The electronic world can only get so far on automation, as I was reminded yesterday at the Seattle Spend Management Day. Brian Jones, Purchasing Operations guru at Nestle, discussed the opportunities, process and results from their efforts to categorize spend in order to identify low hanging procurement fruit and drive ongoing spend management initiatives across […]
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Despite the economic turmoil, people still need to eat. And when times are tough, they’re naturally going to eat out less, cook more meals at home and even brown bag some lunches. So, you would assume that provides opportunity for supermarkets, but that might not always be the case.
Last week Safeway announced they had increased […]
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On a swing through Europe last week, I had the good fortune to attend a discussion with British Airways CEO Willie Walsh during the Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply (CIPS) forum at the new Sofitel in the airline’s new Terminal 5 at London Heathrow.
In between pot shots at rival Virgin Airlines CEO Sir Richard […]
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All too often, we have good intentions in life but aren’t quite sure how to put those intentions into action. The cynics among us (and are there any non-cynics left?) question whether petitions we’re asked to sign really mean what we’re told and whether or not donations end up going where they claim.
Enter the internet […]
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My own travels last week offer validation from the trenches that Amex’s predictions for travel curbs will come to fruition. Travel restrictions were a hot topic at the Sourcing Interests Group (SIG) Conference last week. No less than five procurement execs said their companies had implement restrictions for all but sales related travel. (Only two […]
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The Doctor at Sourcing Innovation created another cross-blog series, asking a number of us to give our Seven Grand Challenges for Supply and Spend Management. Some insightful posts have already tackled topics like spend data, currency, trade barriers and supply chain risks. But rather than echoing their lists, which I believe are largely right on […]
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Few would deny that spend management has taken hold and earned it’s place at the table in the C-Suite of large companies. But in the mid-market (<$2 billion in annual revenues), adoption of the principals and tools of the “big companies” has been slower to take hold. In fact, we recently conducted a survey of […]
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… I’d set up my own Group Purchasing Organisation using my own customer base as the Group - Perhaps I’d call it a Lone Purchasing Organisation.
Given the resource constraints of many buyers and the requirement to show that they are purchasing wisely, if I were an indirect supplier, I’d do whatever I could to ensure […]
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Over the next few weeks, I’m going to change the thrust of this blog to discuss my hobby, Incentive Practice and Theory, rather than discussing the day-to-day practical issues facing procurement managers
The change is prompted by the fact that, since I’ve gone in-house as a procurement manager, I’ve been largely unable to write anything out […]
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As usual, a day late and a penny short due to the overwhelming interest in my new startup Coupa, I’m pleased to bring you my vieww on what the “Top 3″ issues are holding purchasing departments back.
First, some housekeeping. Michael L. of Sourcing Innovation came up with the idea for this series. Imho, he provides […]
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