After separate assessments, followed up with robust and passionate discussions at last week’s judging day, the shortlist for nine team and two individual categories for this year’s CIPS Supply Management Awards was announced today. Link to two stories. (more…)
It was a miserable evening weatherwise, thanks to the current wet spell visiting England’s capital. However, the procurement profession’s female representatives were undeterred and last night gathered in force at the Barbican-based offices of law firm Linklaters to network.
More than ever before, UK manufacturers have to deal with rapid change in their supply chains. Raw material availability has become more volatile and costs have risen dramatically, with agricultural input costs 2.5 times higher than 2008, copper 2.3, and cotton nearly five.
This could be viewed as a reason for doom and gloom, but there is another side to this. The rewards for effective management of raw materials are greater than ever before. (more…)
I am not superstitious in the slightest, so today’s date of 13 Friday holds no fear for me.
The warnings around black cats, magpies and horseshoes are all hokum to me. Avoiding walking under a ladder is the only pragmatic caveat I would add.
So I was surprised to learn that the superstition of others does have a practical overspill pertinent to buying. (more…)
The royal wedding may be over, but its ability to provide a tenuous connection to seemingly unrelated matters continues.
According to staffbay, there has been a 400 per cent rise in the number of people looking for a new job after the wedding and the unexpected good weather.
“It seems all play and no work has given people more time for career reflection or maybe they are just looking for a package that offers more paid annual leave!” said founder Tony Wilmot. “During periods when we get more time off work, such as during the unprecedented bank holiday period in April, we are given time to reflect on our careers and the back to work blues hits us stronger than at any other time. This spurs us on to make changes in our careers and apply for new jobs.” (more…)
This week I learned that not only is the second in line to England’s throne getting married on 29 April, but it is also – and some would of course argue more importantly – the world’s largest day of amphibian conservation.
That’s right, the nuptials of Prince William and Kate Middleton coincide with the third annual ‘Save The Frogs Day’. (more…)
News dropped into my inbox this week that delivery company DHL Express is to offer SMEs the chance to pick up Nectar points when they use its service. For every pound spent the cardholder will receive two points
.
They are not the first company to offer this to customers. The Nectar Business loyalty scheme has been running since 2005 and suppliers of office products, commercial insurance, catering and vehicle rental are also involved. (more…)
We’ve made a lot of changes to the new, re-designed, bigger, monthly Supply Management based on our reader research. These include extra law coverage, more features and greater input from stakeholders. We have also condensed the news section to a digest of recent stories from the SM website. We still have our daily email newsletter – please sign up at www.supplymanagement.com/news/enewsletter. (more…)
What happens if you threaten to punish an outsourced supplier? Does its performance improve or get worse? For the purposes of answering this question, which I looked at in my MBA dissertation, “punitive measures” should be taken to mean contractual measures to secure adherence or deter non-performance such as service credits.
When an outsourcing contract is first implemented, the outsourcer is mostly viewed as a direct extension to the customer’s internal IT team. This is a hindrance to maximising the business value of deals because experience shows the customer will typically micro-manage the outsourcer. (more…)
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