Senior Procurement Manager

Are you ready to take your career to the next level in a dynamic and innovative pharmaceutical environment? We are seeking a strategic and experienced Senior Procurement Manager who can lead our sourcing efforts, drive supplier relationships, and contribute to improving patient outcomes. In this pivotal role, you will collaborate with cross-functional teams, implement supply chain efficiencies, and ensure compliance with industry regulations. This is an exciting opportunity to join Novo Nordisk as Senior Procurement Manager within regional responsibilities. The role is based in Istanbul, Türkiye and reporting to Senior Director, Finance and Operations.

The Position

As Senior Procurement Manager, you will play a crucial role in overseeing the strategic management of indirect spend across Business Area Middle East and Central Asia (BAMECA) and BAAF (Business Area Africa), with a focus on optimizing and leveraging procurement processes and expenditures. Moreover, you will be designing and executing category strategies across multiple geographies. You will be leading and developing a high-performing procurement team fostering a culture of continuous improvements and professional growth.  Your predominant aim is to procure the highest quality goods and services at the best possible commercial terms, levels of innovation, and sustainability, ultimately adding value to the BAMECA and BAAF and contributing to business growth.

Your key responsibilities include:

• Developing and implementing procurement strategies, refining procurement processes to align with changing market conditions and achieve business objectives
• Managing sourcing projects and supplier relationships, maintaining and enhancing relationships with existing suppliers to ensure ongoing quality of service and goods and innovation and developing and monitoring metrics to evaluate supplier performance to drive continuous improvement
• Ensuring compliance with policy and regulatory and driving cross-functional collaboration to align procurement initiatives with overarching business objectives.
• Identifying opportunities for process improvements and implementing best practices to enhance procurement efficiency, developing, implementing, and utilizing procurement tools and resources to facilitate day-to-day procurement activities and conducting benchmarking studies to compare procurement performance against industry standards and identify opportunities.
• Conducting market analysis to stay informed about industry trends and competitive landscape, enabling informed sourcing decisions, identifying, negotiating, and tracking cost-savings opportunities resulting from sourcing and procurement activities.

Qualifications

You hold a bachelor’s degree in business administration, Supply Chain Management, or a related field, with 8 years of relevant experience within Procurement or other related fields. Having an experience in pharmaceutical, healthcare, or similarly regulated sectors is a strong asset. You should have excellent command over both written and spoken English and you are an excellent communicator who can translate complex ideas into actionable plans for local teams.

• Your stakeholder management skills are strong, and you have good intercultural skills to engage with different cultures as well as different areas and functions of Novo Nordisk and have proven ability to build trust and collaboration remotely with country-based procurement leads.

• You have good persuasion skills and an ability to find pragmatic solutions with stakeholders and strong ethics and integrity, with a commitment to sustainable and responsible procurement.
• You have Projects management skills and the ability to solve tasks “through others” to successfully drive projects and solve issues across business area.
• You possess a high drive and can-do mindset while at the same time being pragmatic and keeping the bigger goals of Novo Nordisk in mind.
• You have an excellent understanding of procurement principles and practices, with a solid track record of aligning procurement strategies with business objectives and the ability to align procurement goals with Novo Nordisk’s broader business priorities, including cost, compliance, quality, sustainability, and innovation.
• You have strong people leadership skills, particularly in managing remote and culturally diverse teams and ability to coach, influence, and develop procurement professionals at various levels.
• You have the familiarity with digital procurement tools and technologies that enhance procurement.

• You are skilled in influencing without authority, especially important in matrix organizations like Novo Nordisk.

As a person you are a strategic, culturally fluent procurement leader with deep regional experience, capable of setting a bold vision, inspiring dispersed teams, and ensuring operational excellence in a highly regulated, purpose-driven global company like Novo Nordisk.

About the department

BAMECA (Business Area Middle East, Central Asia) and BAAF (Business Area Africa) are part of Region EM (Emerging Markets), and in total cover 76 countries. The business area office is in Istanbul.

Working at Novo Nordisk

Novo Nordisk is its people. We know that life is anything but linear, and balancing what is important at different stages of our career is never easy. That’s why we make room for diverse life situations, always putting people first. We value our employees for the unique skills they bring to the table, and we work continuously to bring out the best in them. Working at Novo Nordisk is working toward something bigger than ourselves, and it’s a collective effort. Novo Nordisk relies on the joint potential and collaboration of its more than 64,000 employees. Together, we go further. Together, we’re life changing

Contact

To submit your application, please upload your CV and motivational letter online (click on Apply and follow the instructions).

Internal candidates are kindly requested to inform their line Manager before applying.

Deadline

1 July 2025

We commit to an inclusive recruitment process and equality of opportunity for all our job applicants. 

At Novo Nordisk we recognize that it is no longer good enough to aspire to be the best company in the world. We need to aspire to be the best company for the world and we know that this is only possible with talented employees with diverse perspectives, backgrounds and cultures. We are therefore committed to creating an inclusive culture that celebrates the diversity of our employees, the patients we serve and communities we operate in. Together, we’re life changing.