Article: Purchasing and supply management skills and personality traits across roles: a job advertisements perspective Journal: International Journal of Procurement Management (IJPM) 2022 Vol.15 No.3 pp.281 - 304 Abstract: This paper contributes to a growing trajectory of research on purchasing and supply management skills and requirements and uses job advertisements as a novel source of data and research perspective. Our findings broadly corroborate the extant literature in showing which skills are required across different hierarchical organisational levels. Our analysis also identified the key and hitherto underexplored personality traits required by PSM professionals. At a holistic level, the findings show that employers have a clear and consistent view of PSM personality: being conscientious and able to work independently, willing to travel, flexible, proactive and stress-resistant. However, traits generally associated with innovativeness, such as intellectual curiosity, boundary spanning, sociability or teamwork and cooperation, were not found in the data. Although advertisements for junior buyers featured less combined skills, a higher number of advertisements than those for more senior jobs featured at least one personality trait and they were more heavily emphasised. Inderscience Publishers - linking academia, business and industry through research

Title: Purchasing and supply management skills and personality traits across roles: a job advertisements perspective

Authors: Vojtěch Klézl; Stephen Kelly; Klaas Stek; Jan Vašek

Addresses: Örebro University School of Business, Fakultetsgatan 1, Örebro, 702 81, Sweden ' Edge Hill University, St Helens Road, Ormskirk, L39 4QP, UK ' Department of Technology Management and Supply, University of Twente, Drienerlolaan 5, 7522 NB Enschede, The Netherlands; Working Group 'Industrial Marketing, Purchasing and Supply Management', Institute of Business Economics and Industrial Sociology, Graz University of Technology, Kopernikusgasse 24/II, 8010 Graz, Austria ' University of Chemistry and Technology, Technická 5, 166 28, Prague, Czech Republic

Abstract: This paper contributes to a growing trajectory of research on purchasing and supply management skills and requirements and uses job advertisements as a novel source of data and research perspective. Our findings broadly corroborate the extant literature in showing which skills are required across different hierarchical organisational levels. Our analysis also identified the key and hitherto underexplored personality traits required by PSM professionals. At a holistic level, the findings show that employers have a clear and consistent view of PSM personality: being conscientious and able to work independently, willing to travel, flexible, proactive and stress-resistant. However, traits generally associated with innovativeness, such as intellectual curiosity, boundary spanning, sociability or teamwork and cooperation, were not found in the data. Although advertisements for junior buyers featured less combined skills, a higher number of advertisements than those for more senior jobs featured at least one personality trait and they were more heavily emphasised.

Keywords: purchasing and supply management skills; personality traits; Big Five model of personality; job advertisements; conscientiousness; purchasing and supply management professionals.

DOI: 10.1504/IJPM.2022.122595

International Journal of Procurement Management, 2022 Vol.15 No.3, pp.281 - 304

Received: 29 Oct 2021
Accepted: 30 Oct 2021
Published online: 03 May 2022 *

Title: Purchasing and supply management skills and personality traits across roles: a job advertisements perspective

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