decision-making through advanced dashboards, KPIs, and predictive analytics.

• Partner with IT to implement system enhancements and enable end-to-end procurement visibility and automation.

Leadership & Organizational Development

• Lead and develop a high-performing global procurement and sourcing organization, including regional and category leaders.

• Build scalable capabilities in strategic sourcing, negotiation, analytics, and supplier management.

• Foster a culture of accountability, continuous improvement, and cross-functional collaboration.

Qualifications, Experience & Skills

• Bachelor’s degree in Supply Chain, Business, Finance, or related field required

• MBA or advanced degree strongly preferred

• APICS / ASCM (e.g., CSCP), Lean, or Six Sigma certifications preferred

• 12–15+ years of progressive leadership experience in procurement, strategic sourcing, or supply chain within a global environment

• Minimum 8+ years of people leadership, including leading leaders and global teams

• Proven experience managing procurement across multi-DC, regional, or global distribution networks

• Demonstrated success leading procurement transformation and enterprise sourcing initiatives

• Experience in distribution, food service, hospitality, or similarly complex supply chain environments preferred

• Strong executive presence with the ability to influence C-suite and cross-functional leadership

• Deep expertise in:

• Global procurement strategy and category management

• Strategic sourcing and supplier negotiations

• Financial levers including margin, pricing, and working capital

• IBP / S&OP and demand-driven supply models

• Hands-on experience with:

• ERP systems (SAP, Oracle, Dynamics, etc.)

• Demand planning / CPM tools (e.g., Tagetik)

• Procurement analytics and supplier performance tools

• Strong change leadership, transformation, and organizational design capability