Vendor Management & BCP Specialist in Archbold, Ohio at Farmers & Merchants State Bank

POSITION SUMMARY:

The Vendor Management & BCP Specialist manages the full vendor lifecycle- from onboarding and contract negotiations to performance monitoring. The Vendor Management & BCP Specialist aligns third party dependencies with internal business continuity and disaster recovery frameworks. This role is essential to maintaining strong vendor relationships and ensuring vendors meet the bank’s standards and objectives.

OBJECTIVES OF THIS ROLE:

• Proactively reduce third party risk by assessing vendors for financial, cybersecurity, operation, reputational, and compliance risks before they affect the organization.
• Monitor vendor performance to support consistent, high-quality banking services.
• Maintain a centralized system for vendor contract, due diligence records, performance rating, and risk histories throughout onboarding, renewal, and offboarding.
• Ensure third party relationships comply with applicable federal and state banking regulations.
• Partners with departments to conduct annual Business Impact Analyses that identify critical services and assess the potential impact of operational disruptions.
• Help develop practical contingency plans for high risk or single source third parties to reduce vendor lock in and prevent sudden service failures.

RESPONSIBILITIES:

• Oversee the onboarding process for new vendors, including conducting due diligence, completing inherent risk assessment, and negotiating contracts.
• Conduct ongoing due diligence reviews, residual risk assessments, and set future reminders within software.
• Monitor and track vendor performance and compliance with contractual agreements, service level agreements and regulatory requirements.
• Prepare and present vendor reports and presentations for the Vendor management committee, IS Steering Committee, and others as needed.
• Utilize vendor management software to maintain centralized vendor records and policy documentation.
• Ensure that third party activities adhere to federal and state banking laws, consumer protection rules, and cyber security mandates.
• Oversee contract drafting, pricing terms, service level agreements, renewal or termination schedules, and set reminders within software.
• Act as a central liaison between external vendors, internal vendor relationship managers, and internal departments like Compliance, Legal, IT, Credit, and Risk Management for contract reviews, Due Diligence Reviews, AI Reviews, and on-going monitoring of vendors.
• Ensure all documentation within the platform is up to date and report at minimum monthly on all items falling out of scope with the vendor policy.
• Train and educate internal stakeholders on vendor management and BCP processes and procedures.
• Prepare, gather, and submit vendor management and BCP requests for external auditors and examiners.
• Assist in resolving any audit or exam findings relating to Vendor Management or BCP/Disaster Recovery.
• Conduct and document Business Impact Analysis (BIA) and assist with determining which banking functions data systems, and customer services are most critical to restore first.
• Assist in running regular drills, testing, tabletop exercises, and staff training so employees know and understand their emergency roles.
• Maintain F&M’s software platform in accordance with policy requirements and established timelines.
• Stay up to date on industry best practices and regulatory changes related to vendor management and BCP.
• Continuously evaluate and improve vendor management and BCP processes to increase efficiency and effectiveness
• Assist with coordinating the immediate incident response team during and actual crisis and communication.
• Other duties as assigned.

QUALIFICATIONS:

• Associate’s degree in relevant field (Business Administration, Risk Management, Finance, Supply Chain Management, Information Security, or Emergency Management) preferred.
• 3-5 years’ experience in vendor/third party relations, risk management, financial operations and or Business Continuity/Disaster Recovery preferred.
• Regulatory knowledge: Deep understanding of banking rules and guidelines (FFIEC, OCC, FDIC, and GLBA) to manage third party compliance and security risks.
• Strong contract negotiation skills with proven ability to draft, review and negotiate favorable vendor service agreements and terms.
• Strong verbal and written communication skills to coordinate with internal stakeholders, executive leadership and external vendors.
• Proficiency with Vendor Management Systems (VMS), contract management software, and Microsoft Office Suite with proficiency in Excel

ADDITIONAL REQUIREMENTS:

Certificates and Licenses

• Valid Driver’s License

COMPLIANCE:

• As generally applicable to F&M Bank and commensurate with these job functions, this job role includes accountabilities for following Bank policies and related procedures, as well as regulatory requirements involving federal and state laws, regulations, and related guidance.
• Compliance with Bank Secrecy Act (BSA), including accurate completion of Currency Transaction Reports (CTR) when applicable, Anti-Money Laundering Act (AML), Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC) and the USA PATRIOT Act. Adhere to Customer Identification, Customer Due Diligence and reporting of suspicious activities to the BSA Department.

EXEMPT/SALARIED COMPETENCIES:

• Job Knowledge: Understands duties and responsibilities, possesses necessary job knowledge and technical skills, maintains job knowledge current.
• Productivity: Manages a fair workload, volunteers for additional work, prioritizes tasks, develops good work procedures, manages time well, and handles information flow.
• Quality: Is attentive to detail and accuracy, is committed to excellence, looks for improvements continuously, monitors quality levels, finds root cause of quality problems, owns/acts on quality problems.
• Self-Development: Seeks out and accepts feedback, is a proactive learner, takes on tough assignments to improve skills, keeps knowledge and skills up to date, turns mistakes into learning opportunities.
• Adaptability: Ability to plan and organize work in new or changing situations, to apply self in emergencies and to respond to new procedures.