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24 January 2013 | Adam Leach

The breadth of the procurement challenges and opportunities that come with working at the Department of Work & Pensions was what attracted Andrew Forzani to his new role.

This month it was announced Forzani, who was previously head of procurement and commissioning at Surrey County Council, has been appointed as procurement director at the DWP, where he will start in March.

In the role - where he will report directly to commercial director David Smith - Forzani will play a central part in helping the department meet its ambitious reform agenda, including universal credit, the work programme and a range of commercial goals.

Speaking to SM, he explained the department’s high profile and large spend attracted him to the role: “Its size and scale is really attractive and the complexity in terms of what DWP has to deliver with regard to government reform agenda. A lot of that will be delivered through the commercial agenda and a network of contractors, that will be really challenging and complex.”

As with the Work Programme, many of the projects that DWP will be rolling out will involve a large amount of contractors, putting the procurement team at the core of its work. For Forzani, this gave the role extra appeal. “There’s a really strong sense that under David’s leadership, [David Smith, DWP commercial director] this is a procurement team that’s very well listened to and has real influence over this huge department,” he said.

Past CIPS president Smith added the DWP had received more than 140 applications for the role from a high calibre of procurement professionals. He told SM that they got the right man: “We’ve been lucky enough to secure the best applicant and we’re really pleased. Andrew is from an area of local government that has shown huge commercial improvement [Surrey County Council has won three CIPS Supply Management awards over the past two years] and that’s what we’re buying here.”