Despite their reliance upon legacy systems, manufacturers are all about efficiency. This, combined with the pain caused by those same legacy systems, is finally starting to build momentum for procurement digitalization – especially among larger manufacturers. Sundar Kamak is the Global Head of Manufacturing Solutions at Ivalua, and his background in manufacturing is largely concentrated in the aerospace and automotive industries. In this podcast, he shares his perspective on the move towards dig...
Jan 13, 2020•44 min
If 2019 was the year of emerging technology hype, then 2020 holds the potential to be the year that we turn our attention to the work that needs to be done to derive concrete value from that technology: blockchains included. In late 2019, Remko Van Hoek, Clinical Full Professor of Supply Chain Management at the University of Arkansas – Sam M. Walton College of Business and a Member of the CSCMP Board of Directors, co-authored a book titled Integrating Blockchain into Supply Chain Management: A T...
Jan 06, 2020•27 min
As we begin to wind down for 2019, Art of Procurement host Philip Ideson shares the three themes that are at the forefront of his mind when considering the health of the procurement function and the opportunities that await in 2020.
Dec 23, 2019•11 min
This week's podcast is based on our recent AOP Live session with Pierre Lapree and Jason Treida. They joined us last month to take live audience questions about how procurement can maximize the value potential of automation while ensuring that performance management is not lost in the 'noise' of technology. Most of today's technology focuses on either the transactional aspects of procurement (P2P) or shiny new toys (RPA/AI/Blockchain). It does not necessarily provide a holistic view our activity...
Dec 16, 2019•56 min
Whether you call it supplier performance management or supplier relationship management, procurement has always understood that we need supply partners at their best for us to realize the maximum ROI from each contract. Usually, however, that boils down to a meeting where we point out where they could be doing better or ask a bunch of questions that imply the same thing and send them on their way to figure out how they should improve. It basically amounts to procurement making a wish list and th...
Dec 09, 2019•44 min
Having the opportunity to reflect back on a successful career in its entirety is a gift, and in "A Procurement Compendium", Peter Smith shares that gift with the whole procurement community. From being found by procurement (either because he could play tennis or because he was lousy at sales), to his time as a consultant and then 8+ years with Spend Matters, he's experienced nearly everything. Peter shares stories from his career that capture the things he'd done differently. He wishes he'd insi...
Dec 02, 2019•47 min
In this episode, AOP Host Philip Ideson and Kelly Barner (General Manager of AOP and Owner of Buyers Meeting Point) discuss their major take-aways from November's news, industry topics and podcast interviews. Note: This is a special - early and shortened - version of our This Month in Procurement podcast due to the Thanksgiving holiday in the US. We would like to thank you, our listeners and followers, for sharing your time and energy with us during the year. The procurement community is amazing...
Nov 25, 2019•21 min
In this week's podcast, Philip Ideson is joined by two members of the Procurement Leaders team, David Rae, their Chief Product Officer, and Geraldine Craven, Head of Research. They recently completed a study in cooperation with Bain Consulting to understand what is changing in advance of the arrival of 2020 and what remains the same. In this conversation, David and Geri talk about the key recommendations in Procurement Leaders' 2020 CPO Planning Guide, including: • The need for procurement to co...
Nov 18, 2019•37 min
"A good procurement person has two qualities: One is they're curious. They want to know how things are made. How did we get it here? Why is the supplier doing that? What is the price? What is the cost? So, curiosity is the number one thing and the number two thing is emotional intelligence. Do they have the capability to build relationships inside and outside the business?" In this week's podcast, Philip Ideson is joined by Bill Michels, Vice President of Operations Americas at CIPS. They discus...
Nov 11, 2019•22 min
In this episode, AOP Host Philip Ideson and Kelly Barner (General Manager of AOP and Owner of Buyers Meeting Point) discuss their major take-aways from October's news, industry topics and podcast interviews. In October, we heard a total of seven podcasts: A solo show from Philip Ideson on Getting Executive Buy-in for a Procurement Change Initiative A five-part series with leadership team from Efficio, titled "A CPO's First 100 Days" An interview with Ryan Flynn, a Principal at Deloitte Consultin...
Nov 04, 2019•45 min
"The 'complexity masters' have taken the transactional side of procurement and turned it into a well-oiled machine, a combination of operating models and digital strategies, so that they can focus on those areas where they can drive the most value." The annual Deloitte Global CPO survey is one of the most anticipated reports of the year. In this year's report, the 11th annual, the authors took a different approach than they have in the past, calling out a single word of focus: complexity. Ryan F...
Oct 28, 2019•47 min
You have just been appointed to a new CPO position. Your executive leadership team is looking at you to make an immediate impact while setting up procurement as a driver of sustainable, long term value. You know that your first 100 days in the role may make or break your career. What do you do? Where do you start? In this special 5-part series, made possible through a partnership with Efficio, we will provide you with the roadmap you need to hit the ground running. In the fifth - and final - epi...
Oct 25, 2019•13 min
You have just been appointed to a new CPO position. Your executive leadership team is looking at you to make an immediate impact while setting up procurement as a driver of sustainable, long term value. You know that your first 100 days in the role may make or break your career. What do you do? Where do you start? In this special 5-part series, made possible through a partnership with Efficio, we will provide you with the roadmap you need to hit the ground running. In this fourth episode of the ...
Oct 24, 2019•17 min
You have just been appointed to a new CPO position. Your executive leadership team is looking at you to make an immediate impact while setting up procurement as a driver of sustainable, long term value. You know that your first 100 days in the role may make or break your career. What do you do? Where do you start? In this special 5-part series, made possible through a partnership with Efficio, we will provide you with the roadmap you need to hit the ground running. In the third episode of the se...
Oct 23, 2019•16 min
You have just been appointed to a new CPO position. Your executive leadership team is looking at you to make an immediate impact while setting up procurement as a driver of sustainable, long term value. You know that your first 100 days in the role may make or break your career. What do you do? Where do you start? In this special 5-part series, made possible through a partnership with Efficio, we will provide you with the roadmap you need to hit the ground running. In the second episode of the s...
Oct 22, 2019•20 min
You have just been appointed to a new CPO position. Your executive leadership team is looking at you to make an immediate impact while setting up procurement as a driver of sustainable, long term value. You know that your first 100 days in the role may make or break your career. What do you do? Where do you start? In this special 5-part series, made possible through a partnership with Efficio, we will provide you with the roadmap you need to hit the ground running. For the opening episode of the...
Oct 21, 2019•14 min
I've been spending a lot of time the past few months working with procurement teams on their transformation journey from being a tactical function to a strategic one. This journey must begin by inspiring people on the art of the possible. This often has to be members of your procurement team - to rethink the possibilities of what they can achieve - and also senior executives and stakeholders - on what they can expect from a fully functional procurement team. Today, I'm going to share a few appro...
Oct 14, 2019•19 min
In this episode, AOP Host Philip Ideson and Kelly Barner (AOP Content Director and Owner of Buyers Meeting Point) discuss their major take-aways from September's news, industry topics and podcast interviews. In September, we heard four diverse interviews: NBA CPO Joe Postiglione started the month by reminding us of the importance of self-empowerment as well as how powerful a truly engaged manager can be. Mahmood Shah, Director of Global Procurement at MetLife, brought the continued importance of...
Oct 07, 2019•44 min
"If you were to ask me what the 'Art of Procurement' is, I would say it is bringing together the right people and the right partners." In this week's podcast, we get to listen in on a conversation about digital transformation on a global scale that was recorded at Ivalua NOW in Paris earlier this year. Hakan Cakir is the Procurement Digitalization & Analytics Product Owner of Sourcing Solutions for Deutsche Telekom AG, one of the world's leading integrated telecommunications solutions with 1...
Sep 30, 2019•15 min
"How do I get from where I am today to where I would like to be?" In the age of digital transformation, it goes without saying that change is on everyone's mind. But despite all of the energy we are putting into thinking about change, we may or may not be seeing that change come to pass. In this week's podcast, host Philip Ideson speaks with Chris Sawchuck, Principal and Global Procurement Advisory Practice Leader at The Hackett Group. They recently released a new research report titled "World-C...
Sep 23, 2019•50 min
"We have to be able to talk in a language that the business understands, and they have to see the actual value of what [procurement is] bringing to the table over and over, above any type of savings, I think that's the key for me." In this week's podcast, host Philip Ideson speaks with Mahmood Shah, Director of Global Procurement at MetLife. He started his career in supply chain in the automotive and airline industries before making the switch to procurement and financial services. He has also w...
Sep 16, 2019•49 min
If we were to describe a CPO that was focused on emotional intelligence (EI) and self-empowerment, tranquility and self-possession, where would you guess he or she worked? Maybe at a lifestyle brand or a Silicon Valley startup. It would probably take you a few hundred guesses to come up with the National Basketball Association (NBA). In this week's podcast, host Philip Ideson interviews Joe Postiglione, CPO of the NBA, author and executive coach. True to our opening question, he is a certified e...
Sep 09, 2019•38 min
In this episode, AOP Host Philip Ideson and Kelly Barner (AOP Content Director and Owner of Buyers Meeting Point) discuss their major take-aways from August's news, industry topics and podcast interviews. In August, we split our time between active procurement practitioners and thought leaders. Dana Small, Global Category Manager at BioMarin Pharmaceutical, talked about her transition from finance to procurement (yes, on purpose) and shared how being a business blogger changes her perspective on...
Sep 02, 2019•47 min
According to research undertaken by today's guest, Procurement Insights Founder Jon Hansen, 70% of an organization's digital transformation activity passes through the procurement and supply chain. But is procurement prepared to step outside the frameworks of our historical job descriptions to proactively enable our companies to create and execute their digitization strategies? In today's podcast, Jon and I discuss: Why the unknowns of digitization are impacting executives across the company, no...
Aug 26, 2019•43 min
No one wants conflict for its own sake, but it can actually be an important factor in personal or organizational growth and decision making. Rather than shying away from conflict, especially in a professional context, procurement professionals need to start embracing it as proof of diverse thought and opportunities to practice empathy. That is the point of view espoused by Jason Cammorata, Vice President of Strategic Sourcing at MDC Partners, and one that he is quite passionate about. Is this po...
Aug 19, 2019•32 min
It seems that we live in a service-centric world these days, and that includes a growing number of procurement spend categories. Although we've made headway in IT, legal and marketing, there is one category of professional services spend that still gives most of us reason to pause: management consulting. In this episode of the podcast, I ask Helene Laffitte, Founder and CEO of Consulting Quest, some of the questions I hear most frequently about managing consulting spend. For instance: How can we...
Aug 12, 2019•58 min
The commonly-cited disconnect between procurement and finance all comes down to one central question: where did the money go? As hard as procurement works to negotiate and track different types of savings, they always seem to evaporate or be reallocated for other projects. In the best cases, this gets the enterprise more value for their dollar, but in the worst cases can lead to reduced credibility for procurement – especially with finance. I'm joined today by Dana Small, Global Category Manager...
Aug 05, 2019•37 min
Last week, I had the opportunity to facilitate a webinar last week with procurement consulting firm Efficio, titled Driving Greater Procurement Performance from Complex Direct Spend and Factory Indirects. In the webinar, I was joined by two of their US-based principal consultants, Arthur Mattouch and Waldo Saville. During the webinar, Arthur and Waldo shared three case studies demonstrating the strategies and tactics that can be used to deliver sustainable savings in a mid-cap manufacturing envi...
Jul 29, 2019•22 min
What do childcare, ducks, and power have to do with negotiations? In today's episode, host Philip Ideson shares three negotiation tips taken from his experience as a procurement practitioner and entrepreneur.
Jul 22, 2019•16 min
As we enter the summer, I'm going to spend some time answering some of your most frequently asked questions. These pod's are going to be bite-sized, so I'd love to hear your feedback on whether you like the shorter podcasts or not. One of the topics that I get asked the most about is negotiations. So for the next couple of weeks, I'm going to share some insights based on my own experience. This week, I'm going to dig into the archive and share a part of a podcast I recorded 3 years ago - specifi...
Jul 15, 2019•11 min
