Since Philip Ideson started Art of Procurement almost six years ago, a broad range of executives, practitioners, academics, and more have shared over 3.2 Million words of wisdom through our podcasts, webinars, virtual events, and long-form writing. Regardless of their focus or point of view, each person shared our singular goal of helping forward-thinking leaders change the game for their company by elevating procurement's impact. In this week's episode, Philip Ideson delivers a solo show update...
Aug 23, 2021•18 min
Procurement professionals are always plagued by the fact that no one seems to understand what we do. While this is often blamed on language barriers and the fact that procurement is always evolving, at the end of the day it comes down to one harsh reality - procurement does not have a well-established, recognisable brand . Steve Wills is the Founder and Managing Director of Procurement Central, a specialist training provider based in the UK. Steve formerly served as the Procurement Advisor to th...
Aug 16, 2021•33 min
In this week's episode, which is based on an Art of Procurement Mastermind Community Category Briefing, Philip Ideson and Kelly Barner ask J. Grant Caplan, President of Procurigence, Inc. and Chairperson of the GBTA Committee on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, detailed questions about the current state of the meetings and events to better understand the conditions companies are dealing with and possible steps they can take to restart their meetings programs without incurring unnecessary risk. ...
Aug 09, 2021•59 min
Every time someone interacts with procurement's people, processes, or technology, it influences what that person thinks of procurement. This perception determines how early procurement is brought into a sourcing decision, if they are approached about a new business need, and how willingly stakeholders participate in procurement-led projects. Procurement may not often focus significant resources on the 'intake-to-procure' process, but distributed buyers are likely to feel different. By meeting bu...
Aug 02, 2021•58 min
"A lot of procurement managers think, 'I have my process. It will be digitized, but I'm still in control of the process and it will remain with procurement.' But digitalization is one step further where you really question everything." Procurement has been focused on digital transformation for so long that we accept the change it will have on our work and team structures. That said, none of us is certain how emerging technologies such as RPA and AI will be incorporated into existing platforms, w...
Jul 26, 2021•31 min
When the first edition of Managing Indirect Spend was published, Joe Payne and Bill Dorn often spoke to customers about what strategic sourcing was and what value it could bring to their organization. 10 years later, much has changed, but a lot has remained the same. Procurement is now much better known and recognized as a valuable corporate function, and yet we are still facing many of the same challenges we were back then. Authors Joe Payne, Bill Dorn, Dave Pastore, and Jenn Ulrich all work fo...
Jul 19, 2021•41 min
Between corporate efforts to digitize operations and an increasingly remote workforce, telecom and technology spend is now more important than ever. Changes to the ownership or structure of a business often lead to opportunities to optimize this category - but only if procurement has it actively under management and knows what to be on the lookout for. Jeff Poirior is the President & COO of Valicom. He joined us for a recent AOP Live session focused on the unique nuances and opportunities co...
Jul 12, 2021•57 min
We recently partnered with UNA to bring their The Sourcing Hero podcast into the Art of Procurement stable. The Sourcing Hero is a weekly 20-30 minute podcast that captures the stories of people who are rising up and beating the odds to create exceptional value within procurement, and is hosted by Art of Procurement General Manager, Kelly Barner. Today marks the launch of Season 2 of the podcast, and the first of our collaboration with UNA, and we're going to run the episode in full in the AOP f...
Jul 07, 2021•42 min
As digital transformation progresses, corporate leadership teams are increasing their focus on the quality and availability of data. Spend analysis is just one internal data resource in a sea of data ecosystems, but it has the potential to serve as the foundational connection point for all procurement analytics. For this special series, Art of Procurement partnered with Sievo and Buyers Meeting Point to take a deep dive into procurement data ecosystems. We will explore how procurement leaders ca...
Jul 05, 2021•39 min
As procurement places greater and greater emphasis on building supplier relationships, what impact will that have on the role played by our contracts? Kate Vitasek has been studying the role of contracts in relational procurement for years, and she has seen the contract v. relationship question go wrong many times. She has seen companies tell suppliers that they are in a partnership, only to terminate their contract on 60 days' notice, and she has seen effective contracts fall into disarray when...
Jun 28, 2021•39 min
As digital transformation progresses, corporate leadership teams are increasing their focus on the quality and availability of data. Spend analysis is just one internal data resource in a sea of data ecosystems, but it has the potential to serve as the foundational connection point for all procurement analytics. For this special series, Art of Procurement partnered with Sievo and Buyers Meeting Point to take a deep dive into procurement data ecosystems. We will explore how procurement leaders ca...
Jun 21, 2021•37 min
The bi-annual Deloitte CPO Report has been a source of insight and information for procurement leaders for years. In the last report, released in 2019, the core topic was mastering complexity. Little did Deloitte - or the participating CPOs - know, the whole world was about to get a crash course in mastering complexity. Ryan Flynn is a Principal at Deloitte Consulting and one of the co-authors of the 2021 CPO Report: Agility serves as the solution to an increasingly complex procurement landscape...
Jun 14, 2021•48 min
As digital transformation progresses, corporate leadership teams are increasing their focus on the quality and availability of data. Spend analysis is just one internal data resource in a sea of data ecosystems, but it has the potential to serve as the foundational connection point for all procurement analytics. For this special series, Art of Procurement partnered with Sievo and Buyers Meeting Point to take a deep dive into procurement data ecosystems. We will explore how procurement leaders ca...
Jun 07, 2021•49 min
Procurement has been swept up in nearly non-stop change for the last two decades, and yet, we continue to talk about the need for transformation? Is this due to their failures or their successes? In Conrad Snover's opinion, it is a little bit of both. Conrad Snover is the President of ProcureAbility and he was joined by Betsy Pancik, their Vice President of Customer Success, for a recent AOP Live session. They believe that how procurement is structured can either help them achieve overall busine...
May 31, 2021•58 min
As digital transformation progresses, corporate leadership teams are increasing their focus on the quality and availability of data. Spend analysis is just one internal data resource in a sea of data ecosystems, but it has the potential to serve as the foundational connection point for all procurement analytics. For this special series, Art of Procurement partnered with Sievo and Buyers Meeting Point to take a deep dive into procurement data ecosystems. We will explore how procurement leaders ca...
May 24, 2021•45 min
The book "Profit from Procurement: How to Add 30% to Your Bottom Line by Breaking Down Silos" was recently published by Alex Klein, Simon Whatson, and Jose Oliveira of procurement consultancy Efficio. To mark the official release, they invited AOP Founder and Managing Director Philip Ideson to moderate their virtual book launch. In this podcast conversation, the co-authors discuss the key themes of the book which was written to help inspire action and provide a roadmap for readers to increase pr...
May 17, 2021•43 min
As digital transformation progresses, corporate leadership teams are increasing their focus on the quality and availability of data. Spend analysis is just one internal data resource in a sea of data ecosystems, but it has the potential to serve as the foundational connection point for all procurement analytics. For this special series, Art of Procurement partnered with Sievo and Buyers Meeting Point to take a deep dive into procurement data ecosystems. We will explore how procurement leaders ca...
May 10, 2021•56 min
Marketing has always been a difficult category for procurement to bring under management. In the earliest days, it was placed beyond our scope, and more recently, the lack of alignment with the business around 'value' versus savings has created an impasse. As a result, marketing operations spend (including branded merchandise, print, and point of sale) have fallen victim to fragmentation, maverick spending, and underdeveloped category strategies. In this episode, which is based on a recent AOP L...
May 03, 2021•54 min
As digital transformation progresses, corporate leadership teams are increasing their focus on the quality and availability of data. Spend analysis is just one internal data resource in a sea of data ecosystems, but it has the potential to serve as the foundational connection point for all procurement analytics. For this special series, Art of Procurement partnered with Sievo and Buyers Meeting Point to take a deep dive into procurement data ecosystems. We will explore how procurement leaders ca...
Apr 26, 2021•38 min
At Mastermind LIVE Spring 2021, Art of Procurement had the opportunity to bring together a visionary panel of procurement leaders to discuss the urgency of the present moment and what can and should be done to support corporate growth. The panel included: Adam Brown, Senior Manager of Procurement Transformation & Head of the Procurement Garage at BT Amy Fong, Vice President, Sourcing and Vendor Management for Everest Group Keith Browning, Managing Director, Supply Chain Management at Delta A...
Apr 19, 2021•47 min
Procurement's organizational structure is as important as the processes and technology they use. Their operational model has to position them to deliver what the company needs most - requirements that may not remain fixed. When the business needs something different from procurement, their structure will have to evolve as well. Robert Bonnar is currently the Global Procurement Director at SHV Energy, but he has worked in procurement in a number of industries. As he puts it, "I did cars, drugs, b...
Apr 12, 2021•43 min
According to the Procurement 2021 Pulse Check by WNS Denali and ProcureCon Europe, only 9% of CPOs are satisfied with the current level of stakeholder alignment in their organization. 9%. In 2021. I was so surprised by that number that I decided to dedicate this episode of the podcast to it. In this podcast, we'll explore the differences between what the alignment journey and the corresponding operating model changes mean for small, mid-sized, and larger companies, as well as the solutions to be...
Apr 05, 2021•17 min
In today's fast-paced world, imagery is just as important for communicating meaning as the words we use. That is why the Mastermind LIVE Spring logo includes a clock with its hands set at 5 minutes until midnight. This is a moment for urgency - but not panic. The business world needs leaders, and the AOP team firmly believes that those leaders are currently in the ranks of the procurement profession. Stepping up to lead is a serious decision, not one to be taken lightly. That is why we have buil...
Mar 31, 2021•25 min
Profitability is more important than ever — and procurement leaders are more strategic than ever. Procurement is no longer just a cost center, a spender of money made by others in the enterprise. With the right tools and methodology, procurement can maximize every dollar of profit and discover every dollar of cost savings, positioning them to be critical drivers of the bottom line today - and into the future.. Adam Brown is Head of the Digital Garage at BT Procurement and a Senior Transformation...
Mar 29, 2021•59 min
Today's podcast is part of a special two-week series, our second annual sponsored StartUp and Growth Series, where we aim to shine a light on the early stage and growth companies who are changing the way that leading procurement teams are driving outcomes that truly align with corporate objectives. We will ask an entrepreneur from seven different companies questions about what gap in the market their solution addresses, how they differentiate their technology and what their tools look like in ac...
Mar 24, 2021•16 min
Today's podcast is part of a special two-week series, our second annual sponsored StartUp and Growth Series, where we aim to shine a light on the early stage and growth companies who are changing the way that leading procurement teams are driving outcomes that truly align with corporate objectives. We will ask an entrepreneur from seven different companies questions about what gap in the market their solution addresses, how they differentiate their technology and what their tools look like in ac...
Mar 23, 2021•15 min
Today's podcast is part of a special two-week series, our second annual sponsored StartUp and Growth Series, where we aim to shine a light on the early stage and growth companies who are changing the way that leading procurement teams are driving outcomes that truly align with corporate objectives. We will ask an entrepreneur from seven different companies questions about what gap in the market their solution addresses, how they differentiate their technology and what their tools look like in ac...
Mar 22, 2021•20 min
Today's podcast is part of a special two-week series, our second annual sponsored StartUp and Growth Series, where we aim to shine a light on the early stage and growth companies who are changing the way that leading procurement teams are driving outcomes that truly align with corporate objectives. We will ask an entrepreneur from seven different companies questions about what gap in the market their solution addresses, how they differentiate their technology and what their tools look like in ac...
Mar 18, 2021•12 min
Today's podcast is part of a special two-week series, our second annual sponsored StartUp and Growth Series, where we aim to shine a light on the early stage and growth companies who are changing the way that leading procurement teams are driving outcomes that truly align with corporate objectives. We will ask an entrepreneur from seven different companies questions about what gap in the market their solution addresses, how they differentiate their technology and what their tools look like in ac...
Mar 17, 2021•18 min
Today's podcast is part of a special two-week series, our second annual sponsored StartUp and Growth Series, where we aim to shine a light on the early stage and growth companies who are changing the way that leading procurement teams are driving outcomes that truly align with corporate objectives. We will ask an entrepreneur from seven different companies questions about what gap in the market their solution addresses, how they differentiate their technology and what their tools look like in ac...
Mar 16, 2021•15 min
