Art of Procurement

Joining me today on the show is Pierre Lapree.  Pierre founded Per Angusta, a procurement project pipeline and performance tracking tool, over four years ago following a career within IT, and then procurement, at staffing firm Adecco.  For regular listeners, you may recall that Pierre was previously one of our revolutionaries at The Procurement Revolution event that I co-founded with Kelly Barner last September. Today, we talk all about the savings process.  Specifically, what are the actions that we can take to bring trust, transparency and consistency to the savings tracking process. It is widely reported that CFO’s neither trust our reported numbers, nor see the majority of our claimed savings dropping to the bottom line.  So, what can we do to bridge the gap.  Listen in as Pierre and I discuss the best practices that we have observed and implemented throughout our careers – both as practitioners and service providers.

Today I am joined by Michael Shaw.  Michael is well known through the Sourcing industry, particularly here in the US, he is currently chairperson of the American Council of Sourcing and Procurement Executives. The heart of today’s conversation revolves around a concept called 3SI – Supplier Specific Sourcing Intelligence. The premise is that a number of companies struggle to access the supplier market intelligence that they need to really enable them to build win-win relationships with key suppliers.  We tend to focus on win-lose, or leverage when it comes to using market intelligence.  Following the principles of 3SI provides the ability to craft deals with key partners – and Michael provides an example of a Microsoft licensing deal – that provide better results than a typical negotiation would achieve.

Today I have a really insightful interview to share with Jonathan Grant and Ben Szostek, two senior leaders within the procurement group at Newell Brands. Jonathan and Ben have been on a journey to bring advanced analytics capabilities to Newell Brands, delivered through a center of excellence model. In today’s discussion, we talk about some of the tactics they use, from clean sheet costing and cost modelling to negotiation fact packs which is a concept I really like. You will also hear examples of different sources of data used, the skill sets necessary to build out a team like this, and how advanced analytics are being applied to both Direct and Indirect areas of spend. If you have an interest in understanding how you can build an advanced analytics capability, this is a must listen!

Today on the Art of Procurement, I welcome back David Bush, the Chief Revenue Officer for SpendHQ. David joined me back in Episode 139 to share his advice on the steps that procurement leaders can take to gain greater visibility into supplier spend, which is the foundation of robust procurement strategies. Today we continue the conversation with a look to the future - how will spend analytics evolve, and what impact are emerging technologies likely to have in the way we understand and gain visibility into the products and services that we buy.

It is Independence Day week here in the US, and so what I thought I would do today is to go back into the achieves and replay one of my solo shows that I recorded almost 18 months ago now.  It is a topic that I remain passionate about – why I think we in procurement should care less about being “best-in-class”, and more about what our internal organization really needs from a procurement function.

We have all read the blog posts and listened to the talking heads who inform us that Generation X believes this, and Millennials believe that. But are these generational labels actually true, or do we use them as a lazy or misinformed way to try and understand and connect with peers who are not within our own age group.  That is the topic of today’s Art of Procurement. I am joined in today’s discussion by two experts in the field.  Jim Baehr is group lead for Sourcing Strategies Group and through roles both in consulting and as a procurement leader has helped a number of organizations through procurement transformation initiatives. Joining Jim is Mike Urick. Mike is Graduate Director and Assistant Professor at St. Vincent College in Latrobe, Pennsylvania.  Both Jim and Mike have joined forces to explore the future of work and the impact of generational labels at they seek to understand how procurement leaders can mitigate the coming talent shortage in our profession.

Today on the pod I am joined by David Bush, formerly of IASTA and Determine, and now Chief Revenue Officer for spend analytics specialist SpendHQ. It has been a year since I first met David, and so his appearance on the Art of Procurement is long overdue! I invited David onto the show discuss the topic of spend analytics.  Spend analytics have always been a bit of a pain for me - I have spent a lot of time playing with pivot tables and searching Google to try and categorize suppliers which leads to lots of errors and a lot of time invested! But I know that it doesn’t have to be like that.   I invited David on to the show to hear his advice on the steps that procurement leaders can take to gain greater visibility into supplier spend, which is the foundation of robust procurement strategies.

We are in for a treat this week on the show.  I am joined by Steve Wozniak, the co-founder of Apple, the inventor of the personal computer, and a serial entrepreneur.  Steve really needs no introduction! Steve recently keynoted the Coupa Inspire conference in San Francisco that I attended a couple of weeks ago.  Coupa arranged for Steve to spend 15 minutes with me after he got off stage, and so fresh off his fireside chat, we sat down and I recorded the conversation. As I considered what kind of questions to ask to maximize our 15 minutes together, I focused on areas that have been a key part of Woz’s experiences as an innovator, and from his first-hand experience building the Apple brand with Steve Jobs.

This Month in Procurement returns, and this week Mark and I welcome a special guest, Sigi Osagie. Sigi is the charismatic author of the popular procurement book, Procurement Mojo, and a has an extensive background driving performance improvement and change across multiple functions and industries - both as a practitioner and business owner. Mark and I invited Sigi to join us this month to chat about Procurement Mojo, and to hear Sigi’s perspective on some of the actions we can take to create procurement success.

At the Art of Procurement, we get many press releases - usually detailing client wins, technology updates, or company acquisitions.  However, there was one that came across my desk recently announcing the launch of an Indirect Procurement Standard. With my interest piqued, I reached out to the author of the Standard - Sime Curkovic - to learn more. Sime is Professor of Supply Chain Management at Western Michigan University, and joins me on the show today to share more details about the Indirect Procurement Standard - what was the need, how was it developed, and what does the final output looks like.