Software Asset Manager, London

WPP is the creative transformation company. We use the power of creativity to build better futures for our people, planet, clients, and communities.

Working at WPP means being part of a global network of more than 109,000 accomplished people in 110 countries. WPP has headquarters in New York, London and Singapore and a corporate presence in major markets worldwide.

We create transformative ideas and outcomes for our clients through an integrated offer of communications, experience, commerce, and technology.

WPP and our award-winning agencies work with most of the world's biggest companies and organisations - from Ford, Unilever and P&G to Google, HSBC, and the UN. Our clients include 61 of the FTSE 100, 317 of the Fortune Global 500, all 30 of the Dow Jones 30 and 62 of the NASDAQ 100. WPP are the leader in the Bloomberg Gender Equality Index and 8th in the FTSE 100 rankings for Women on Boards.

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Why we're hiring:

At WPP, technology is at the heart of everything we do, and it is WPP IT's mission to enable everyone to collaborate, create and thrive. WPP IT is undergoing a significant transformation to modernise ways of working, shift to cloud and micro-service-based architectures, drive automation, digitise colleague and client experiences and deliver insight from WPP's petabytes of data.

As we progress on this journey, we need to establish a new and refreshed IT Asset Management backbone to our technology organisation to support our transformation. You will be responsible to operate the Software Asset Management (SAM) practice, so that we are able to optimise our asset base and manage/reduce risk. The ITAM function is responsible for deploying and enforce best practice on the IT E2E asset lifecycle.

What you'll be doing:

• Define strategy and produce effective license positions, risk and forecast positions for major software vendors.
• Lead engagement with technology teams to turn asset trends, asset performance and asset requirements into decision aiding data for contract managers at renewal or true up events
• Define and implement a centralized knowledge base for managed software vendors
• Chair cross function, cross company vendor governance meetings. C-level stakeholder management
• Define and deploy new SAM processes across a continually shifting estate involving multiple IT teams and platforms
• Lead a continuous improvement approach to running SAM activity in WPP
• Lead strategic approach for risk management and licence optimisation
• Define and own the risk management process: identify and assist business owners with managing software contract risks, report non-compliance. Provide risk mitigation recommendations and drive risks mitigations.
• Identify software cost optimisation opportunities and lead the projects to achieve software savings, working closely with stakeholders
• Drive the compliant use of WPP's software contracts through educating colleagues, enforcing policies, and monitoring adherence to processes.
• Work with procurement, finance and legal on contract renewals and new purchases.

What you'll need:

• Degree in engineering, computer science, finance or equivalent (i.e. MBA) desirable but not essential
• Minimum 7-10 years working in an Software Asset Management role or related
• Minimum 5-7 years working with ITAM or CMDB tools
• Strong experience and background in Software Asset Management disciplines and ITIL
• Expertise in end-to-end SAM ownership for vendors such as IBM, Oracle, Microsoft, SAP, VMware
• Demonstrable experience of license modelling in datacentre, virtualised and end user environments
• High competency in SAM data modelling and a deep bias towards data-driven decision making
• Knowledge and hands-on experience with IT asset management tools, ServiceNow and CMDB.
• Expert communicator with a track record of operating, partnering with and influencing business stakeholders and ability to translate technical information to a non-technical audience
• Ability to operate in a fast-paced organizational transformation and able to navigate and champion change across organisational / geographical complexity.
• Excellent organizational skills: detail-oriented, thorough, dependable, and trustworthy, with a positive attitude
• C- level stakeholder management

Who you are:

You're open : We are inclusive and collaborative; we encourage the free exchange of ideas; we respect and celebrate diverse views. We are accepting: of new ideas, new partnerships, new ways of working.

You're optimistic : We believe in the power of creativity, technology and talent to create brighter futures or our people, our clients and our communities. We approach all that we do with conviction: to try the new and to seek the unexpected.

You're extraordinary: we are stronger together: through collaboration we achieve the amazing. We are creative leaders and pioneers of our industry; we provide extraordinary every day.

What we'll give you:

Passionate, inspired people - We promote a culture of people that do extraordinary work.

Scale and opportunity - We offer the opportunity to create, influence and complete projects at a scale that is unparalleled in the industry.

Challenging and stimulating work - Unique work and the opportunity to join a group of creative problem solvers. Are you up for the challenge?

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