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Big salaries are on offer to purchasing and supply chain specialists - if they have the skills needed for new e-commerce roles and they are willing to take a calculated risk. Mark Whitehead looks at the state of the market and talks to some of the early movers
Only yesterday, it seems, a great debate was raging about whether e-commerce would be a threat or an opportunity. Now the first wave of recruitment is under way, the answer is clear: e-commerce offers the biggest opportunity to ambitious purchasing and supply chain professionals since the invention of the telephone.
Purchasing and supply management recruitment specialist Purcon, for example, reports a huge increase in numbers being drafted in to new e-commerce ventures. In 1998, the first year such jobs began to register with recruiters, four or five candidates were placed in e-commerce roles by Purcon. In 1999 the figure shot up to 25. This year, the tally is running at four times as many.
"It's a red-hot marketplace," says Sarah Lim, director of permanent recruitment at the consultancy. "All the e-commerce ventures are looking for people from purchasing backgrounds. E-commerce is a new way of purchasing that everyone wants to tap into and they've realised they need people with the right knowledge and skills."
There are several types of opening for purchasers. The first organisations to start recruiting procurement staff two or three years ago were the big consultancy firms and they continue to lead the way. Typically, according to Lim, they're looking for people with between five and eight years' experience in senior purchasing roles at large, wellestablished companies. These recruits will usually be brought into the consultancies' e-procurement businesses and trained as consultants, advising others on how to set up e-commerce systems. Basic salaries are typically between L50,000 and L70,000, plus the kind of benefits associated with bluechip firms. Management grade roles can offer L90,000 or more.
PricewaterhouseCoopers, a good example of an established management consultancy branching out into e-commerce, has so far recruited a team of seven purchasing specialists to help run economy, an online marketplace for indirect goods and services ranging from office supplies and business travel to temporary staff. It expects the total number of recruits to reach at least...