This week I attended – and spoke at – Sainsbury’s fourth annual supplier conference and awards.
Alongside a host of speakers from the supermarket who addressed strategic suppliers on subjects from sustainability to logistics, online developments to customer insights, the opening presentation was given by a board director – this year, chief financial officer John Rogers.
As I said to the gathered group, strategic relationship management (SRM) doesn’t work without the support of those at the top. (more…)
For me, one of the big failures of London 2012 was to get to grips effectively with some of the ethical issues in the supply chain (despite some leading-edge work from LOCOG) and to address the question of ethical standards for sponsors. (more…)
I have put together 10 tips to help you on your next sourcing project in China. I have spent several years sourcing in China, including setting up and running representative offices for my employers in the UK. This is not a fully exhaustive list (I did have more than 30 tips, and a more detailed look at purchasing from the country will appear in an upcoming edition of SM) but they are the ones I thought most helpful to act as a checklist. (more…)
Outsourcing works when you embrace and understand the concept of a partnership approach with your chosen provider. Your partner must be seen as an integral extension of any retained function and treated in the same way as any other colleague. Only by understanding that success is a shared responsibility between you and the provider, not the sole responsibility of either party, will you be able to create a powerful platform for transformation. Outsourcing works when it is underpinned with a clear mandate and executive sponsorship from the business to effect change. Of course, if it was easy we would all be doing it. (more…)
My fellow students and I returned to a moderately sunny Geneva in April for an intense module in finance and management accounting. The regular five-hour drive from Mannheim in Germany was not too bad, and although I had left my winter tyres on the car in case it was still a little snowy in Switzerland, thankfully I was wrong.
Carried over from March was my assignment in macroeconomics and, as with all the previous modules, there was also a lot of preparation to be done for the next one. (more…)
We’re going back to basics with this post. I meet non-procurement specialists with procurement responsibilities that just need a ‘nudge’. SM readers should find this list helpful when advising their non-procurement’ colleagues. To set up and manage supplier (vendor or contractor) engagements is tough for some people who are outside procurement (which is why they need us) – especially because some suppliers are much better at bidding than they are at delivering the contract.
How do they get the core information they need to ensure a successful supplier engagement? Here’s a simple but incredibly effective checklist I recommend to our clients. These 10 simple questions will improve your colleagues’ approach to supplier engagements. Misaligned expectations are the number one cause of commercial disputes. (more…)
Chief procurement officers have long viewed business process outsourcing (BPO) as a way to streamline operations, enhance efficiency and reduce costs.
BPO, however, can do so much more than that. Today, leaders in this space are increasingly looking at BPO as a way of adding value, enabling their procurement functions to play a more strategic role in the business. This involves using their BPO relationships to provide business insight, innovation, and solutions, not just cost cut. (more…)
It never fails to amaze me in business the number of people and organisations that accept the initial offer a vendor has put forward to them. Are people scared of negotiating? Is it seen as a faux pas or a dirty habit? Don’t get me wrong I am not saying you should act like you are negotiating on a rug in an Istanbul market but you should at least open up a discussion. (more…)
Within modern businesses, it is essential that creativity and employee engagement are fostered through an inclusive decision-making process for major business decisions within supply management. This however, is easier said than done, so how should companies go about keeping employees included in decision-making without losing the ability to act decisively? (more…)
Contract management is about much more than automation and reducing administrative burden. Here are three innovative ways that companies have used to leverage contract management to support strategic business initiatives. (more…)
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