Consultant

Your Opportunity:

The Contract Specialist is a professional position in the Community & Continuing Care Contracting department. This position provides support and expert advice to ALA stakeholders on all aspects of contracting, procurement, and strategic business decisions impacting contracts with vendors supplying goods and services to ALA. The position will also be tasked to work with senior management to conduct unique/specialized procurements and develop contracts for complex business arrangements.

Description:

The position will provide instructional task advice, management and supervision, to Contract Coordinators and other contracting professionals conducting competitive bidding processes to assist with standardizing work methods, protocols, and procedures related to Sourcing/Contracting and creating documents that will bind ALA to contractual commitments. A component of this work includes knowledge sharing sessions which involves the development of educational tools/resources for purposes of facilitating periodic training sessions for contracting staff relating to industry best practices in competitive bidding and contracting. The position will also have a role with project management that extends into planning of Sourcing/Contracting projects, implementation/conversion of contracts that are provincial in scope impacting end-users in all geographic areas of the province. This may involve developing project strategy, plan and schedule; monitoring project progress against standards, timelines, plans and budgets; and managing project resources in a matrix organization structure. The Category Specialist will act as a subject matter expert having in-depth knowledge with respect to the development of contracting strategies, Request for Proposal documents, and resulting contracts that are of significant value, complexity, typically longer term and provincial in scope. The position will lead the contract develop/negotiation/writing process consulting with various ALA departments. The work product that this individual and team of direct reports is required to produce is expected to be of high quality, with attention to detail, as for the consequences of the work product will impact budgets (positively or negatively) in the order of magnitude of millions of dollars.

Bachelor of Commerce, or other bachelor’s degree with additional business or legal training. MBA is preferred. Five years of experience in contracting or sourcing, preferably in an organization of significant size, complexity and diversity. Knowledge and demonstrated application of business strategy, planning, policy development, modelling concepts, and project management. Excellent quantitative and qualitative analytical and problem-solving skills. Deep knowledge of contract negotiations. Progressive experience writing contracts. Contract management experience. Health Care Supply Chain or Project Management courses an asset. Equivalencies of education and experience will be considered.

Experience in concluding and implementing large dollar-value business transactions that deliver effective business solutions on complex matters to users. Effective communicator with strong organizational skills, and ability to influence others. Ability to relay or explain complex issues or difficult situations using skills in negotiation, facilitation and conflict resolution. Ability to develop and facilitate presentations to convey information or transfer knowledge. Ability to get buy-in and commitment from both internal external stakeholders. Ability to prioritize competing responsibilities. Ability to understand, use, and mentor staff on financial analysis concepts (, total cost of ownership, make versus lease versus buy, NPV, ROI). Ability to develop actionable recommendations and implementation plans. Leadership skills, including demonstrated ability and comfort with decision making responsibilities, coaching and teaching, and the ability to inspire and build confidence in others. Good management and development/teaching skills as advanced staff development is an important element of this position to continue building a high performing team of contracting professionals.

Ability to manage diverse human, financial and physical resources in a changing and multifaceted environment with diverse, complex and sensitive issues. Strong negotiation skills based on a thorough understanding of sales/marketing practices, market intelligence gained through fact-based empirical research. Interprets user needs, assesses requirements and identifies solutions to complex, time-sensitive and non-standard issues.