Hi, I'm here to meet with the procurement manager.
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Good morning, I'm Herb Hyman.
Hi, I'm Ferrari, it's nice to meet you too. So I'm spending the day with you today?
Sure, that's great.
Cool.
Have a seat.
All right. Purchasing managers shop for a living. Buying goods and services for their companies. Herb Hyman purchases for the town of Davie, Florida.
And what we do is buy everything that the city needs to operate. Everything from police cars to fire trucks, to cutting the grass outside. You name it, we buy it.
His title is procurement manager, because he not only manages the buying of goods, but also the selling of them.
So, everything you see in the garage that's on the rack right now was originally purchased by, by me for the police department mostly. You see some fire trucks down there on the end. And at the end of the life cycle of these vehicles, we'll eventually auction them off. Which is where the procurement, rather than purchasing, comes in to play.
More than 40 percent of purchasers work for wholesale trade and manufacturing industries. Another 11 percent work in retail trade. The remainder work for small companies or government agencies. Herb says he's got to follow more rules and regulations than other buyers.
Differences that we're spend, the money that we're spending is the public's money, the residents money.
Okay.
So, we're spending public money whereas.
As opposed to a company, right.
In the private sector, they're.
Okay.
Spending the owner's money.
Most procurement and purchasing managers work a standard 40 hour week in an office. But expect to work weekends and holidays if you're a retail buyer. And if you work for the government, you may be expected to stay late for meetings.
Yeah, there are days that I am not at my desk at all. I just go from one meeting to another meeting to another meeting. Various locations, all over town.
Think this sounds like the career for you? Make sure you're up for some competition.
Right now, there are not a lot of jobs out there for procurement people, because people who are in their jobs are pretty well set in their jobs and not making moves.
Break in to the competitive field of purchasing by starting out as a trainee. Purchasing clerical or assistant buyer. Retail and wholesale firms prefer to hire people who have a college degree and who are familiar with the merchandise they sell. Some government positions require a masters degree. But all your hard work will pay off, annual earnings for purchasing managers average more than 81,000 dollars a year. Purchasing agents average nearly 45,000 dollars a year. What type of person would be good in your position?
Well, I think somebody who's very detailed oriented. Somebody who doesn't mind working with numbers. Also, some, some legal background would be good. You don't have to be an attorney obviously, but you're dealing with contracts all day long. So some knowledge of how contracts work.
If you enjoy buying and think you can handle the responsibility of managing large amounts of money, a career as a procurement manager or a purchasing agent might be right for you.
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