Developing Purchasing Policies, Processes and SLAs

Purchasing policies, processes and Service Level Agreements (SLAs) guide the activities of purchasing professionals and their business partners, and provide a functional and moral compass. To ensure effectiveness, these documents must be aligned to the strategic intent and the broader environment of the organization. They must also be written using an appropriate language level and style. In this course, we will demonstrate how to develop such policies, process flowcharts and SLAs in a simple, specific and appropriate style that meets the requirements of a modern organization. We will also illustrate how performance against processes and SLAs can be measured and analyzed for continuous improvement.

This course uses a highly interactive workshop setting involving activities to plan and draft policies. We will also be designing, mapping and evaluating processes as well as drafting SLAs.

By the end of the course, participants will be able to:

• Outline the strategic role of purchasing in the organization
• Practice the latest business writing techniques suited for the development of policies, processes, procedures and SLAs
• Formulate policies to effectively govern the organization’s purchasing activities
• Design cross functional processes and procedures that optimize effort, cost, time, output and controls
• Develop SLAs that set smart rules of engagement between the purchasing department and the rest of the organization

Purchasing and supply chain management professionals at all levels of the organization, as well as other company personnel involved in the purchasing process.

• Procurement management
• Policy development
• Processes design
• Process evaluation
• SLA development
• Business writing