Senior Buyer

Responsibilities

• Lead, coach, and prioritize work for a team of Buyers supporting multiple geothermal plants, balance workload across routine demand, outages, and capital maintenance projects.
• Serve as escalation point for urgent plant needs, forced outages, and procurement issues; coordinate solutions with Plant teams, Supply Chain/Logistics, Strategic Sourcing, and the Procurement Manager.
• Provide onboarding, SOP guidance, and ongoing training for Buyers; reinforce standard work, internal controls, and best practices.
• Support performance management through KPI tracking, cycle-time/throughput monitoring, and regular coaching/feedback.
• Execute and oversee procurement of MRO materials, critical rotating equipment/spares, and specialty geothermal services (wellfield, turbines, heat exchangers, brine systems, electrical and I&C), including contracted maintenance and outage services.
• Convert requisitions into compliant, accurate Purchase Orders in SAP (S/4HANA), ensuring correct pricing, scope, delivery terms, account assignment, and required documentation.
• Partner with Plant Managers, Maintenance Planners/Schedulers, Reliability Engineers, and Operations to validate requisition quality (scope, urgency, and correct material/service classification) and improve front-end planning inputs.
• Track procurement cycle time and separate procurement lead-time drivers from planning/maintenance delays; remove constraints and improve schedule adherence.
• Support outage planning and quarterly/long-range maintenance look-aheads by surfacing long-lead material/service risks and executing sourcing and expediting plans.
• Ensure buying aligns with approved vendor lists, MSAs, negotiated pricing, and sourcing strategies; prepare and issue RFQs, support competitive bids, and document supplier evaluations as required.
• Couple with Strategic Sourcing on new vendor onboarding, sole/limited-source justifications, OEM relationships, and long-lead equipment.

Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in Supply Chain, Business, Engineering, or related field (or equivalent experience).
• 7+ years of procurement or supply chain experience, including O&M or industrial operations; experience supporting power generation, oil & gas, geothermal, utilities, or heavy industrial environments.
• 2+ years in a lead, senior buyer, or supervisory role with demonstrated ability to set priorities, coach others, and drive consistent use of standard processes and controls.
• Demonstrated commercial expertise, including complex negotiations and contractual risk evaluation, including total cost thinking, supplier evaluation, Proven ability to lead teams and influence senior and cross-functional stakeholders.
• Experience operating effectively beyond formal authority. High leadership maturity and decisiveness.
• Advanced working knowledge of SAP (S/4HANA preferred) and ERP/MRP purchasing processes, with strong attention to master data and transaction accuracy.
• Strong negotiation, RFQ, and contract/commercial skills; ability to apply total cost thinking and document sourcing decisions.
• Strong prioritization under operational pressure; ability to respond effectively during outages and time-critical plant needs.
• Clear written and verbal communication with a plant-focused customer mindset; ability to challenge poor requisition quality constructively and drive alignment.
• High attention to detail, strong organizational skills, and the ability to multi-task and meet deadlines; proficiency in Microsoft Office (Excel, Word, PowerPoint).