Supply chain talent management remains a priority at Lenovo

I recently interviewed John Zapko at Lenovo, who talked to me about some of the issues Lenovo is facing globally around supply chain talent management.  John began our interview by commenting on the importance of this topic.

Zapko:  Without question, attracting talent, bringing it on board, being able to hire this talent and especially retaining talent around the world in some of our most important positions, not only at management levels, senior management levels, but also commodity management and the people that really focus on the procurement activity, driving the supplier-based management… negotiations, contracts. As we drive in this complex world, having that level of talent is really critical for us, and it is clearly the biggest challenge we have.

How do you create talent and why is it so important in a complex world? We’ve been hearing a lot about global complexity and the challenges in dealing with governments, with regulations. Why is talent so important in procurement as you work these issues?

Zapko …Global complexity is becoming more and more significant for us. As we drive our growth, in emerging markets especially, and as we drive our activity into those emerging markets, people that really understand the procurement role, with experience in delivering professional procurement activity… in a more complex environment in the merging market, where government regulations’ specific uniqueness is around contract.

New emerging suppliers and our ability to manage those emerging suppliers become key critical skills and key critical experiences that, if we don’t have, we’re seriously lacking. So we benefit from those greatly, and when we find those people, whether we build that town internally through activity and growth and development, or we hire it in — once we have it and once we’re driving the advantages with it — we really have to retain it. And so that becomes the major initiative for us as we work in this complex world.