Get closer to your stakeholders
Sawchuk believes that procurement teams need to engage directly with stakeholders. This does not mean customers, as generally procurement should rely on its marketing and sales teams to provide that interface although in some circumstances this might be the case. In fact one would question why procurement can do a better job of that when its main role is communicating back through the supply chain.
There are some exceptions to this, one of which Sawchuk cited where the Head of Procurement was responsible for Store fit outs and need that direct interaction with customers, this is rare though. Sawchuk doesn’t believe that direct interaction is necessary as he commented that it … “Doesn’t matter how, as long as there is an aligning of the organisation to external information flow.”
One way that Sawchuk sees this as being effective is the introduction of procurement specialists for each business unit. He elaborated by saying that some multinational companies insist on potential leaders spending time within procurement. Often these people will understand the business functions and procurement need to take advantage of this to understand what the business needs rather than what it feels is the best purchasing decision.
IT teams should be considering doing the same thing, both in terms of how they interact with the business and indeed with procurement. Many companies now have business managers, acting as the liaison between the technology department and the business, if these people came from the business rather than a technical background then with training and relationships built they could be an incredible asset for any firm. Conversely IT departments often see purchasing teams as a hindrance to them, perhaps by working with them more closely, seconding team members to that function, or indeed even an exchange of team members there might be benefits that both departments gain as well as the wider organisation.
Procurement and IT alike both need to understand who their own customers are, they are rarely the same people as the customers of the business.
(Next : What about smaller organisations?)
