Our vision is to create a safe and sustainable world.

Ricardo, member of WSP, is a global strategic, environmental, and engineering consulting company. With over 100 years of engineering excellence and employing close to 3,000 employees in more than 20 countries, we provide exceptional levels of expertise in delivering leading-edge and innovative cross-sector sustainable products and solutions. Every day, we enable our customers to solve the most complex and dynamic challenges to help achieve a safe and sustainable world.

The role 

We’re looking for a highly organised and detail-focused Purchasing Administrator / Trainee Buyer to join our supportive procurement team. Perfect for someone who enjoys admin, supplier communication, and wants a clear progression route into a Buyer role.

The sucessful candidate will be responsible for:

• Administration of indirect purchasing including raising and placing Purchase Orders.
• Follow-up correspondence and enquiry handling including expediting goods or services.
• Receipting services on the system and handling invoice queries.
• Expediting production parts – emailing / calling suppliers for update or confirmation dates.
• Expect to develop into Buyer with own portfolio of production items to manage.

Autonomy: You will begin with close supervision and clear processes, progressing towards independent working.
Problem Solving: Initially escalate issues, developing towards suggesting and implementing your own solutions.
Knowledge & Complexity: Follow established procurement processes, using common sense to prioritise issues and identify opportunities for efficiency.
Accountability: Responsible for placing approved orders; over time, you’ll move towards placing your own orders up to £10,000.
Leadership: No management responsibilities.

What makes the role great

• Full training provided.
• Ongoing mentoring and career development support.
• Welcoming, friendly team who will help you settle in.
• Mostly site-based in Leamington Spa.
• Some UK travel may be required.
• Daily supplier interaction.
• Access to LinkedIn Learning for continued development.

Essential Skills

• Exceptional attention to detail.
• Persistence in gathering data and chasing information.
• Confident making phone calls and communicating in person.
• Excellent written communication skills for accurate and concise emails.
• Strong Microsoft Excel skills.
• Highly organised and efficient, with strong time‑management skills.
• Previous service industry or office experience.
• Enjoys working through structured tasks and admin processes.
• Able to work both independently and as part of a supportive team.
• Uses initiative and common sense.
• Full UK driver’s licence.
• Preferred degree: Engineering, Maths, Economics, or Science.
• Minimum qualifications: GCSE Maths & English at Grade 6/B or above.
• Minimum 3 A‑Levels at Grade C or above.

Desirable Skills

• Experience in an office environment within manufacturing, engineering, or similar (not essential)
• Interest in building a long‑term career as a Buyer or in Supply Chain.

Working here

You will be warmly welcomed into our workplace where every voice matters. We are diverse thinkers and doers, coming together to create a culture of inclusion. We will support you to find your place.

We will encourage you to use your passion and expertise to make a positive impact through the projects you work on.  Your knowledge and desire to bring about change will be invaluable in helping deliver innovative solutions that support communities across the globe in becoming safer and more sustainable.

Benefits

We want you to know how much you are valued. Your remuneration and benefits package will reflect that. You will receive a range of benefits which include support for your physical and mental health. 

Our core benefits include 25 days' annual leave, plus 8 flexible bank holidays, a competitive company pension scheme, life assurance and professional subscriptions reimbursement. We also offer a wide range of flexible benefits to suit your lifestyle.

Diversity, Equality, and Inclusion statement

We are an Equal Opportunity Employer, we believe in each person's potential, and we'll help you reach yours. We have an ambitious diversity, equality, and inclusion approach as explained here. We value diversity; recognising that a more diverse workforce creates a richer and more varied working environment. Diversity also drives innovation, by allowing us to offer our clients the best consultancy service that we can. As part of our commitment to engage positively and pro-actively with all our employees and to ensure an inclusive culture, we are a recognised as a 'disability confident' employer.

Next steps

Once you have submitted your application a member of our Recruitment Team will be in touch. Please be aware that the timing can vary dependent on the volume of applications that we receive for each role and in some cases, we may start to review applications prior to the closing date.

Ricardo is a Disability confident employer please advise the recruitment team via recruit@ricardo.com if you require any adjustments to support you throughout the recruitment process.