Online Class: Purchasing and Vendor Management 101

This concise course is designed to explore the institutional purchasing cycle for consumable materials, raw materials, spare parts, and capital assets. Additionally students will explore and develop a thorough understanding of the supplier/buyer relationship, the benefits of high-quality vendor management systems, and the pitfalls of poorly designed or implemented vendor management systems. Throughout this course we will focus in detail on the basic principles, procedures, and policies involved in the organizational function often referred to as Supply Chain Management.

Courses Frequently Bought Together:

Payroll Management 101

Accounts Receivable Management

Accounts Payable Management

Course Motivation

Consider the purchasing function within your own business, or a business you might be familiar with, such as a school parent association, homeowners association, or church. Decisions are made to purchase goods and services almost daily right? Well those daily decisions can and do have a bottom line impact on the organization's income statement. It is essential for the sake of having a system of checks and balances that an organization's supply chain management system be independent.

Independence creates a system of anonymity and prevents biased purchasing decisions that we typically find when the end user of the proposed purchased good or service is also making the purchasing decision. Why might that be? Think about this in your personal purchases; quite often we are prone to impulse purchasing decisions based on our own preference. That preference might be based on experience, marketing impact, or a number of other variables.

While there is a need for independence for the purchasing and vendor management function of an organization there might be situations where it simply is not possible to have this system of independence. In such cases, the purchaser must be vigilant, recognize their own personal biases, and be prepared to make the right decisions based on data, not personal preference. It is essential to remember the independence is meant to serve as a system of checks and balances that separate the end user requesting the purchase, from the vendor, supplier, or contractor delivering the product or service.

Case Study 1:

Jim is the maintenance manager for a manufacturing organization and recently requested the purchase of a new pump to replace an outdated pump in the factory. Jim has for a number of years become quite familiar with the local supplier of pumps and has even engaged in out-of-work social activities with the vendor.

The vendor has recently asked Jim to attend a professional sporting event. While at the event the vendor asks Jim when he will receive a purchase order for the replacement pump. Jim tells him not to worry about it, that he will get the purchase order to him next week after he has a chance to speak to the purchasing manager.

Case Study Debrief:

There are a number of things that should immediately be recognized as wrong by even the most inexperienced, or novice person within the case study 1. First, it is generally considered to be inappropriate to accept gifts from vendors. By accepting the invitation to the sporting event Jim has put  himself in a questionable position ethically and professionally if his organization has a policy forbidding the acceptance of gifts (which most do). 2. Jim has clearly let his personal relationship with the vendor influence his purchasing preferences. 3. Jim feels as though he can influence the purchasing manager's decision in favor of this particular vendor.

Supply chain management is responsible for purchasing all goods and services necessary for an organization to achieve its goals. That being said, there are a number of areas where a good purchasing person might derive value for the organization. They might be able to negotiate the best price for the good or service, and save the organization in that regard. They might purchase based upon the lowest possible life cycle cost, thus insuring low operational costs of equipment purchased. There are likely a number of contracts that must be negotiated by the supply chain management team. What about vendor quality management? Best in class supply chain management organizations will implement vendor quality control measures and hold vendors accountable to those measures. Ultimately, there are a number of ways for supply chain management to create value for an organization; however, the breadth and depth of this value proposition is highly contingent on the size of the overall organization. The larger the organization, the larger the impact, simply based on economies of scale.