U.S. chief procurement officers’ perspectives on public procurement

Abstract

Each year public procurement officials in the United States spend trillions of dollars to purchase goods and services for public use. The volume of public procurement spending compels public administration and supply chain management scholars to examine these procurement practices. Based on a unique dataset composed of a series of qualitative and quantitative interviews with chief procurement officers (CPOs) and their team members from 45 states and 2 territories in the United States, this paper explores the key institutional factors affecting state-level public procurement in the U.S., explores variation in the definition of contract performance, and assess the importance of multiple factors in creating procurement contracts. We present an agenda for future research on state-level public procurement in the U.S that has important implications for the theory and practice of public procurement.