Sr. Category Manager Professional Services

About the role

At Aristocrat, we excel where innovation meets excellence, creating world-class gaming experiences that bring happiness to millions worldwide. As a Sr. Category Manager – Professional Services, you will help craft our sourcing strategies, increase value, and ensure smooth delivery across a broad range of professional services. Join our driven team and support our mission of bringing happiness through the power of play. This role gives you a chance to create a significant impact by leading complex sourcing projects and building positive relationships with senior business collaborators.

Responsibilities

• Formulate and uphold complete category strategies for assigned Professional Services categories, aligned with business priorities and market conditions.
• Analyze internal spend, supplier landscapes, demand patterns, and external market intelligence to identify sourcing opportunities and category risks.
• Lead complex end-to-end sourcing initiatives, including collaborator discovery, requirements definition, market analysis, supplier evaluation, negotiation, selection, and implementation.
• Negotiate commercial terms, pricing models, service levels, and other key contractual conditions.
• Establish effective commercial frameworks for consulting, advisory, agency, legal, recruitment, and contingent labor engagements.
• Develop supplier segmentation and governance models based on spend, business criticality, performance, risk, and strategic importance.
• Serve as a trusted procurement advisor to senior leaders and functional collaborators across the organization.
• Ensure sourcing and contracting activities align with procurement policies, delegated authorities, legal requirements, and internal control standards.
• Use spend analytics, market intelligence, supplier data, and performance metrics to inform category decisions and evaluate outcomes.
• Provide category expertise, mentorship, and support to sourcing colleagues and business collaborators.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Supply Chain, Procurement, Finance, Business Administration, Economics, or a related field. An advanced degree or equivalent experience is preferred.
• Considerable background in strategic sourcing, procurement, category management, supplier management, or a related commercial role.
• Established capability in handling complex Professional Services categories like consulting, contingent labor, recruitment, legal, human resources, marketing, finance, audit, or other advisory services.
• Strong commercial and negotiation capability, with experience negotiating high-value master services agreements, statements of work, rate cards, and complex service arrangements.
• Ability to operate effectively in a fast-paced, changing, and globally distributed organization.
• Excellent communication, facilitation, presentation, and project-management skills.
• Strong skills in managing relationships with key individuals, with the ability to influence senior leaders and navigate competing priorities.
• Experience applying spend analytics, market intelligence, benchmarking, and supplier data to guide sourcing decisions.
• Working knowledge of supplier risk, privacy, information security, regulatory compliance, and third-party governance requirements.
• Strong financial competence and experience developing arguments, validating savings, and tracking realized value.