Interview on Buyer's Meeting Point BlogTalk Radio: Creating Procurement Value is a Lot of Work!

Gerard Chick and I were recently interviewed by Kelly Barner on the Buyer’s Meeting Point Blog Talk Radio yesterday, and this was posted on their site for any interested parties to view.  We spent a lot of time talking about the need to move up the maturity ladder, as well as the different sets of capabilities required to move up the ladder.  But you still have responsibility for the lower rungs of the ladder!

We talked about how  procurement needs to think about the five core “game changers” that are going on in the world, including the balance of power, technology, globalization, demographics, and sustainability.  If we are to build value, procurement needs to think about how they are going to drive value beyond the simple mantra of “save more money”.  These game changers require a new set of capabilities and approaches that many dyed in the wool procurement people may be uncomfortable with!

The issue around managing people was a strong theme – as was the need to think about adopting analytics into the core abilities that help build a business case that allows people to influence and drive change within their stakeholder community.  Gerard points out that we really need to be able to work as a team – and that value is a lot more about the utility of a good or service.  The value that good procurement brings to the business is at the point of where buying occurs – and that the utility of that purchase is improved.  Procurement is therefore about really being more commercial and understanding the busienss…the business of procurement is business!

This was a really fun interview with Kelly and Gerard!