{"id":2839452,"url":"https://alion.io/job/northwestern-mutual-vp-procurement-technology-and-digital","title":"VP Procurement - Technology and Digital","company":{"id":690951,"name":"Northwestern Mutual","domain":"northwesternmutual.com","url":"https://alion.io/company/northwesternmutual","size_band":"501-1000","is_staffing_agency":false,"employer_type":"direct","is_intermediary":false,"listed_via":null,"ats_vendor":"Workday","truth_index":null},"role":"Operations","role_family":"Operations","seniority":"head","employment_type":"full_time","work_mode":"on_site","remote_scope":null,"remote_scope_basis":null,"remote_working_hours":null,"hiring_geo_confidence":"structured","locations":["Milwaukee, United States"],"countries":["US"],"hiring_countries":[],"hiring_countries_total":0,"salary":{"min":176000,"max":264000,"currency":"USD","period":"year","gross":null,"usd_annual":264000},"salary_estimate":null,"experience_years_min":15,"visa_sponsorship":false,"relocation_package":false,"has_equity":false,"technologies":[{"name":"Agile","optional":false}],"status":"live","first_seen_at":"2026-09-25T00:00:00Z","employer_posted_date":"2026-09-25","last_verified_at":"2026-11-01T13:26:22Z","board_verified":true,"closed_at":null,"days_open":37,"trust":{"level":"ok","repost_count":null,"flags":[],"days_open":37},"description":"Summary\nThe Vice President of Finance for Technology and Digital Procurement leads enterprise-wide sourcing, vendor strategy, and commercial negotiations across technology domains, with a strong emphasis on building and sustaining strategic relationships with CIO/CDO and senior technology leaders. This role acts as a trusted partner to IT leadership, aligning procurement strategy with technology roadmaps, innovation goals, and business outcomes.\nKey Responsibilities\nStrategic CIO/CDO Partnership\nServe as the primary procurement strategic partner and day-to-day relationship leader for the CIO, CDO, and senior technology executives.\nPartner with IT leaders to translate technology strategy and roadmaps into multi-year category strategies, sourcing plans, and vendor ecosystem decisions.\nBuild and sustain executive-level trust through proactive engagement, transparent governance, and clear articulation of value, risk, and tradeoffs.\nShape technology demand and investment decisions by leading early engagement and intake with IT teams-clarifying business outcomes, requirements, timelines, and budget assumptions before sourcing begins.\nEstablish and run joint operating rhythms with CIO/CDO organizations (quarterly business reviews, pipeline reviews, and steering committees) to drive decisions, remove blockers, and maintain alignment.\nDefine shared success metrics with IT (cost, time-to-contract, risk posture, service performance, innovation outcomes) and provide executive-ready reporting on progress and realized value.\nBroker alignment across IT, Finance, Legal, Risk, Privacy, and Information Security to ensure deals are executable and balanced across value, compliance, and operational constraints.\nOwn executive escalation paths and conflict resolution for sourcing decisions, supplier performance issues, and commercial disputes-ensuring fast, well-governed outcomes.\nBring external market intelligence to CIO/CDO leaders (pricing benchmarks, contract terms, emerging vendors, platform shifts) and curate executive-level vendor engagement to accelerate innovation and modernization.\nLead change management for new procurement operating models, standards, and policies within technology teams through stakeholder communications, training, and adoption measurement.\nEstablish and manage business facing service level agreements, OKRs, and KPIs that drive success for EE&T. \nTechnology Procurement Leadership\nSet the enterprise technology procurement vision and multi-year strategy across software, cloud, infrastructure, SaaS, data, cybersecurity, and emerging technologies-aligned to CIO/CDO priorities and business outcomes.\nOwn technology commercial governance and portfolio outcomes, including executive prioritization, financial stewardship (budget impact, TCO), and risk posture across major programs and strategic suppliers.\nLead (and when appropriate, personally conduct) the most complex, high-value negotiations and approvals-setting deal strategy, ensuring contract structures and commercial models (subscription, consumption-based, enterprise agreements) protect the enterprise and enable speed, innovation, and scalability.\nSupplier Lifecycle Management\nDefine and lead the enterprise technology supplier lifecycle strategy including segmentation, preferred partner models, and build/buy/partner recommendations.\nEstablish executive governance with strategic suppliers through joint business planning and QBRs-driving roadmap alignment, performance commitments, innovation agendas, and supplier issue resolution.\nOptimize enterprise value while managing concentration, operational, and third-party risk-ensuring resilience, contractual protections, and exit/transition readiness across critical vendors.\nArchitect a healthy vendor ecosystem by maintaining competitive tension, commercial optionality, and a clear rationalization roadmap (standardization, consolidation, and strategic diversification where needed).\nGovernance & Value Realization\nEstablish procurement governance aligned with EE&T operating models and agile delivery.\nTrack and communicate total value delivered (cost savings, risk reduction, innovation enablement).\nEnsure compliance with legal, security, and regulatory requirements.\nLeadership & Influence\nLead and develop a high-performing technology procurement team.\nInfluence senior stakeholders across IT, finance, legal, and business units.\nAct as a change leader modernizing procurement practices and operating models.\nQualifications & Experience\n15+ years of experience in technology procurement, sourcing, or vendor management.\nProven experience partnering with CIOs/CDOs and senior IT leaders at an enterprise level.\nDeep understanding of modern technology ecosystems, cloud platforms, AI, and digital transformation.\nStrong executive presence with exceptional negotiation and relationship-management skills.\nExperience operating in complex and matrixed organizations.\nExperience in insurance, financial services, banking, and/or investment firms preferred.\nCompensation Range:\nPay Range - Start:\n$176,000.00Pay Range - End:\n$264,000.00This role is eligible for additional short-term and long-term incentive compensation.\nWe believe in fairness and transparency. It’s why we share the salary range for most of our roles. However, final salaries are based on a number of factors, including the skills and experience of the candidate; the current market; location of the candidate; and other factors uncovered in the hiring process. The standard pay structure is listed but if you’re living in California, New York City or other eligible location, geographic specific pay structures, compensation and benefits could be applicable, click here to learn more.\nGrow your career with a best-in-class company that puts our clients' interests at the center of all we do. Get started now!\nNorthwestern Mutual is an equal opportunity employer that welcomes talented individuals of all backgrounds. We are committed to creating and maintaining an environment in which each employee can contribute creative ideas, seek challenges, assume leadership and continue to focus on meeting and exceeding business and personal objectives.","description_format":"text","description_chars":6179,"description_truncated":false,"requirements":{"experience_years_min":15,"management_years_min":null,"team_size_min":null,"manages_managers":false,"education":null,"security_clearance":false,"languages":[]},"benefits":[],"hiring_locations":[],"hiring_excludes":[],"relocation_offered":false,"industries":["Supply Chain","Financial Services","Wealth Management & Financial Advisors","Life Insurance & Annuities"],"lifecycle":[{"event":"open","at":"2026-10-19T08:29:27Z"}],"visa":[],"liveness":{"score":23,"band":"cold","label":"Long shot","p_open":1,"p_active":0.648,"p_room":0.35,"age_days":37,"expected_fill_days":15,"reasons":["conf:4","velocity","win:tail"],"computed_at":"2026-11-01T06:10:25Z"},"pay":{"stated_usd_annual":264000,"is_top_pay":true},"html_url":"https://alion.io/job/northwestern-mutual-vp-procurement-technology-and-digital","json_url":"https://alion.io/job/northwestern-mutual-vp-procurement-technology-and-digital.json","meta":{"generated_at":"2026-11-01T17:37:09Z","cache_seconds":300,"methodology":"https://alion.io/methodology","terms":"https://alion.io/terms","contact":"https://alion.io/contact","api":"https://alion.io/developers","about":"Alion is a live layer of people, companies and AI agents: who they are, whether they are real and active right now, what they do and how to work with them, readable by people and by agents and paid per call.","catalog":"https://alion.io/catalog.json","usage":{"tier":"crawler_verified","counted_by":"address","units_charged":1,"used_today":26993,"day_limit":null,"remaining_today":null,"minute_limit":300,"resets_at":"2026-11-02T00:00:00Z"}},"offers":[{"id":"company.slices","title":"One company in depth, by slice","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002,"plus_per_slice":{"credits":0.05,"usd":0.005}},"unit":"per company, plus each slice with data","note":"the employer in depth","call":{"mcp_tool":"get_company","arguments":{"id":690951},"rest":"https://alion.io/mcp/rest/get_company?id=690951"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.slices&for=job%2Fnorthwestern-mutual-vp-procurement-technology-and-digital"},{"id":"market.stats","title":"A market slice: pay, demand and time to fill","status":"live","price":{"credits":1,"usd":0.1},"unit":"per slice","note":"pay, demand and time to fill for this role and place","call":{"mcp_tool":"market_stats"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=market.stats&for=job%2Fnorthwestern-mutual-vp-procurement-technology-and-digital"},{"id":"job.search","title":"Open jobs by role, technology, place, pay and visa","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002},"unit":"per posting in a list","note":"similar open postings","call":{"mcp_tool":"search_jobs"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=job.search&for=job%2Fnorthwestern-mutual-vp-procurement-technology-and-digital"},{"id":"company.verify","title":"Is this company real and active right now","status":"pilot","price":null,"unit":"per company","request":{"url":"https://alion.io/catalog/request","method":"POST","body":"{\"offer\": \"company.verify\", \"for\": \"job/northwestern-mutual-vp-procurement-technology-and-digital\", \"note\": \"what you need it for\"}"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.verify&for=job%2Fnorthwestern-mutual-vp-procurement-technology-and-digital"}],"agent":{"mcp":"https://alion.io/mcp/jobs","mcp_open":"https://alion.io/mcp/open","next":[{"tool":"get_job","arguments":{"id":2839452}},{"tool":"search_jobs","arguments":{"company":"northwesternmutual.com","detail":"compact"}},{"tool":"match_people","arguments":{"job_id":2839452},"note":"people open to offers who fit this vacancy"}],"note":"The same data through MCP tools: https://alion.io/mcp/open needs no sign-in (compact searches, postings, people); https://alion.io/mcp with an Alion account has everything. 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