Are We Focused On The Right Transformation Objectives?
Art of Procurement
February 20, 2019
There is no sense in fighting an uphill battle to transform into a procurement function that does something other than what our executive team has in mind. This is true whether our journey forward follows the path described by other leading procurement organizations or not.
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Tags: Digital Transformation, Procurement, Supply Chain
The Procurement Maturity Curve – Managing Risk Inside & Out – Part 1
Determine
February 19, 2019
In the past, we’ve taken a close look at how the procurement maturity curve affects its focus. Two recent posts addressed issues concerning the evolving role of procurement savings, information and technology. In this two-part blog series, we’ll consider supply chain risk in the context of procurement’s maturity. We start by looking at supplier risk and the available methods to monitor and mitigate it. Then we’ll examine internal vs. external sources of risk.
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Tags: Procurement, Supply Chain
Is B2B driving B2C supply chain innovation, or vice versa?
ATSC Blog
February 18, 2019
Every supply chain manager is also an individual consumer, and there can be no doubt that the innovations in one market often alter the demand, offerings and consumer expectations of the other. Despite the fact that we have different priorities and perspectives on our personal spend than we do corporate spend, the rate of idea exchange between the two markets seems to be speeding up, ultimately bringing business and consumer supply chain and logistics closer together.
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Tags: Customer Experience, Procurement, Supply Chain
Combating Leadership Fatigue
Art of Procurement
February 05, 2019
NASCAR doesn’t fill its cars with regular unleaded, and SpaceX doesn’t either. High-performance engines need a specialized kind of fuel to achieve top speed and performance along with advanced maintenance. If you’re moving in the fast lane, you need to do the same for yourself. A little bit of support and self-care can go a long way, increasing your results and your professional satisfaction over the long term.
It isn’t a weakness to admit that being a superstar is taking a toll on you. In fact, it may be the wisest thing you ever do. Make sure you protect yourself before you reach the point of burnout, or worse, ‘walk out’.
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Tags: Change Management, Innovation, Leadership
The January ISM-New York Report on Business: Long Term Growth Without Employment?
Buyers Meeting Point
February 04, 2019
In January, New York City purchasing managers indicated short term decreases in the face of longer term optimism, according to the survey taken by the Institute for Supply Management-New York.
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Tags: Procurement, Supply Chain
The Procurement Maturity Curve, Part 2: Savings — and Value — at Every Stage
Determine
January 17, 2019
Part One of this two-part series on procurement maturity looked at how procurement is (and likely always will be at some level) linked to savings, even as our perspective on those savings changes. But the scope of procurement’s role has expanded. Technology and data are accelerating procurement along the value continuum and expanding our contributions beyond the bottom line. In Part Two, we look at how procurement professionals can leverage tools to increase our organizational effectiveness — and influence.
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Tags: Procurement, Supply Chain
Imagining a World Without (Good) Spend Analysis
SynerTrade
January 17, 2019
Before procurement had spend analysis solutions at our disposal, every question about historical purchasing activity led to unthinkable manual work or a big question mark. Now that we can centralize, cleanse, and normalize data for analysis - often with the assistance of tailor-made automation – many of us have stopped thinking about what life was like without it. But not all spend analysis is up to the task. In fact, having inferior spend analysis can be almost as bad as not having spend analysis at all. Poor spend analysis inflates expectations about the level of visibility we have, and may artificially inflate our confidence about how well we understand the spend we’re working to manage.
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Tags: Digital Transformation, Procurement
The Procurement Maturity Curve, Part 1: Savings at Every Stage
Determine
January 15, 2019
After multiple years of transformation (first procurement, then digital), most of us have accepted the idea that we work in a state of perpetual change and self-examination. What are my company’s current practices? What am I doing to advance myself or my team to the next level? How does that compare to what my competition is doing? Isn’t this striving for growth what “procurement maturity” is all about?
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Tags: Digital Transformation, Procurement
The December ISM-NewYork Report on Business: Downward Close to 2018
Buyers Meeting Point
January 03, 2019
I couldn’t help thinking about this month’s survey findings while watching the rain fall down on the New Year’s Eve revelers in Times Square on Monday night. For months, outlook and business conditions remained cautiously optimistic despite fears of global trade disputes. In December, it all finally came crashing down.
If I try to step back and think objectively about what this month’s report teaches us, I see both good news and bad news – despite December’s downturn.
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Tags: Management, Procurement, Supply Chain
Wondering What Your Procurement Contracts are Worth?
Determine
January 03, 2019
It would be easy to calculate the value of a contract by multiplying projected volume, negotiated costs and term. Accuracy notwithstanding, this answer limits the 'value' of the contract to its transactional footprint. Any procurement organization that insists their value transcends savings dollars or spend under management has to be willing to take the same approach when determining total contract value.
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Tags: Digital Transformation, Procurement
Additional Commentary on the November ISM-NewYork Report on Business: Outlook Stands Alone
Buyers Meeting Point
December 04, 2018
In November, New York City purchasing managers indicated lower conditions in all indices but two, the Six-Month Outlook and Prices Paid.
Current Business Conditions reached a seven-month low, coming in at 67.8 in November. Current Business Conditions have fallen between 2 and 4 points per month for the last three months.
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Tags: Procurement, Supply Chain
Making the Business Case for Digital Procurement this Budget Season
SynerTrade
December 04, 2018
The days remaining in this fiscal year are slipping away quickly. All across the enterprise, decision makers’ attention is turning to 2019. The start of a new year brings new budgets – along with all their ups and downs. Procurement’s spend management mandate might lead one to expect that we have an inside line on securing funds, but this is not usually the case. Procurement teams have varying levels of visibility and influence during the annual budgeting process – especially when it comes to making the case for investment in our own technology. And an investment in digital procurement can be the difference between ‘getting by’ and ‘getting ahead’.
Procurement teams that have successfully transformed into a strategic and digitally-enabled function have stronger relationships with stakeholders and executive leadership. This is partially because of the increased access to information that transformation provides and partially because of reduced ‘static’ thanks to access to integrated, end-to-end digital procurement.
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Tags: Digital Transformation, Procurement, Supply Chain
3 Procurement Software Obstacles to Change
SynerTrade
November 13, 2018
“Hooray! Change!” said absolutely no one ever.
We work in a time of rapid, disruptive change. Today’s innovation is tomorrow’s passé trend, and yesterday’s innovation is… well, who can remember yesterday?
Procurement is often in the driver’s seat for change management efforts, and we must deal with natural resistance to change as well as competition from other enterprise projects. The following obstacles are commonly – and uniquely – faced by procurement teams in the course of rolling out processes and technology...
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Tags: Procurement, Supply Chain
Business Survey Chair Commentary on the October ISM-New York Report on Business: "Hotter Jobs Under Cooler Conditions"
Buyers Meeting Point
November 02, 2018
In October, New York City purchasing managers reported yet another new high level of Employment while indicating lower Current Business Conditions and a lower Six-Month Outlook, according to the survey taken by the Institute for Supply Management-New York.
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Tags: Management, Procurement
Policy or Practice? Supply Chain Risk Management in Reality
All Things Supply Chain Blog
October 29, 2018
It is a scary reality for companies with global raw material supply chains that the data does not always exist to verify the source of the metals they and their suppliers buy. We can invest in supply chain risk management and/or compliance solutions and regularly audit our supply chains, but reliable visibility remains elusive.
This is not just a challenge for small or growing companies. The firms named in the WSJ article include Fortune Global 500 regulars such as Apple, VW, and Samsung. If they cannot keep conflict minerals out of their high visibility supply chains, how can any company hope to?
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Tags: Procurement, Supply Chain, Sustainability
Fleet Innovation - Beyond the Robots
ATSC Blog
October 08, 2018
Driverless fleet vehicles (a.k.a. autonomous trucks) have everyone so excited that you might finish your daily read of news from around the industry and think it is the only promising area of innovation in logistics. While fully autonomous fleets probably won’t become mainstream for a few years (at least!), there are plenty of other potentially disruptive advancements being rolled out right now – and not a single one of them involves robots.
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Tags: Autonomous Vehicles, Innovation, Supply Chain
Comparing the Merits of Digital and Electronic Invoicing
SynerTrade
October 04, 2018
If digital and electronic invoicing sound like the same thing to you, you’re not alone. Can an invoice be one and not the other? Absolutely.
With all of the hype surrounding digital (i.e. digitalization, digitization, digital transformation), it seems like the optimal form for invoicing. And yet, it has its limits. A PDF is digital, as is a Word document, a photograph and even a freeform text file. Digital just means that information is stored in ‘soft’ copy rather than on paper. And while an e-mailable soft copy is worlds better than a piece of paper, it doesn’t necessarily leverage the speed, efficiency, or effort-reducing capabilities of computing. Taking a picture of a paper invoice technically makes it digital, but that doesn’t make the data in that invoice accessible to most software programs.
The alternative to a digital invoice is an electronic invoice. Rather than being scans or images of invoice information, electronic invoices contain data directly in a file and, more importantly, in a format that can be accessed and interpreted by software. Electronic invoices change the playing field for companies looking to invest in either invoice automation or the automaton of the end-to-end P2P process, but they aren’t always the friendliest or most convenient format for the humans involved in the invoicing process.
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Tags: Innovation, Procurement
The September ISM-New York Report on Business: Help Wanted! Employment reaches a new all-time high
Buyers Meeting Point
October 02, 2018
In September, New York City purchasing managers reported the highest Employment number on record, according to the survey taken by the Institute for Supply Management-New York. Current Business Conditions were at 72.5 in September, a 4 point drop from the 12-year high of 76.5 in August. There are two really significant findings in this month’s report: employment and quantity. Both are interesting from an economics perspective, but you have to view them through a procurement lens to get the full color.
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Tags: Management, Procurement
Elements of a Diversified #Procurement Technology #ROI - Tracking the Value of Time, Efficiency and Risk Management
SynerTrade
September 06, 2018
When procurement is looking to select and implement new or replace Source to pay software, our focus is often on gathering requirements and comparing qualified alternatives. But we can’t view ourselves as the only stakeholders for the effort.
One of the earliest hurdles we must often get past is delivering a business case that documents the ROI corporate leadership can expect to see from the implementation.
Sure – there’s always savings, and no procurement technology ROI calculation would be complete without that element, but in an environment where every function, team, and individual is looked at to deliver ‘more’, a savings-only ROI may seem one dimensional.
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Tags: Customer Experience, Management, Procurement
A Dose of Our Own Medicine: Improving Procurement Technology Selection and Implementation
Buyers Meeting Point
September 06, 2018
Working with a third party that specializes in selecting and implementing procurement technology offers a number of advantages, not the least of which is driving business outcomes. While completing a project on time and on budget are important considerations, the implications of prioritizing them over finding the right solution are significant – and long lasting. Although many procurement organizations have one or more IT category managers on staff, they rarely possess current expertise focused on procurement technology because their attention and effort are required elsewhere (like managing categories relevant to the business).
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Tags: Culture, Digital Transformation, Procurement
The August ISM-New York Report on Business: Nowhere to go but down... except up
Buyers Meeting Point
September 05, 2018
In August, New York City purchasing managers reported significant highs in Current Business Conditions and Current and Expected Revenues. Current Business Conditions were at 76.5, a new 12 year high over the 75.0 seen in July, but still failing to surpass the 77.1 reported in November of 2006.
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Tags: Procurement, Supply Chain
AI Needs Us More than We Need It – For Now
ATSC Blog
September 03, 2018
Imaginative business leaders dream of applying AI to spend data analytics, achieving full supply chain transparency, and deftly automating internal buyer support. While these remain on the table as potential applications for AI in procurement and supply chain, AI is being held back like many of the other enterprise technologies we implemented with equally lofty goals.
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Tags: AI, Procurement, Supply Chain
Evading the Strategy Trap in Pursuit of Procurement Agility
Determine
August 22, 2018
Procurement’s desire to be agile is as well-documented and frequently discussed as our interest in transformation. In both cases, however, we are at risk of falling into the ‘strategy trap’ – the lack of clarity, direction and actionability that accompany all things non-tactical.
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Tags: Digital Transformation, Leadership, Procurement
Survey Chair Commentary: The July 2018 ISM-New York Report on Business
Buyers Meeting Point
August 02, 2018
The findings in this month’s survey are nothing short remarkable. Not only do we have a number of milestone index levels, they are high across the board. This is the only time that all of these indices have been collected (current and expected revenues have only been collected since February of 2012) and that they have all been above 60. Keep in mind, too, that we closed the survey for July on Friday the 27th – the day that the Q2 2018 GDP of 4.1% was announced – meaning that all of the optimism associated with that day did not meaningfully affect this month’s results.
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Tags: Procurement
The Private Company Paradox
Procurious
August 02, 2018
Many procurement teams have been tasked with diversifying the supply base. This often means partnering with small, diverse, or locally-sourced suppliers.
One challenge that arises is that many of the companies that qualify for such programs are privately owned. The lack of information that usually accompanies private ownership is at odds with procurement’s transparent supplier evaluation frameworks. Add to this the fact that participating in an RFP process just to be ‘diversity fodder’ is onerous and potentially even harmful to small businesses, and we’re left with a paradox:
How can procurement stay true to our mandate while also finding mutually beneficial opportunities for small and diverse businesses?
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Tags: Innovation, Procurement, Sustainability
Advantages of Having the Right End-to-End Procurement Software Solution in Place
SynerTrade
July 26, 2018
The value of working with one company, on one platform, for all procurement technology needs can be measured through ease of use, user adoption, and functionality. The advantage of taking a platform approach – with the right platform and partner – is that the results and intelligence derived from using the system are as expansive as the automation, user groups, and processes it encompasses.
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Tags: Digital Transformation, Procurement, Supply Chain
Procurement steps up its game
Determine
July 24, 2018
In this, the third of our four-part blog series for the release of CPO Rising 2018: The Age of Intelligence, Kelly Barner of Buyers Meeting Point delves into the myriad facets of Procurement Performance in Chapter Three. There’s no debate that the importance and influence of procurement is on the rise across industries, but the question is, are procurement’s metrics – like spend under management – truly representative of those accomplishments?
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Tags: Analytics, Procurement
Making the Case for Libertarian Procurement
Procurious
July 10, 2018
Technology and consumer expectations have advanced to the point where we can consider the possibilities of ‘Libertarian’ procurement, an approach to spend management and compliance that nods to the free will of buyers whenever possible, even if it means giving up some of the ‘control’ traditionally associated with spend management.
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Tags: Procurement
Survey Chair Commentary: The June ISM-New York Report on Business
Buyers Meeting Point
July 03, 2018
In June, New York City purchasing managers indicated a solid end to the second quarter in the form of strong forward-looking business conditions and employment. At the highest level, this month’s findings were almost ‘directionally ideal’. What do I mean by that? Anything that we would want to see go up (current business conditions and employment) goes up and prices paid goes down.
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Tags: Procurement
Common Misconceptions About the Summer Supply Chain
All Things Supply Chain Blog
June 25, 2018
Freight is considered a leading indicator for the economy, and for good reason: goods have to be in place (or at least in distribution centers) before they can travel the final mile and be sold or delivered. This means that while many of us are ramping down for a few months, logistics activity is heating up along with the weather.
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Tags: Supply Chain
Survey Chair Commentary: The May ISM-New York Report on Business
Buyers Meeting Point
June 04, 2018
The May ISM-New York Report on Business was released on June 4th at 9:45am Eastern. This post reviews the report's actual findings as well as an interpretation of their meaning.
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Tags: Procurement
The Story Behind the Numbers: The April 2018 ISM-New York Report on Business
linkedin
May 02, 2018
Current Business Conditions were at 64.3 in April, reaching the highest level since January when they reached an eleven plus year high of 72.5. The Six-Month Outlook fell to 58.4 in April. With the exception of the small increase we reported in March, the six-month outlook has declined every month since December 2017.
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Tags: Procurement, Management
The Story Behind the Numbers: The February ISM-New York Report on Business
linkedin
March 02, 2018
The February ISM-New York Report on Business was released on March 2nd at 9:45am Eastern and is available for download on the ISM-New York site. You can also hear my podcast commentary on BMP Radio, part of the Art of Procurement Network.
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Tags: Procurement, Management
The Story Behind the Numbers of the January ISM-New York Report on Business: Optimism Today, Optimism Tomorrow
linkedin
February 02, 2018
Current Business Conditions were at 72.5 in January, up almost 20 points from December. This marks the highest level reported since November of 2006 when current business conditions were at 77.1. At that time, the Six-Month Outlook was also in growth territory at 73.0, but it was lower than what we are seeing this month.
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Tags: Procurement, Management
Call for input: Preserving Trust and Respect in Negotiations
linkedin
September 21, 2017
Mark Bilgin, career negotiator and the author of Mastering High Stakes Negotiations (2017), and I will be doing a regular podcast series – one that we’re looking for community input on. Our first discussion (next week) will be focused on the importance of trust and respect in negotiation: how to foster them and signs that they are missing.
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Tags: Procurement, Management
Help! My webinar topic sounds boring!
linkedin
January 24, 2017
This content was originally featured on the Webinara blog.
One of the things we have talked and written about at length here at Webinara is the importance of having a compelling topic for your event. That topic is what will get people’s attention when you want them to register. It will give them the incentive to show up for the live event. Lastly, it will ensure that you hold their attention while you share your content.
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Tags: Procurement, Management
Capt. Sully Sullenberger on Crisis Leadership (Revisited)
Buyers Meeting Point
September 15, 2016
January 15, 2019 marks the 10-year anniversary of the "Miracle on the Hudson". I’m as struck by his leadership now as I was then. While he is first and foremost talking about teamwork and leadership, he also teaches us about the tradeoffs of cost and risk, preparation and prevention.
My original focus was on the line about a “false dichotomy between cost and safety” but today the idea that “safety can pay for itself” stands out. After all, procurement organizations today are looking to stretch their influence beyond savings. Could a strategic, value driven approach to managing the supply chain have enough of an operational impact on the company that it would outweigh the direct bottom line impact from traditional savings? That is a question that each team will have to answer for themselves and their unique circumstances.
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Tags: Culture, Leadership, Procurement
How Procurement Saved the American Revolution
Buyers Meeting Point
July 04, 2014
As we prepare to celebrate the 4th of July in the United States, we have a lot to be grateful for. We are grateful for the simple things like peak of summer traditions: fireworks, grilling, and parades. We are also grateful that in the many years since the Declaration of Independence was signed our relationship with Britain has improved. We’d be awfully sorry not to be able to work with our British colleagues and partners.
All that being said, is the 4th of July a reason to be grateful for procurement? Absolutely. Procurement played more of a role in the American Revolutionary War than most people probably realize.
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Tags: Leadership, Procurement, Supply Chain
How Procurement Saved the American Revolution
Buyers Meeting Point
July 04, 2014
As we prepare to celebrate the 4th of July in the United States, we have a lot to be grateful for. We are grateful for the simple things like peak of summer traditions: fireworks, grilling, and parades. We are also grateful that in the many years since the Declaration of Independence was signed our relationship with Britain has improved. We’d be awfully sorry not to be able to work with our British colleagues and partners.
All that being said, is the 4th of July a reason to be grateful for procurement? Absolutely. Procurement played more of a role in the American Revolutionary War than most people probably realize.
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Tags: Leadership, Procurement, Supply Chain
Finance Unleashed
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Automation Deployment And Change Management Best Practices
SIL Podcast: High-Stakes Procurement w/ Kelly Barner
Negotiating for the Unknown: Buying Emerging Technologies
Boosting Supplier Performance with 360° Information