Purchasing Supervisor

Under the supervision of the Shared Services Contracts and Purchasing Manager, the Purchasing Supervisor serves as a strategic leader and advocate for the purchasing team, managing the acquisition of high-volume goods and services for the 23 VCCS colleges, the System Office, and the Shared Services Center.

• Acts as a primary liaison between SSC buyers and external college stakeholders to resolve complex disputes and ensure policy consistency.
• Responsible for cultivating a safe work environment, driving operational excellence through implementation of quality control frameworks, and mentoring a diverse staff of Lead Buyers and Buyer Specialists.
• Performs managerial/supervisory activities including monitoring, reviewing, and evaluating performance of subordinate staff of approximately 11 with about 2 Lead Buyers and 9 Buyer Specialists.
• Ensures that purchases are performed accurately and timely and in accordance with applicable VCCS and state policies and applicable laws. Solicits and issues contracts for goods and services as needed by the SSC customers utilizing a variety of procurement methods.
• Manages all the daily, transactional high-volume purchases.
• Analyzes market data to make appropriate best value, compliant sourcing decisions.
• Organizes and designs the team in order to ensure speed and accuracy are achieved.
• Employs best business practices to continuously improve performance, compliance, efficiency, and effectiveness of procurement team.
• Assists the Contracts and Purchasing Manager and the Procurement Operations Manager streamline and resolve operations-related procurement issues.
  
  

Knowledge Of

• Governmental procurement principles and ability to follow procurement policy and standard operating procedures
• Servant leadership principles and practices that support empathy, active listening, stewardship, and the creation of inclusive environments
• Employment mediation techniques and neutral facilitation
• eVA (state procurement system)
• Commonwealth of Virginia (VPPA, APSPM, etc.) and VCCS procurement policies
  
  

Skills

• Energetic, resourceful, and self-directed
• Willingness to stay on the forefront of procurement best practices
• Expertise in MS Office products and demonstrated expertise to perform data analysis using Excel
  
  

Ability To

• Lead a team to continually seek higher levels of efficiency and compliance
• Manage sensitive personnel information with total confidentiality and neutrality
• Analyze market data to make appropriate sourcing decisions
• Effectively lead or supervise staff and to develop staff knowledge, skills, and abilities
• Exercise sound judgment, take initiative, handle multiple competing priorities, solve problems, and attend to detail while maintaining a big-picture perspective
• Think creatively, objectively, and to work to continuously improve business processes and to transfer those skills to others
• Provide exceptional customer service to internal and external customers in a professional manner and to transfer those attributes to others
• Build working relationships to solve problems and achieve common goals
• Work effectively with a wide range of constituencies
• Express thoughts clearly verbally, in writing, and through presentations
• Develop, execute, measure and continuously improve procurement effectiveness
• Travel within Virginia and within the United States as needed - less than 10%
  
  

Minimum Qualifications

• Multiple years of progressive experience in purchasing or procurement
• Experience in leading, supervising and positively motivating a team to include inclusion, accountability, and continuous improvement
• Experience resolving stakeholder issues and facilitating conflict resolution
• Experience managing procurement metrics (e.g., SLA attainment, requisition quality/accuracy, cycle times, compliance measures) and using res lts to drive sustained improvement
• Current Virginia Contracting Officer (VCO) certification or ability to obtain Virginia Contracting Associate (VCA) within one year of hire and VCO within two year(s) of hire; see https://vip.dgs.virginia.gov/ for more information on VCA and VCO certification process
  
  

Additional Considerations

• Experience managing a team of 10 or more
• Proven experience in analyzing procurement data to develop and implement process improvements
• Procurement experience in higher education and/or state government
• Experience using an electronic procurement system
• Experience using MS Office products and/or Adobe Acrobat Pro
  
  

Hybrid telework available!

Sponsorship will not be offered for this position