Advanced Diploma in Purchasing and Supply

This unit is designed to enable students to manage their own area of responsibility within an organisation's internal supply chain, in line with the overall strategic business plan and the operational plan for the purchasing function. Students should be able to implement operational plans for their own area of responsibility to achieve objectives set out in their plan. In doing so they should be able to employ a range of resources, including human, physical and financial, and manage and delegate tasks effectively. This unit is about managing the expectations of the stakeholders that are directly involved in the student's own area of responsibility and will provide them with management techniques to help them to involve others, be innovative, consultative, influential and persuasive in order to achieve targets effectively. This unit at level 5 is concerned with the day to day management responsibilities within the purchasing function and wider organisation and appropriate links and understanding of the relevant theories.

This unit is designed to enable students to undertake risk analysis and a variety of risk assessments relating to different aspects of purchasing and supply and to implement a range of appropriate risk management tools and techniques. Students will use a variety of risk assessment tools and techniques designed to provide a detailed analysis of supply chain situations, including legal, corporate social responsibility (CSR), ethical, health and safety, financial, international, innovation and a variety of other potential risk scenarios. The scope covers both the proactive identification and avoidance of risk, as well as provision for post-event recovery initiatives.

Achieving success within the supply chain involves a complex range of variables, which can frequently be dependent on one another for the success of the supply chain. This unit is designed to enable students to use a range of techniques and strategies to develop and improve supplier performance in order to achieve competitiveness, efficiency and profitability within the supply chain. By the end of this unit, students will be able to measure and evaluate the effectiveness of supply chain performance. They will be able to identify innovative development of systems to improve the performance of the supply chain, and make justifiable recommendations for implementation in order to aid the effectiveness of the supply chain.

This unit aims to identify the major areas of concern in effectively managing storage and distribution throughout the supply chain. It is essential that goods are moved through supply chains to customers at the right time, in the right condition, at the right place and at the right cost. Failure in any of these areas will add unnecessary costs to the ultimate customer while success will add value, and delight the customer. It is essential that the management of inventory, storage, distribution and general logistics are coordinated, both upstream and downstream, in order to reduce lead times, provide agility and reduce unnecessary costs. In order for this to happen it is essential that relationships, both internally and externally, are honed to the appropriate level. To be effective, storage and distribution must fit in a seamless way to the total supply chain locally, nationally and globally.

This unit is designed to provide students with an appreciation of the basic principles of marketing so they can interact more effectively with marketing colleagues within their organisation. It provides an insight into the role of marketing within an organisation and sets out marketing's relationship with purchasing and other business functions. Students will be introduced to concepts, tools and techniques that are widely used by their marketing colleagues. It will help purchasing students to understand the terminology of marketing and to identify ways that they can contribute more effectively towards their organisation's marketing efforts. The unit is applicable to students working for organisations in all sectors (including not-forprofit/ third tier sectors) and geographic territories. Where appropriate, international marketing aspects are considered. By the end of the unit students should be able to evaluate and apply marketing tools and techniques in a range of contexts, and to understand how marketing contributes to key business objectives, in particular growth in income, profit and market share, and enhanced customer satisfaction.

This unit is designed to enable those who work in purchasing to assess the efficiency and effectiveness of an organisation's operations. This is the process of converting input resources into output products and services that occurs in all types of organisation, whether in manufacturing or services, public sector or private. Students should be able to understand how operations staff adds value to its inputs through the effective management of production and delivery. Operations staff are likely to be the most important internal customers of purchasing and supply chain managers. By the end of this unit students will be able to analyse and evaluate an operations environment and implement a strategic plan that allocates resources in terms of materials, labour and machinery. In addition they will be able to consider the infrastructure requirements of the management control systems, as applied to different process types and technologies, and select the right approach.

This unit explores the drivers and decision makers of central and local government and the National Health Service (NHS), and the impact these have upon the public sector procurement function. It covers the background to current public procurement policy and procedures, the regulatory frameworks and rules relating to procurement practice and the role of elected representatives and officials in making significant procurement decisions. The course also examines the impact of procurement policy and government initiatives on procurement, and the significance of the financial accountability cycle and the role of audit for improving procurement policy and practice.

This unit is designed to develop the knowledge and understanding to analyse concepts underlying the contracting process, including markets, transparency, competition, relationships and trust. The course examines how the contracting process may be managed efficiently and effectively through developing the business case for the procurement, analysing the nature and scope of the contract, applying appropriate selection procedures and developing positive relationships with suppliers, to realise intended benefits in the context of public accountability and responsible stewardship.

This unit is designed to develop a working knowledge of sustainable procurement: what it is, how it aligns with overall organisational strategies, policies and operations and how to recognise, apply and successfully manage sustainable procurement activities to achieve future improvements and benefits and mitigate risk. The unit enables students to recognise and implement appropriate sustainable specifications, sourcing and whole life contract management for products and services and evaluate how sustainable procurement impacts on business performance. The unit also introduces supplier audit, assessment and development tools to measure and increase sustainable procurement activity in the global supply chain.