“It’s one of the most fascinating jobs I can think of,” says the head of the Government Procurement Service (GPS). He is referring – perhaps not suprisingly – to procurement. Presumably one of the other fascinating jobs Nigel Smith can think of is project and programme management (PPM) – the other civil service professional grouping he leads (see CSW 4 Nov, p21).

The procurement profession, however, is significantly more developed than is the case with PPM – though Smith explains that this was not always the case. “When I started [as professional head] two years ago I asked how many procurement professionals there were in central government, and nobody could tell me. So that’s a pretty good indication [of how little information there was].”

Data on numbers wasn’t the only gap in information. “We did not have a definition for the procurement profession established by the community at that time; we had no strategic plan for building the profession; we had little in the way of assessing organisational capability in procurement,” Smith recalls. So things were bad – but the simultaneous drives towards civil service professionalisation and commercial nous have catalysed things, he says, and procurement is now one of the most evolved professions in terms of identity and opportunities for members.

One of the most obvious manifestations of this change is the GPS’s dedicated graduate scheme, which was launched in 2007 and recently unveiled its third annual intake. Smith explains that participating departments take the new entrants into procurement teams for placements lasting between six months and a year; departments pay their salaries for the duration, but the two-year learning and development scheme undergone by the graduates is coordinated and paid for by the GPS.

Smith is as keen to point out the benefits for host departments as for the graduates – participating departments gain ambitious young officials, undertaking an intensive training scheme for which they do not have to pay. “It’s very structured; we manage their work experience into different departments and different challenges over the two years,” he says. “We are providing a pretty good service for departments – they’d be stupid not to take it up.”

As well as the dedicated graduate scheme, the purchasing profession is having its profile raised by its inclusion as part of the mainstream fast-stream programme for high-performing graduates. As with many other heads of profession we’ve spoken to, Smith is eager to have his group sit on the traditional ‘top table’ of the civil service with Whitehall policymakers – and participation in the fast stream is an important step in this process. It is also important in spreading practical and commercial experience at the top of government, Smith believes.

“It was a natural consequence of Sir Gus O’Donnell mandating that experience of operational delivery and wider experience [would be] a requirement for all senior civil servants,” Smith says. Fast-streamers themselves, he adds, have “enthusiastically met” the prospect of getting procurement experience. “Some of them will come in and stay in the profession, while others will get very structured training, professional learning and development and then go onto other jobs with a seeded knowledge of procurement.”

These two programmes are only part of a broader strategy, ‘Building the Procurement Profession’, which Smith launched in June after consultation with procurement heads across Whitehall – and, indeed, with all departmental permanent secretaries. The document is refreshingly concise but its recommendations are wide-ranging, covering everything from definitions of procurement to plans for harmonising the pay and conditions of buying professionals across departments. The GPS head says the strategy illustrates how far the profession has come in recent years, and sets its future direction. “This was the culmination of saying: ‘How do we make the procurement profession a reality and also provide relevance to individuals?’ It is quite a seminal document and makes clear what we see the profession being.”

Smith is frank when I ask him if the profession is as high-profile and respected as it needs to be in all departments. “The answer would be ‘no’ [overall] at the moment, but ‘yes’ in some departments; some are better than others,” he replies. “But don’t let anyone tell you that we are hopeless at procurement in government: the problem is that we are not consistent or uniform across government.”

The inevitable period of tightened spending ahead should create a pressure to improve both civil service procurement and commercial skills in general; the head of profession certainly hopes so. “The relevance is far, far greater given the state of public finances, the pressure on spending,” he says. “Achieving more for less is largely about how we get our third party goods and service providers to provide more for less.”


Who are they?
A range of labels and job titles are used to describe procurement professionals across government. The group includes officials who work specifically in the procurement of goods and services, as well as those working in procurement policy or management and in category management. Membership of the profession used to be restricted to individuals who had joined the Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply, but this requirement was dropped in February this year.

What do they do?
The Government Procurement Service describes a procurement professional as a central government official “in a role that adds value to the quality and cost-effectiveness of the procurement/acquisition of goods, services, assets and works”.

Number Crunching
Government spends more than £175bn annually on third party goods and services
3,500 members of the Government Procurement Service (GPS)
147 different job titles exist across government for those working in procurement
June 2009 saw the launch of a new strategy for the procurement profession
There are 10 key recommendations in the strategy, which is designed to recruit and support talent
In 2007 the procurement graduate scheme was launched
23 graduates accepted on the scheme in ‘09
47 per cent of procurement professionals feel that their career opportunities are limited compared to colleagues in generalist roles, according to a GPS survey
60 per cent believe private sector pay for equivalent jobs is better
Just 2 per cent of the senior civil service are procurement professionals, Cabinet Office research suggests
38 per cent of GPS members have full membership of professional group the Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply


Looking ahead: The head’s three priorities
Establish procurement at the ‘top table’
Provide an idea of context and career support for the individual
Build organisational capability across the GPS