Purchasing Management

What is Purchasing?

• Definition
• Organisational buyers
• Purchasing, profitability and added value
• The evolution of purchasing
• Purchasing and change
• The status of purchasing

Purchasing Strategy

• Definition
• Levels of strategy
• The strategic planning process
• Purchasing strategy
• Environmental scanning
• Strategy formulation
• Strategy implementation
• Strategy evaluation and control
• Strategic options

Purchasing Organisation

• Organisational design and structure
• Approaches to organisation structures
• Centralised purchasing
• Purchasing and its functional interfaces
• The internal organisation of purchasing departments
• Purchasing and supply in group undertakings
• Horizontal organisations
• Supply chain management
• Materials management
• Logistics management
• The contribution of purchasing to supply chain management

Purchasing Procedures

• Introduction
• Traditional purchasing procedures
• The inefficiencies of traditional procedures
• Legal aspects of ordering procedures
• The ‘battle of the forms’
• Purchasing records
• Small orders
• Purchasing manuals

Purchasing and IT

• Introduction
• Management Information Systems (MIS)
• Information Technology (IT)
• IT and competitive advantage
• Computer systems
• Computer operation
• A typical computerised purchasing application
• Flowcharts
• Essential features of a computerised supplies system
• Some computer applications relevant to purchasing
• Some advantages of computerised purchasing
• Telecommunications and networks
• Electronic commerce
• Electronic data interchange
• Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT)
• Electonic mail
• Smart cards
• Bar coding
• Electronic catalogues
• Security and legal issues
• The impact of IT on purchasing and supply

Human Resources in the Supply Chain

• Introduction
• Human resource planning
• Job analysis
• Recruitment and selection
• Performance appraisal
• Training and development
• Purchasing and pay
• Motivation, communication and commitment
• Communication
• The management of change
• Teamwork and multinational teams
• Management styles and leadership
• Strategic aspects of HRM applied to purchasing

Specifying and Assuring the Quality of Suppliers

• Introduction
• What is quality?
• The importance of TQM
• The specification of quality
• Product and production design and re-design specifications
• Standardisation
• Value analysis and engineering
• The implementation of quality
• Quality control and assurance
• Quality systems
• Independent quality assurance and certification
• Tools for quality and reliability
• Failure Mode and Effects Analysis (FMEA)
• Quality circle and task teams
• The cost of quality
• Purchasing and quality

Matching Supply with Demand

• Definitions
• Inventory classifications
• The aims of inventory management
• The right quantity
• Demand
• The economics of stock management
• ABC analysis
• Variety reduction
• Economic order quantities (EOQs)
• The quantity discount model
• Lead times
• Forecasting demand
• Fixed order and period review systems
• Materials Requirements Planning (MRP)
• Distribution Requirement Planning (DRP)
• Just-In-Time purchasing (JIT)
• Optimised Production Technology (OPT)
• Lot sizing
• Safety stocks and service levels
• Special inventory factors

Sourcing

• Sourcing levels
• Sourcing information
• Analysis of market conditions
• Directives
• Sources of supply
• Suppliers assessment and appraisal
• Supplier performance rating
• The supplier base
• Make or buy strategies and tactics
• Outsourcing
• Outsourcing purchasing
• Tiering
• International sourcing
• Partnership sourcing
• Forming successful partnerships
• Reciprocal trade
• Countertrade
• Intra-company trading
• Subcontracting
• Local suppliers
• Small or large suppliers
• Sourcing decisions
• Factors in deciding where to buy

Contrasting Approaches to Supply

• Introduction
• Industrial products
• Capital investment items
• Buying used equipment
• Evaluating capital investments
• Selecting suppliers of capital items
• Leasing
• The buyer and capital investment purchases
• Production materials
• Raw materials
• Futures dealings
• Methods of commodity dealings
• Component parts and assemblies
• Production materials and bills of materials
• Consumables
• Construction supplies and bills of quantities
• Goods for resale in wholesaling and retailing

Storing Supplies

• Storage and supplies
• Type, location and siting of storage facilities
• Storage and materials handling equipment
• Assessment of storage requirements
• Stores layout
• Identification of stock items
• Surplus

Controlling Prices and Costs

• Price
• The conditions for perfect competition
• Imperfect competition and monopoly
• UK competition legislation
• Price information
• Pricing agreements
• Variations to firm and cost price agreements
• Price analysis
• Price variation and adjustment
• Currency management
• Incoterms

Support Tools

• Tendering
• Debriefing
• Post-Tender Negotiation (PTN)
• Forecasting techniques
• Techniques of investment appraisal
• Application of costing techniques
• Life cycle costing
• Target costing
• Absorption costing
• Activity-Based Costing (ABC) and management
• Standard costing
• Budgets and budgetary control
• Learning curves
• Project management
• Scheduling
• Models and simulation approaches

Negotiation

• Introduction
• Definitions
• Approaches to negotiation
• The content of negotiation
• What is an effective negotiation?
• Factors in negotiation
• The process of negotiation
• Pre-negotiation
• The actual negotiation
• Post-negotiation
• Global negotiation

Purchasing Research, Performance and Ethics

• Purchasing research
• Purchasing performance and control
• The aims of performance measures
• The prevalence of purchasing performance measures
• Principles of performance measures
• Methods of evaluating purchasing performance
• Accounting approaches
• Comparative approaches
• The purchasing management audit approach
• Management by Objectives (MBO)
• Purchasing and fraud
• Whistle-blowing
• Purchasing ethics