Strategy . Influence . Innovation . Process

Once the current economic turmoil is over CPOs will need to develop new strategies to maintain executive attention. The economic downturn has highlighted the role procurement can play as a creator of value but many CEOs still view the function mainly in terms of cost savings rather than as enablers of growth. Having gained the [...]

Yesterday, Specsavers placed an add for a Director of Supply Chain Finance. This is a bold move for which Specsavers should be congratulated and reflects the growing importance of Procurement and the Supply Chain. The problem for procurement is that they are seeking qualified accountants to apply for this job, not supply management experts with [...]

Herein we argue that through their joint focus and contribution to the organisations brands and reputation. Marketing and Procurement should be natural allies. “Our Focus is on markets and brands, but without an effective supply chain, we cannot even begin to compete” Chairman, Unilever The Role of Supply Management in Brand Building: The statement above [...]

The recession and financial crisis have shaken shareholders’ faith in corporate boards and management. How can confidence be restored? Read More

The foundation for modern supply management strategy has been built upon Peter Kraljic’s matrix, “portfolio analysis” model. It has provided the foundation on which many procurement board presentations, organisational designs and careers have been built. The primary object of Kraljics matrix was to focus on the risks and opportunities presented by the supply market. Now, [...]

A recent posting over on Supply Excellence left me questioning how far has procurement has really developed over the years. My major difficulty in using the vendors document starts right at the beginning of the procurement process – the message it sends to the vendor is that ‘the buyer does not know what they want’ [...]

One of the many battles procurement often finds itself in is its right to manage the supplier relationship. Often there is in no governance in place to support procurements claim. A claim which must be won if it is to claim its place at the top table and steer outsourcing strategy for their organisation. Below [...]

CPO’s must have an outsourcing strategy for their company – so here are some pointers to help you develop your outsourcing strategy. Before outsourcing any part of their organization, companies should answer questions like the following as part of a rigorous evaluation: 1. What are the goals we want to achieve from outsourcing? 2. What [...]

Most CEO’s and CFO’s could only guess about how much their company spends on goods and services, and certainly could not express this in terms of meaningful supply market facing spend categories. The reason for this is that it is not normally a requirement in financial statements or accounts. Yet, most companies spend between 30 [...]

Raising procurements game – managing conflicting stakeholder interest: That procurement must treat its stakeholders as customers in not in question. However, the notion that procurement must ‘Kowtow’ to these stakeholders for mutual benefit is absurd. Whilst procurement must have a strategy to collaborate with stakeholders, touched upon in the “Brave CPO” to build trust, collaborative [...]