Chief Procurement Officers (CPOs) have a very short window of time in which to make their mark at a company (the average tenure of a CPO is less than five years), and the terms of engagement are brutal: corporate mandates to reduce costs in the supply chain set up procurement officers for failure since […]
Focus on value, not cost, to beat odds Read More »
“A good negotiator should be a nice guy,” according to Khaled Chatila, senior procurement officer for the United Nations’ World Food Programme in Egypt. “You should be caring, clear and an active listener who is honest and willing to compromise or offer solutions,” said Chatila, at the CIPS Middle East Conference focus day in Dubai
Nice-guy negotiators come first, says United Nations Read More »
Supply chains are process and people driven. If a change situation is not correctly managed, then processes fragment and possibly fall apart and people push back when familiarity and control are taken away from them. In this current environment of uncertainty, it is crucial that Supply Chain Practitioners can quickly move from paralysis to
Re-aligning your supply chain strategy – managing the change Read More »
A number of current issues in procurement will affect every professional, according to a new book, Procurement at a Crossroads: Career-Impacting Insights into a Rapidly Changing Industry. As authors Kelly Barner and Jon Hansen see it, the choices individuals make today will determine the direction of their careers and the future of procurement itself.
Will procurement continue to exist in its current form? – New book Read More »
A great deal of South Africa’s supply chains rely on long-distance freight, whether road or rail (the imbalance between the two and cost implications of each is a debate for another time). With transportation costs featuring so prominently in the country’s supply chains and oil prices possibly on the rise, it is worth examining
The real impact of high transportation costs Read More »
Market consolidation and the inclusion of extra services will be among the most significant trends driving the global procurement outsourcing market, according to research. Market research company Technavio analysed emerging trends to find the biggest factors that will influence the sector up to 2019.
Market consolidation “key trend in procurement outsourcing” Read More »
Selecting the right suppliers remains a combination of analysis, art and fortune-telling. There are many decision-making traps buyers can fall into. Cuneyt Altinoz, a supply chain management and decision analysis lecture at Kaplan University (US) has taken the following from JE Russo and PJH Schoemaker’s book Decision Traps: Ten Barriers to Brilliant Decision-Making and
5 traps to avoid when choosing your suppliers Read More »
The South African Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) continued its recent upward move and reached 54.9 index points in April. The PMI rose from 50.5 in March and is now more than 10 points above the level recorded just three months ago, noted the Bureau for Economic Research (BER). The new sales orders index rose
PMI improved strongly in April – surged 4.4 index points Read More »
