Six in 10 employees who graduated from university in the past two years are not working in a profession related to their degree. This should resonate with buyers.
I was gobsmacked to find out that a Hollywood-style sign has been erected on a grassy roadside knoll in… Essex
The problem with public finances is obvious; we are spending more than we generate in taxes. Tax more and spend less, some argue, but raising taxes hurts the economy and cutting frontline services hurts the people we all want to help.
There is another way: drive down the public sector’s £220 billion third-party spend. Nigel Smith, chief executive of the Office of Government Commerce, has recognised this, as have commercial directors, but have they found the solution? Pan-government collaboration is managerially very difficult to achieve.
How not to negotiate: first, adopt a loud and provocative public position. Second, make unspecified but worrying threats. Third, refuse to budge. Fourth, wait and watch everything collapse around you. Fifth, go back to step one.
This is a potted and perhaps slightly unfair summary of the dispute between British Airways (BA) and the Unite union, which at the time of writing was still hopelessly unresolved. Is it naive of me to imagine that by the time you read this a deal will finally have been done? I hope not. But if you are reading this stranded at a far-flung provincial airport waiting for an alternative flight home, then I apologise for tempting fate.
A good procurement professional can negotiate a better price on just about anything – even the body of Christ.
The religious authorities at Lourdes probably felt the warm glow of a job well done when they discovered that buying communion wafers from a Polish manufacturer would save the Church money.
The Daily Telegraph’s Matt always manages to hit the nail on the head in his cartoons, and has reduced the debate on “efficiency savings” to its core brilliantly.
Here’s something else to dislike the recession for (as if you needed another reason): the phrase “the new normal”.
Here are my thoughts on putting together an appropriate strategy for the procurement of (ex-)cabinet ministers.
All the expectations were that yesterday’s announcement would effectively be a non-budget. What we got was the opposite.
Buyers and suppliers of space technology are about to see their business rocket.
