Senior Specialist – Procurement & Contracts (Sustaining Capital)

Senior Specialist – Procurement & Contracts (Sustaining Capital)

Lead a team of contract advisors and specialists

Construction focused, commercial and contract management

Support the business in delivering its annual sustaining capital projects plan

Permanent opportunity, CBD location – Brisbane

About the role

Finding better ways to provide the materials the world needs.

We are looking for a Senior Specialist – Procurement & Contracts (Sustaining Capital) to lead a team of contracts advisors and specialists who prepare and manage multiple contracts across the sustaining capital project portfolio. Supporting Rio Tinto Aluminium (RTA) Pacific Operations, this role will work closely with key stakeholders in our Aluminium business on the east coast of Australia and New Zealand and have broad exposure across the sustaining capital portfolio, as well as stakeholders in Rio Tinto Procurement and corporate functions.

This role is a great opportunity for an experienced contracts and procurement professional and people leader who has effective stakeholder engagement and negotiation skills, as well as a sharp commercial awareness with an extensive background in project procurement and contracts. Reporting to the Business Partner – Sustaining Capital, you will:

Provide leadership, coaching and mentoring of the end to end procurement team supporting key and complex capital projects across Bauxite, Alumina and Smelter assets;

Direct reports: 5

Be an expert negotiator, mediator and problem solver who is committed to driving positive contractual outcomes for the business;

deliver an end to end procurement service delivery for the sustaining capital portfolio with key responsible areas being Bauxite assets, and Power & Automation projects.

Maintain pre and post award contracts management reporting and monitoring to measure progress, current health metrics and the like to inform senior management;

Ensure all capital contracts are executed in line with the Company’s strict governance and compliance requirements, including use of Ariba;

With your team, manage the dispute resolution process for complex contractual claims;

Work closely with project leads, engineers, site based construction teams and other project delivery professionals in order deliver the annual capital plan;

Maximise commercial value for the business through leading contract management practices and behaviours;

Attend contract progress meetings, when needed, and identify and help mitigate any potential commercial risk associated with active studies and projects; and

Be expected to travel to sites as required on an as needed basis, in order to maintain effective relationships with key site based stakeholders.

What you’ll bring

To be successfully considered for this role, you will have:

A degree in Business, Law, Engineering (or a related discipline);

A minimum of 10 years’ experience in procurement and contracts, with significant exposure to capital projects across the end-to-end contract lifecycle;

Strong influencing, stakeholder engagement and negotiation skills;

Demonstrated prior leadership experience will be highly regarded;

What we offer

A work environment where safety is always the number one priority

Flexible working from home arrangements as per operational requirements

18 weeks of gender-neutral and equal paid parental leave, with continued superannuation contributions whilst employees are on unpaid or half paid parental leave

A competitive base salary reflective of your skills and experience with annual incentive program

Comprehensive medical benefits including subsidised private health insurance for employees and immediate family

Attractive share ownership plan

Company provided insurance cover

Extensive salary sacrifice & salary packaging options

Career development & education assistance to further your technical or leadership ambitions

Ongoing access to family-friendly health and medical wellbeing support

Leave for all of life’s reasons (vacation/annual, paid parental, sick leave)

Exclusive employee discounts (banking, accommodation, cars, retail and more); and

Local relocation packages offered for Australian residents only

Where you’ll be working

Rio Tinto Global Procurement ensures resilient supply chains that deliver value to the Rio Tinto Group through the strategic sourcing and buying of goods and services for our operations. Playing a fundamental role, value is achieved through effective supplier partnerships, innovation, easy and standardised processes, e-technology, corporate social responsibility and increased commercial advantage.

Application Deadline: 28th April 2026 COD

(Rio Tinto reserves the right to remove advertised roles prior to this date)

Please note, in order to be successfully considered for this role you must complete all pre-screening questions.

Rio Tinto does not accept unsolicited CVs or candidate profiles from recruiters or employment agencies. Rio Tinto will not consider or agree to payment of any referral compensation or recruiter fee relating to unsolicited CVs or candidate profiles. Rio Tinto reserves the right to hire those candidate(s) without any financial obligation to the recruiter or agency. Any unsolicited CVs or candidate profiles, including those submitted to hiring managers, are deemed to be the property of Rio Tinto.