Vice President of Procurement

The Business

Our client is one of the largest wood product producers and distributors in the US and among North America's top buyers of forest products, purchasing lumber and panel products directly from mills across multiple locations. This seat manages annual spend in the billions, making it one of the biggest procurement roles in the industry.

Have you got what it takes to succeed The following information should be read carefully by all candidates.

This is a newly reshaped VP role sitting inside a large, sophisticated procurement organization. The company is not asking this leader to be the best trader in the room. It is asking this leader to build the next generation of traders and buyers, as the current bench of experienced commodity talent is aging out across the entire industry and there is no pipeline behind it.

The Opportunity

This role takes ownership of a team of roughly 25, structured under 3 director-level direct reports, each managing 8-15 people, along with direct, mill-level purchasing relationships across the company's core wood products categories, including lumber, panels, and other forest products, domestic and international. Landed cost and working capital performance across the buying and replenishment function fall under this leader's ownership, without sacrificing quality or reliability of supply, while building and formalizing a training and development pipeline for buyers and traders, including people who may come from outside the industry entirely.

On the supplier side, this role designs and runs vendor quotation evaluation, national and regional program negotiation, category reviews, supplier performance tracking, and program compliance, while identifying and capturing cost-reduction opportunities through smarter buying patterns and supply channels, including lumber reload and vendor-managed inventory (VMI) programs. Sourcing of inbound truck and rail freight, where the company manages it directly, falls within scope as well, applying the same cost and reliability lens as core product buying, along with preparing and presenting market reports and supply chain performance updates to senior executive leadership.

Cross-functional partnership with logistics, finance, and sales leadership spans a large, matrixed organization with a national and international footprint, and the role represents the function with mills, operators, and customers in the field, roughly 30% of the time. xhyhwjd

Success in this role looks like a visible, credible bench of developed buyers and traders within 2-3 years, and strong, self-built relationships with mills and key accounts, even without industry tenure going in. It means a structured, disciplined function that still respects and channels the personalities and instincts that make good traders good, and trusted cross-functional partner status across a large organization, not just within the buying function.

What You Will Need to Be Successful

• Proven leadership of a team of 20+ people, with several leaders reporting up through you
• A track record of training, developing, and promoting people
• History of cross-functional leadership, operating inside a large, multi-stakeholder, matrixed organization
• Strong negotiation skills and experience running a formal vendor evaluation and supplier-alignment process, including national or regional program negotiations
• Strategic and process systems thinking beyond the transaction
• Ability to lead a Cultural Bridge: harnessing the cowboy while installing the discipline