Vendor Management; IT Project Management Specialist

Department

STRATEGIC SERVICES (UA-STS-IUBLA)

Department Specific Responsibilities

• Provides leadership and strategic direction of client relations division to align with strategic and operational objectives of Indiana University and University Information Technology Services.
• Responsible for building and managing relationships with product suppliers and services, ensuring obligations and cost-effectiveness are met contributing to organizational efficiency, productivity and success.
• Establishes, evaluates and improves internal and external policies, standards, workflow processes, and templates for client interaction for UITS in alignment with governance standards.
• Develops strong relationships with IT managers, business owners, and procurement to better support enterprise objectives, influence key stakeholders, and jointly develop strategic sourcing strategies while acting as the interface between the clients and the teams.
• Collaborates with the CTO, the Associate VP for Strategic Services, Contracts Department, Purchasing Department, and Business Relationship Managers to assist with developing statements of work (SOWs), service level agreements (SLAs) and understand any current requests for information (RFIs), requests for quotations (RFQs), and requests for proposals (RFPs) that are in the pipeline.
• Evaluates potential suppliers using criteria such as industry experience, capacity, quality standards, and financial stability.
• Analyzes the University's software usage to determine cost-effectiveness and work with vendors to include incentives and remedies where appropriate.
• Manages factors such as delivery reliability, quality, and accuracy of estimates and invoices.
• Responsible for tracking, analyzing, and generating vendor performance reports to share with executive leaders, stakeholders, and/or project partners.
• Keeps partners informed on developments in the organization or changes in market conditions that might affect demand for products or services.
• Successfully and safely manages data as well as an ongoing knowledge base of negotiating strategies, best practices, personnel/teams, etc. Work with teams (Cybersecurity, Audit, Compliance, HR, Purchasing, Contracts) to ensure that vendors are performing in accordance with existing requirements and meeting SLA terms through audit process.

• Leads planning and implementation of high-level, complex IT projects involving university staff from different teams and external partners on interrelated project tasks.
• Determines and evaluates strategic university needs; creates and adjusts projects as necessary.
• Designs, creates, executes, and manages high-level project work plans and workflow documents; establishes project timelines and revises as appropriate to meet changing needs and requirements.
• Manages budget and monitors progress of projects at highest levels to ensure that quality and cost constraints are met.
• Responsible for reporting and documenting project milestones to share with leaders, stakeholders, and/or project partners.
• Makes recommendations to leadership to improve project management approaches and processes.
• Researches and stays up-to-date with IT project management best practices, approaches, and trends.
• Creates and fosters relationships with key project stakeholders and service owners to ensure functional user expectations and requirements are articulated and integrated.
• Often provides guidance and support to less experienced peers.

Combinations of related education and experience may be considered. Education beyond the minimum required may be substituted for work experience. Work experience beyond the minimum required may be substituted for education.

• Bachelor's degree in related field

• 7 years technical project management experience

• 5 years of demonstrated experience with vendor management, contract negotiations, and purchasing
• 5 years of experience in IT space with demonstrated growth
• 5 years of demonstrated experience with collaborating and working with cross-functional teams for projects

• Project Management Professional (PMP)…