An analysis to ascertain adequacy of staffing in a university purchasing department

The purpose of this study was to develop procurement processing time standards for each procurement category for each commodity team to determine the present and future workload and the adequacy of staffing in the Purchasing Division at the University of California, Riverside. This study accomplished the following research objectives: (1) Establish procurement processing time standards. (2) Determine the current procurement workload quantitatively. (3) Ascertain the adequacy of current staffing. (4) Forecast workload and staffing requirements.;The methodology used in this study was quantitative analysis employing a modified action research design. To collect the necessary data, the researcher collected self-logged data from each buyer and verified the data by work sampling. The self-logged data consisted of the following: the direct time and efforted expended (1) for the procurement of goods and services and (2) after delivery of goods and services, and (3) the indirect time and effort expended not directly related to a specific procurement. The data were processed using several computer files with each successive file refining the data to develop procurement processing time standards. By comparing the available hours to the number of buyer hours required to process the current workload, the adequacy of current staffing requirements was determined. Using the same data and the expected changes in the University, future staffing requirements were determined.;The results of this study relative to the research objectives were as follows: (1) procurement processing time standards were developed for approximately 90 percent of the procurement categories using their own data, and the remaining 10 percent were established by an averaging method; (2) based on the established time standards and an analysis of historical quantity data, the current annual workload was determined to be 13,657 hours; (3) by comparing the annual workload hours to the available buyer hours, it was determined that the purchasing division is currently overstaffed by 1.93 full-time equivalent buyers; (4) based on historical workload trends, it was determined that for the next five years the purchasing division staff should remain at its current number if there are no significant changes in procurement processing steps or University policies and procedures.