Art of Procurement

Pierre Mitchell was the first supply chain practitioner to become a procurement "industry analyst" with roles at AMR Research (now Gartner) followed by The Hackett Group, and now Spend Matters. There are few people, if any, that cover procurement than understand, and have such passion for, the growth of our profession. Both Pierre and I were together last week at the ISM Inside Indirect Conference...

On today's Art of Procurement, I answer a listener question. The question was: how do you make a supplier happy. Now, I'm going to assume that the right answer isn't to give them riches for providing peanuts! So, I sat down and thought through 6 different ways that I think we can all put at least a half smile on the faces of our suppliers this Christmas! For more information, visit: http://artofpr...

I will be in Las Vegas this week at the ISM Indirect Conference, and with Las Vegas also known as Sin City, I thought it would be fun to look back at some old Art of Procurement episodes and come up with a list of 10 sins of procurement! Now, frankly, there are a lot more than 10!  However, I had to stop somewhere! These are inspired by my own experiences, and the guests that we have had on the sh...

This week I welcome Gordon Donovan on to the Art of Procurement.  Gordon is a presently a member of the procurement leadership team at Metro Trains Melbourne, and he has a broad range of experiences as a practitioner including Head of Procurement roles, consultant and training. Gordon's career spans both the UK and Australia, and includes roles at organizations such as the UK National Health Servi...

With it being a holiday weekend here in the United States, I thought I would do is share with you one of my favorite submissions from The Procurement Revolution event from back in late September. More and more, I believe the mindset is a key enabler or roadblock in our efforts to think differently and elevate the procurement value proposition.  Without that change in mindset, it makes the other ne...

Scott Gillespie is an expert in procurement, and corporate travel.  He was an original member of the AT Kearney team that launched the 7-step sourcing process in the 1990's, and has since founded a number of companies with a focus on helping organizations better understand, benchmark and measure the performance of their corporate travel programs.  Scott also authors the popular blog Gillespie's Gu...

Today's episode is in response to a listener question.  I was recently asked for guidance on how to maintain supplier relationships following a tough incumbent negotiation - particularly one that occurs mid-contract.  Listen in to hear my share five considerations that I have used both as a practitioner and service provider to maintain relationships with my suppliers and clients following difficul...

Jimmy Anklesaria is one of the most prominent thought leaders in procurement today.  Jimmy is considered by many as the go-to expert when it comes to the strategic management of cost. He literally wrote the book (well, two books), and regularly travels the globe helping organizations reduce their third party costs.  Importantly, he does this not through the leveraging of power but by using data as...

I sat down to record today's episode just a couple of hours after Donald Trump emerged victorious in the US presidential election.  And today, I am going to replay a discussion with CPO and former Chief Risk Officer Susan Grelling that I first published in the aftermath of the UK Brexit vote early in the year. In our conversation, Susan shared the steps that procurement can take to help our organi...

In today's Art of Procurement we take a look inside the career journey of Alex Brown, long time Chief Procurement Officer for Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) and GLOBALFOUNDRIES, and winner of the 2013 Zycus High Performing Procurement Leader award. In this wide ranging discussion focused on developing a long term career in procurement, Alex shares a number of key decision points that he had to make...

Today is the Art of Procurement's first birthday! What a crazy, and rewarding, 12 months it has been.   Today I go behind the scenes at the Art of Procurement.  I look back at the first 12 months and reflect how the show has evolved over the past 12 months - and importantly what are some of the lessons that I have learned.  Not procurement lessons, but lessons from my journey as a podcast host. I...

Jimmy Anklesaria is one of the most prominent thought leaders in procurement today.  Jimmy is considered by many as the go-to expert when it comes to the strategic management of cost. He literally wrote the book (well, two books), and regularly travels the globe helping organizations reduce their third party costs.  Importantly, he does this not through the leveraging of power but by using data as...

I was thrilled to be a part of the Zycus event as the media partner for the conference. As part of the partnership, I was able to moderate a main stage panel event and present a separate session in the leadership tract. In today's episode, I provide an overview of the two sessions that I was involved in. I also share my key takeaways from the activities that I was able to attend - with topics such...

Unless you are new to the show, you will have heard me talk all about The Procurement Revolution event that I co-organized with Kelly Barner of Buyers Meeting Point.  We were thrilled with how the event panned out. We had 40 revolutionaries, over 50 pieces of content and five live Q&A interviews throughout the week.  We learned a ton from the things that went well, and the things that didn't.  One...

Carlson Rezidor - one of the largest hotel groups in the world with brands such as Radisson and Park Place – embarked on a path to identify, build and deploy a global source to pay platform in mid-2015. I am joined on the Art of Procurement today by Scott Deibert, the SVP of Procurement, and Bart Baetens, Director of E-Procurement for Carlson Residor. In today's show, we chronicle their journey. I...

Today's episode is the second in a two-part series considering Category Management: what we can do not only to implement Category Management, but also do so in a way that is sustainable over the long term. The reason why I think this is important is that often I have seen Category Management implemented for the right reasons, but after the initial burst of energy and picking the low hanging fruit,...

Today's episode is the first in a two-part series considering Category Management: what we can do not only to implement Category Management, but also do so in a way that is sustainable over the long term. The reason why I think this is important is that often I have seen Category Management implemented for the right reasons, but after the initial burst of energy and picking the low hanging fruit,...

Back in early September, the Art of Procurement left the recording studio and went live for the first time with a webinar that I hosted with a friend of the show, RFP365.  The theme of the webinar was Weighted Scoring.  Specifically, how you can use weighted scoring as part of your sourcing process, to help make decisions based on facts, rather than feelings. The webinar was broadly split into a c...

Corporate Social Responsibility – or CSR – is a key value lever that procurement can pull to differentiate ourselves from the perceptions of the past, and that can enable us to play a role in revenue generation, not just cost reduction.  Indeed, how companies approach their CSR commitments will play an ever increasing role in the way that they are perceived by their target customers, impacting bra...

Today is the last day that content will be published in support of The Procurement Revolution event. We have had 40 revolutionaries share their perspective on such as wide variety of topics – tactical, strategic and a little bit of crystal ball gazing too! There was a particular submission from the event that I think embodies my thoughts on what the role of procurement really is - and why change m...

Back in 2012, Sylvain Mansotte received the call from the newly appointed CPO of a large Australian based construction company to assist in the building a new procurement function.  He jumped at the chance, and one of his first priorities was to understand his new employers' third party spend profile. Within 2 months, Sylvain had uncovered a $20M fraud that spanned 12 years and led to the perpetra...

It has been all hands on deck this week preparing for The Procurement Revolution. In the course of recording content, there was a piece that I just couldn't wait for next week to publish.  So, I thought I would hand over the reins of the Art of Procurement Friday Show today to Kate Vitasek.   Kate is a faculty member in the University of Tennessee's Graduate and Executive Education programs, and f...