Vendor Manager

**Alexa Translations** is a leading translation service provider that helps the world’s largest and most prestigious legal, financial, and government industries with translation solutions that elevate the way they do business. Since 2002, we have grown our reputation by forging long-term relationships built on trust. Helping our clients reach their business goals is the foundation of our success.

We have built best-in-class Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) machine translation technology that is specifically trained for the legal and financial markets. It delivers complex, industry-specific translations with unprecedented quality and unmatched speed.

**Position Overview**:
As a **Vendor Manager** at Alexa Translations, you are responsible for our external team of language professionals - translators, revisers, lawyer-linguists, DTPs and other language professionals. The functions span from talent acquisition, onboarding, availability, forecasts, quality assurance and ensuring that our external providers receive the care needed to ensure high quality service to our clients.
This role requires strong communication and negotiation skills, along with a deep understanding of the language services industry.

**Key Responsibilities**:
**Internal Coordination**:

- Close daily coordination with the Director of Resources, project managers, and sales to forecast needs for upcoming projects.
- Coordinate utilization of internal and external resources for best quality and efficiency.

**Vendor Relationship Management**:

- Identify and onboard new specialized vendors who meet Alexa’s standards and needs for translation, revision, post-editing and other language-related services.
- Develop and maintain positive relationships with vendors, acting as the primary point of contact for all vendor-related matters.
- Be the escalation point to collaborate with project managers and vendors to resolve issues or concerns that arise during project execution that are not resolved within the scope of project management.
- Maintain a strong network of reliable and talented language professionals to meet the diverse needs of clients.
- Conduct regular performance evaluations of regular vendors to ensure quality standards are met and maintained.

**Vendor Selection and Qualification**:

- Evaluate and select vendors based on their expertise, capacity, quality standards, availability, and pricing structures.
- _ Conduct comprehensive vendor assessments to ensure compliance with industry-specific certifications, qualifications, and ethical standards._
- _ Negotiate vendor contracts and service-level agreements, considering factors such as pricing, delivery timelines, and quality expectations._

**Continuous Improvement and Vendor Development**:

- _ Stay updated with industry trends, emerging technologies, and best practices in the language services domain._
- _ Identify opportunities for process optimization, automation, and cost-saving initiatives related to vendor management._
- _ Based on feedback and information provided as part of the Resources Quality Module, collaborate with our vendors to improve their performance, quality, and efficiency._
- _ Develop and implement vendor training programs or workshops to enhance the skills and knowledge of language professionals._

**Project Coordination and Resource Allocation (conditional for specific projects)**:

- Work closely with project managers to allocate appropriate language resources for each project, ensuring efficient workflow and timely project delivery.
- Manage escalation project issues and vendor performance to ensure adherence to project requirements and client expectations.
- Proactively identify and resolve any resource or capacity constraints to minimize project delays or bottlenecks.

**Qualifications and Skills**:

- Bachelor's degree in a relevant field such as linguistics, translation, international business, or a related discipline.
- Proven experience in vendor management or supplier relationship management within the language services industry.
- Strong knowledge of translation, localization, and other language-related services.
- Excellent negotiation, communication, and interpersonal skills to build and maintain relationships with vendors and internal stakeholders.
- Ability to assess vendor capabilities, evaluate quality standards, and monitor performance against agreed-upon metrics.
- Familiarity with industry-specific certifications, qualifications, and compliance requirements.
- Proficiency in project management tools and software used in the language services industry.
- Analytical mindset and ability to leverage data for decision-making and process improvement.
- Attention to detail and a commitment to delivering high-quality language services.

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