Vendor Manager

 

PFH Technology are looking for a Vendor Manager to join our growing team.

Contract: Permanent

Location: Cork/Dublin, hybrid

Reporting to: Chief Commercial Officer

Role Overview

We are a €200M+ Irish technology solutions and services group operating across infrastructure, cloud, digital workspace, security, end-user services, and managed services. We partner with a broad and growing ecosystem of global technology vendors and distributors, including strategic partners such as Dell, Lenovo, HP, HPE, Cisco, Microsoft, VMware, Citrix, Commvault, Fortinet, Pure Storage, Apple, Imprivata, AWS, NVIDIA, Palo Alto, CyberArk, and key distributors including Arrow, Exertis, Climb, and Micro Warehouse.

The Vendor Manager role is to own, optimise, and professionalise our vendor and distributor relationships, ensuring we fully leverage partner programs to drive increased rebate and incentive income, improved gross margin and cost optimisation, stronger vendor engagement in opportunities, better sales enablement and pipeline growth, and structured governance, compliance, and reporting.

This role reports directly to the Chief Commercial Officer, operates as a solo specialist, and works closely with Marketing and Sales Operations.

Skills & Experience Required

We are looking for candidates with five or more years’ experience in vendor management, channel partnerships, or IT distribution, a strong understanding of enterprise IT vendor partner programs, proven commercial and financial acumen, experience working with Salesforce and business intelligence tools, strong stakeholder management and negotiation skills, and the ability to operate independently while influencing cross-functional teams. Candidates must be highly organised, detail-oriented, and self-directed.

Key Responsibilities

Vendor & Distributor Relationship Ownership

We require a single point of ownership for all strategic vendor and distributor relationships. The Vendor Manager will build structured, executive-level engagement with vendor partner managers, lead Quarterly Business Reviews and annual Joint Business Planning, align our commercial priorities with vendor focus areas and investment themes, and manage distributor relationships in line with our commercial objectives.

Partner Program & Tier Management

We expect full ownership of our participation in all vendor partner programs. This includes ensuring ongoing compliance with revenue thresholds, training and certification requirements, and program audits and reporting. The Vendor Manager will proactively manage partner tier progression and renewals, ensuring we retain maximum eligibility for rebates, MDF, special pricing, and vendor support.

Rebates, Incentives & Deferred Margin Optimisation

We require disciplined tracking, forecasting, and claiming of all vendor rebates and back-end incentives. The Vendor Manager will manage deferred margin and post-sale rebate programs through distribution, identify incremental rebate opportunities tied to growth targets, new customer acquisition, and strategic product focus, and work with Finance and Sales Operations to ensure rebate visibility and accurate accrual. Regular reporting on actual versus potential rebate performance is essential.

Market Development Funds (MDF) & Co-Marketing

We expect proactive ownership of MDF planning, governance, and execution across all major vendors. The Vendor Manager will work closely with Marketing to build annual and quarterly joint marketing plans and design MDF-funded campaigns including events, digital campaigns, webinars, and account-based marketing. They will secure MDF pre-approval, manage vendor compliance, track ROI and pipeline creation, and ensure MDF is used strategically and consistently rather than reactively.

Sales Enablement & Deal Support

We require strong enablement of our sales teams to fully leverage vendor programs. This includes educating sales on incentives, promotions, and deal registration processes, owning deal registration strategy and execution, coordinating special pricing and bid support, and improving registered deal coverage and win rates. The Vendor Manager will act as an escalation point for vendor-related deal challenges.

Vendor-led renewals and lifecycle motions

This role will also support vendor-led renewals and lifecycle motions, including maintenance, subscription, and services upsell opportunities, ensuring vendor programs are leveraged to maximise retention and account expansion.

Training & Certification Governance

We expect a structured vendor training and certification roadmap aligned to partner tier requirements and our strategic solution priorities. The Vendor Manager will track certification coverage across sales and technical teams, coordinate vendor training and exams, and ensure there are no lapses in mandatory certifications.

Compliance, Governance & Reporting

We require full compliance with vendor contracts, program rules, and audit requirements. The Vendor Manager will maintain visibility of partner statuses, program obligations, and benefit eligibility, and produce executive-level reporting covering vendor performance, rebates earned versus available, MDF usage and ROI, and sales pipeline influenced by vendors. Salesforce and Power BI will be used to deliver transparent, data-driven insights.
The role will work closely with Finance to ensure accurate invoicing, rebate claims, MDF reimbursement, and timely receipt of all vendor income streams.

Account Planning, Partner-of-Record & Co-Sell

We expect active support for joint account planning with vendors for key customers. The Vendor Manager will drive co-sell motions and vendor-assisted opportunities, secure Partner-of-Record and equivalent designations where applicable, improve vendor-led opportunity referral and customer engagement, and identify whitespace and cross-sell opportunities across our customer base.

Distributor & Cost Optimisation Management

We require structured management of distributor commercial engagement and performance. The Vendor Manager will negotiate special pricing, volume discounts, and promotional incentives, improve cost of goods through disciplined buying strategies, and align distributor activity with vendor funding and incentive models.

Planning & Forecasting

We expect ownership of vendor-related revenue, rebate, and funding forecasting. The Vendor Manager will maintain rolling forecasts for vendor income, incentives, and MDF, ensure commitments are confirmed in advance, and provide predictable visibility into vendor-driven commercial performance.

Market & Vendor Intelligence

The Vendor Manager will maintain awareness of vendor strategies, market trends, and competitive dynamics, feeding relevant insights into commercial planning, portfolio decisions, and executive discussions.

New Vendor Onboarding & Portfolio Expansion

We expect leadership in onboarding new vendors into our portfolio. This includes defining engagement models, enablement plans, and early pipeline strategy, ensuring new vendor relationships reach commercial maturity quickly, and maximising launch incentives and early partner benefits.

Key Performance Indicators

We will measure success through rebate growth year-on-year, gross margin improvement attributable to vendor programs, MDF secured versus utilised, pipeline value influenced by vendor engagement, registered deal coverage and win rate, partner tier and certification compliance, vendor satisfaction and strategic engagement, cost savings achieved through pricing and distribution optimisation, and predictability of vendor-related income.

Education:

Degree in Business is preferred.

 

PFH Technology, owned by Ricoh – a Japanese based global ICT company, is a premier provider of end-to-end ICT solutions and a managed services portfolio scaling from SMEs to large Enterprise organisations. We have unrivalled vendor relationships. We can procure, design, deploy and support all your ICT needs. Our ISO certified Custodian™ Cloud Services and Custodian™ Managed Services provide the technology and expertise to mitigate risk and reduce your costs immediately. We have a nationwide network of over 750 dedicated professionals, ready to meet your ICT needs, with offices in Dublin, Cork and Galway.

We are an equal opportunity employer and value diversity at PFH. We do not discriminate on the basis of age, disability, civil or family status, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, race, religion, or any other legally protected status.

We are committed to ensuring that individuals with disabilities or access needs are provided with reasonable accommodation during the recruitment process, to perform essential job functions, and to access the full benefits of employment. Please contact us if you require accommodation at any stage.

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