Procurement Associate Director
RSM · Bengaluru
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Role Purpose
The India Procurement Lead owns end-to-end procurement governance for the indirect and corporate spending of RSM US Integrated. The role will be responsible for ensuring that procurement is conducted through a consistent, transparent and commercially rigorous enterprise framework, aligned with RSM’s global procurement policies, standards and category strategies while appropriately reflecting India business, regulatory and market requirements.
Working closely with business and functional leaders across India, the Procurement Lead will help translate business requirements into effective sourcing strategies, identify opportunities for commercial optimization, manage supplier and contracting processes, and strengthen procurement governance and supplier performance.
This role is the single point of accountability for ensuring every India purchase is sourced against the right vendor, at the right price, and to the right quality standard, while staying inside the enterprise procurement framework. The role sits at the intersection of commercial efficiency and control. The Procurement Lead is expected to operate as a business partner to department heads across the firm, and as the India voice into global category strategy.
Key Responsibilities
1. Purchase Governance and Value Delivery
- Lead sourcing decision, vendor selection, and negotiated price for India procurement within a defined threshold for various segments, including but not limited to facilities, IT, travel, professional services, marketing, admin, and talent.
- Validate vendor selection is competitively and commercially justified, price is benchmarked against market or prior contract terms, and quality/service specification meets the requesting department's stated need.
- Promote an enterprise-wide approach to procurement, reducing fragmented or function-specific buying where aggregation can create better commercial or service outcomes.
2. Category Management and Sourcing
- Develop forward procurement pipelines with major functions to improve planning and reduce reactive or urgent sourcing.
- Run competitive sourcing (RFI/RFP/RFQ) for new vendor requirements above a defined value threshold; negotiate commercial terms directly for categories owned locally.
- Determine the appropriate sourcing route, including competitive tender, global agreement, preferred supplier, single-source or justified exception.
- Maintain a rolling savings and cost avoidance tracker, reported monthly to India leadership.
- Periodically benchmark material categories and contracts against market practices and available alternatives.
3. Global Alignment and Coordination
- Operate within the enterprise procurement policy, DOA framework, and approved vendor/supplier standards; do not create exceptions without sign-off from relevant stakeholders.
- Own India demand aggregation for globally negotiated categories: consolidate India requirements and feed them into global category planning cycles and negotiations, providing India-specific demand, supplier, pricing and market inputs.
- Monitor India's utilization and compliance against global contracts and negotiated agreements, and for purchases under global contracts, confirm the India entity has appropriate contractual coverage and that local requirements are addressed.
- Serve as India's representative in global procurement forums, surfacing India-specific constraints (regulatory, vendor landscape, currency) that global procurement strategy needs to account for.
- Escalate circumstances where global arrangements do not adequately meet India commercial, regulatory, or operational requirements.
4. Stakeholder Management
- Act as the single point of contact for functional heads raising procurement needs, translating business requirements into a compliant sourcing process without adding unnecessary friction.
- Provide stakeholders with market intelligence, supplier insights, commercial benchmarks and sourcing recommendations.
- Challenge and refine requirements where appropriate to improve commercial outcomes, avoid unnecessary spend or identify alternative solutions.
- Set and manage service level expectations with internal stakeholders for sourcing turnaround time, distinguishing standard requisitions from urgent/exception requests.
5. Vendor and Supplier Management & Contracting
- Establish a risk- and value-based supplier segmentation framework for India.
- Maintain the India approved vendor list, including onboarding due diligence (financial health, compliance checks, data security posture where relevant).
- Establish supplier KPIs, SLAs and performance-review mechanisms in partnership with business owners.
- Work closely with Legal, Finance, Information Security, Risk, Privacy and relevant business owners to coordinate the commercial contracting process.
- Ensure material supplier arrangements are appropriately documented through contracts, statements of work, purchase orders or other approved instruments.
- Establish a structured contract-renewal process to prevent automatic or poorly negotiated renewals.
- Facilitate appropriate commercial review of contract amendments, extensions and scope changes.
6. Compliance, Risk, and Reporting
- As custodian of the India procurement policy and framework, ensure all India procurement activity complies with enterprise policy, statutory requirements (GST, TDS, contract law as applicable), and any independence rules relevant to vendor selection.
- Produce a monthly procurement governance report to the India Country Leader and India Finance Leader.
- Maintain visibility of procurement exceptions, non-compliant spend and retrospective procurement activity, and drive corrective actions.
- Maintain an auditable trail for every sourcing decision (vendor comparison, price rationale, approval record) sufficient to withstand internal audit and control testing.
- Support internal audits, statutory reviews and other assurance activities relating to procurement and vendors.
Required Experience and Qualifications
- 14+ years in procurement, sourcing, or category management, with at least 3 to 5 years in an India GCC, shared services, or professional services environment.
- Demonstrated ownership of an approval/sign-off process, not just sourcing execution; experience operating within a formal framework.
- Working knowledge of indirect procurement categories: facilities, IT, travel, marketing, etc.
- Experience coordinating with a global or centralized procurement function while managing local execution; comfort operating in a dual accountability structure.
- Familiarity with P2P systems (Ariba, Coupa, or equivalent) and audit/control expectations (SOX/ICFR exposure is a plus).
- Strong stakeholder management skills; ability to hold a firm line on policy and price with senior internal stakeholders without becoming an obstacle to the business.
At RSM, we offer a competitive benefits and compensation package for all our people. We offer flexibility in your schedule, empowering you to balance life’s demands, while also maintaining your ability to serve clients. Learn more about our total rewards at https://rsmus.com/careers/india.html.
RSM does not tolerate discrimination and/or harassment based on race; colour; creed; sincerely held religious beliefs, practices or observances; sex (including pregnancy or disabilities related to nursing); gender (including gender identity and/or gender expression); sexual orientation; HIV Status; national origin; ancestry; familial or marital status; age; physical or mental disability; citizenship; political affiliation; medical condition (including family and medical leave); domestic violence victim status; past, current or prospective service in the Indian Armed Forces; Indian Armed Forces Veterans, and Indian Armed Forces Personnel status; pre-disposing genetic characteristics or any other characteristic protected under applicable provincial employment legislation.
Accommodation for applicants with disabilities is available upon request in connection with the recruitment process and/or employment/partnership. RSM is committed to providing equal opportunity and reasonable accommodation for people with disabilities. If you require a reasonable accommodation to complete an application, interview, or otherwise participate in the recruiting process, please send us an email at careers@rsmus.com.