Supply Chain Operations Associate

ABOUT ONE ACRE FUND

Founded in 2006, One Acre Fund supplies smallholder farmers with the agricultural services they need to make their farms vastly more productive. We provide quality farm supplies on credit, delivered within walking distance of farmers’ homes, and agricultural training to improve harvests. We measure our success by our ability to make farmers more prosperous: On average, farmers harvest 50 percent more food after working with One Acre Fund.

We are growing quickly. We currently serve more than 800,000 farm families in Eastern and Southern Africa, with more than 7,500 full-time staff, and we aim to serve 1 million farm families by 2020.

JOB DESCRIPTION

One Acre Fund empowers farmers to grow their way out of hunger by delivering only the highest quality agricultural inputs & life-improving products on time every season. It’s the Global Sourcing team’s job to make those inputs readily available at the right price and quality when farmers need them.

One Acre Fund is growing quickly - we plan to more than triple our purchasing portfolio in the next 5 years - to make that happen, our Global Sourcing team is working hard to build efficient, streamlined systems and drive waste out of our key value chains. In 2019 alone, the team will spend over $70M on agricultural and life-improving inputs such as fertilizer, seed, and solar products sourced all over the world on behalf of 6 countries in East and Southern Africa. Doing this effectively will involve developing a flexible sourcing strategy, setting clear and measurable targets, holding the full supply chain team accountable to these ambitious targets using 100% accurate and transparent data, and implementing tight controls across the value chain to guarantee inputs make it from supplier to One Acre Fund's warehouse on time and at the best possible price.

We are seeking an exceptional individual to drive our goals around efficiency and effectiveness by supporting our continual improvement and cost-saving projects and working closely with key stakeholders to streamline processes across the global procurement function.

The overarching goals of this role are to:

• Drive waste out of the value chain through a set of focused, high-impact projects and process improvements
• Deliver a better system and data integrations across the supply chain team from demand planning to purchase to inventory management
• Improve controls environment to prevent and detect over-spend events and fraud
• Work with the Supply Chain Operations Manager to improve order accuracy to dramatically reduce excess inventory without risking stock-outs
• Make team key performance indicators visible to executors and organization leadership to justify investments in supply chain operations

The Supply Chain Operations Associate will play a critical role in supporting the development and implementation of major cost-saving and efficiency improving initiatives with a heavy focus on process automation, reducing redundancies, and better use of data. The ideal candidate has 4+ years of work experience in operations or strategic problem-solving role, with significant exposure to complex project management, process automation, and forecasting.

Specific responsibilities include, but are not limited to:

• Sourcing Data & Reporting management: Work with the sourcing data team to automate data processes and reports for better visibility into supply chain data across the organization. More specifically: 
• Drive 100% real-time, accurate data entry in SAP – this includes managing the data entry & reporting teams with clear targets performance metrics, quality checking supply chain team data regularly to catch errors, and streamlining data entry systems to reduce the risk of errors;
• Work with reporting unit to develop and manage a full suite of automated, easy-to-consume PowerBI and SSRS reports – these reports should provide the team with real-time visibility into performance against targets and empower country teams to make data-driven business decisions;
• Resolve and mitigate future pain points between procurement staff and their counterparts of finance and logistics – you align with cross-department stakeholders regularly to alleviate friction caused by messy data and ensure you have a single-source of truth for decision making.
• Implement long term improvements in our data and reporting systems - improve data collection tools, data reporting, system process integration, etc.

• Driving innovation in sourcing operations to eliminate waste: Work with Supply Chain Operations Manager to drive innovation across the global sourcing and local procurement teams by executing data-focused strategic projects and thinking creatively. Example projects include:
  • Invest in data-driven forecasting and new warehousing and sourcing strategies to minimize excess inventory in regional warehouses without risking stock-outs during key seasonal deliveries;
  • Automate processes, tools, and systems to reduce lead times & improve process visibility;
  • Improve data visibility to empower internal clients, approvers, and purchasers to make better-informed decisions;
  • Investigate projects that could save massive amounts of money such as investing in an e-tendering platform to solicit more competitive bids and make it easier to negotiate better pricing;
  • Identify methods for reducing repetition, spend, and manual movements from sourcing processes – may include collaborating with warehousing, last-mile-distribution, and finance teams in addition to immediate global sourcing colleagues. 
• Improve system integration & controls and use existing tools more effectively to tighten controls and simplify frequent tasks:
  • Streamline order processing and tracking tools to reduce repetition and manual data entry;
  • Identify opportunities to move processes into existing platforms – for example, you’ll be responsible for moving cash forecasting into SAP, implementing an e-tendering platform, and streamlining vendor and contract management processes through SAP;
  • Manage day-day issue resolution and ticket generation for SAP request portal;
  • Identify and close controls gaps in sourcing processes with buy-in from team leadership and executors to reduce possible fraud or over-spend events;
  • Report on controls to systems and organizational leadership.
  • Integrate supplier performance & database management capabilities into data systems

• Capacity building: 
  • Learn systems and processes across sourcing units in order to fill mission-critical gaps as needed;
  • Run capacity building workshops and training across the Sourcing team focused on hard skills (i.e. Microsoft suite, data presentation skills, writing for clarity, etc.);
  • Work with sourcing managers to evaluate hard-skills gaps on their team required for proper succession planning and design training courses to help staff across the sourcing team master those skills;
  • Identify strong talent pools to support with recruitment at all job grades.

CAREER GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT

We have a strong culture of constant learning and we invest in developing our people. You’ll have weekly check-ins with your manager, access to mentorship and training programs, and regular feedback on your performance. We hold career reviews every six months and set aside time to discuss your aspirations and career goals. You’ll have the opportunity to shape a growing organization and build a rewarding long-term career.

QUALIFICATIONS

We are seeking exceptional candidates with 4+ years of work experience, top-performing academic background, a love for data, and a passion for reducing waste across supply chain operations. Prior operations or consulting experience preferred but not required if the candidate has a track record of independent problem solving and innovation in a fast-growing organization. Candidates who fit the following criteria are strongly encouraged to apply:

• Background:
  • Work experience in a demanding professional environment, preferably in positions where frequent cross-department communication was required
  • Experience in operations, consulting, manufacturing, or supply chain preferred
  • Track record of independent problem solving and delivering results.
  • Proven ability to set and meet targets.
  • Leadership experience at work or outside of work.
  • Experience working in a multicultural workplace preferred.
• Professional Skills
  • Extremely strong data and analytical skills; advanced Excel required experience working in SAP preferred
  • Incredible attention to detail – you can pick out a mistake in a data set from a mile away
  • Creativity and strong problem-solving skills. You don’t take no for an answer and constantly look for alternative solutions to problems. 
  • Excellent stakeholder coordination skills – you’re a strong writer and verbal communicator who can negotiate with internal clients and be persuasive but who is also humble and open to other viewpoints. 
  • Professional maturity and ability to stay calm under pressure
  • Strong quantitative reasoning skills – you can QC contracts, POs, and orders effectively without support
  • Strong work ethic and ability to handle a demanding, high-pressure work environment as well as a strong sense of humility, ethics, and integrity 
• Areas of interest
  • You love data – you eat data for breakfast. Empowering organizations, teams, and individuals to use data to make better business decisions is what gets you out of bed in the morning. Bringing real-time, accurate data to the global sourcing team at One Acre Fund is your calling. 
  • Passion for operations, building scalable and efficient systems and solving problems in a difficult operating environment
  • You are passionate about delivering world-class customer service – you put customers first in all that you do and understand the importance of building agile processes and systems that will best serve your clients
• Top-performing academic background
• Language: English required, French and Swahili preferred

PREFERRED START DATE

As soon as possible

JOB LOCATION

Nairobi, Kenya 

COMPENSATION

Commensurate with experience

DURATION

Full-time job

BENEFITS 

Health insurance paid time off

SPONSOR INTERNATIONAL CANDIDATES

Yes. East Africans are strongly encouraged to apply.

One Acre Fund never asks candidates to pay any money or pay for tests at any stage of the interview process. Official One Acre Fund emails will always arrive from an @oneacrefund.org address. Please report any suspicious communication here.