Improving SME Procurement Enables Social Procurement
B2B buyers have multi-fold corporate responsibilities. First and foremost, they must obtain value-for-money in purchasing solutions that solve problems their organization faces. This means buying the right solution, from the right supplier, at the right price. This is part of a broader mandate. Private companies exist to generate profitable cash flow for their owners. Government […]
Supplier Relationship Management Is Not an Adversarial Process
In the movie “Jerry Maguire,” the inciting incident is the protagonist’s departure from his established agency to pursue his own principled approach to managing professional athletes. After a rousing call to action on his way out the door that falls on deaf ears (but one), he rushes to call his clients as quickly as possible, […]
What Do Vendors Want?
Many suppliers tell us that they don’t respond to RFPs. They see them as “rigged” or “wired.” They think that the outcome of the RFP is pre-determined. It is nothing more than a pro forma exercise in compliance. Others tell us their frustration when they see an RFP that is inconsistent. This happens in technology […]
How to Make Digital Procurement Transformation Succeed
Digital transformation involves implementing technology to effect change. This shift we seek may refer to improved business processes, products, or business models, or some combination of improved outcomes. At a high level, it involves two phases: implementation, followed by continuous improvement. According to apocryphal reports, it fails 70% of the time. Yet, businesses still keep […]
How Can Procurement Attract and Retain Talent?
I often remark that “nobody grows up wanting to be in procurement.” Maybe somebody out there did. I have not met them yet. When children are in school, they dream of more glamorous occupations: professional athlete, entertainer, politician, and now, influencer. Of course, not everyone is suited to be these things. Perhaps they lack the […]
Reference Checks Reign Supreme in Vendor Risk Management
There has been an explosion in services that seek to help buyers vet suppliers. These services take unstructured data from a variety of sources online and develop a structured set of data, specific to an individual vendor. Some of them may use AI (and shortly generative AI) to make judgments about the suppliers. This is […]
What Important Procurement Truth Do Very Few People Agree With You On?
Peter Thiel wrote the book on entrepreneurship: Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future, In it, he talks about the principles that he believes work well for people looking to solve problems. For him, there is one question that can help him understand the potential employees or the founders of […]
Augmented Procurement Reality
Enterprise Resource Planning (or “ERP”) systems are core to the way organizations do business today. Think of them as a general ledger for all kinds of workflow, or as the definitive source of truth for various processes and transactions. This does not mean that they are easy to use. ERP modules are functional components that […]
Good Procurement Practices Massively Lower Costs
Internal discussions about procurement tend to focus on cost above all else. The procurement department exists to beat down suppliers and ensure that they get the best price or to enforce policies and procedures intended to curb waste, fraud, and abuse. An interesting study from researchers at Yale University, Columbia University, and the University of […]
Reverse Auctions Are the Superior Procurement Approach
For business-to-business buyers, what is the best way to buy something? Looking at it from the other side, what is the best way to sell something to a business-to-business buyer? Well, as an economist, I naturally defer to the answer, “it depends.” I need more information to answer. First, what does it mean to say […]