For the rest of August, I’m taking a roadtrip across the United States, and so because I’m out of the recording studio, I’m going to dip into the archive all the way back to 2016 to share some of my favorite episodes from that year with you that are still just as relevant as today - and if you found the podcast after 2016, there’s a good chance that you haven’t yet heard these conversations.
Today’s I rewind to a conversation that I had with Tim Jones, Head of Sourcing at Google.
Our conversation documents Google’s journey to become a trusted advisor. Google’s approach includes tactics around stakeholder engagement that I often recommend to procurement teams who are on their own journey from tactical to strategic, regardless of the size of your company.
For the rest of August, I’m taking a roadtrip across the United States, and so because I’m out of the recording studio, I’m going to dip into the archive all the way back to 2016 to share some of my favorite episodes from that year with you that are still just as relevant as today - and if you found the podcast after 2016, there’s a good chance that you haven’t yet heard these conversations.
Today’s I rewind to a conversation that I had with Jack Miles. There are few, if any, leaders in the procurement profession with the depth and breadth of experience as Jack. Jack has enjoyed multiple CPO roles at some of North America’s largest companies and has served as Secretary of the Florida Department of Managed Services. He serves, and has served, on a number of corporate boards, and has become a key advisor and friend to me personally, and to Art of Procurement.
In today’s show, Jack shares seven of the key lessons that he has learned from his career in both the private and public sectors. If you have any interest in growing your procurement career at any level, this episode is a must listen!
For the rest of August, I’m taking a road trip across the United States, and so because I’m out of the recording studio, I’m going to dip into the archive all the way back to 2016 to share some of my favorite episodes from that year with you that are still just as relevant as today - and if you found the podcast after 2016, there’s a good chance that you haven’t yet heard these conversations.
Today’s is a conversation with former procurement practitioner Sylvain Mansottee, now the CEO and Co-Founder of Whispli. It is a story about procurement fraud.
As a practitioner, Sylvain received the call from the newly appointed CPO of a large Australian based construction company to assist in building a new procurement function.
Within 2 months, he had uncovered a $20M fraud that spanned 12 years and led to the perpetrator admitting to the crime, and ultimately being sentenced to 15 years prison.
Today’s Art of Procurement is Sylvain’s story. Sylvain discusses how he uncovered the fraud, and the decisions he had to make in blowing the whistle.
We then talk more specifically about procurement fraud. Sylvain shares a number of fraud red flags and provides tips on how you can ensure you have an environment where a whistleblower feels safe in coming forward if they have information to share.
Sylvain’s story is really absorbing, and also, for me, a wakeup call to realize that procurement fraud is real, and that any one of us in procurement may find ourselves in the same position as Sylvain given the nature of our roles.
For a long time, procurement has gotten feedback that our terminology - and, more specifically, our abbreviations - have a distancing or alienating effect on internal stakeholders and budget owners. But if language has the power to push people away, it can also be used to purposefully clarify, align, and collaborate.
Steve Wills is the founder and Managing Director of Procurement Central and formerly served as the Procurement Advisor to the 2012 London Olympic Games. He has extensive business experience with blue chip organizations and has worked with leaders in industry and commerce as a CPO to transform complex procurement and supply chain functions.
In this interview, Steve outlines:
Marketing is one of those spend categories that procurement often has a hard time breaking into. They are less concerned with cost than their counterparts in other functions, and most of the services they contract are not only complex, project-based efforts, they are usually evaluated from a highly subjective point of view.
Kathleen Jordan is an Associate Director at Source One, a Corcentric Company, where she has been focused on the marketing category for years. She is familiar with the opportunities in marketing spend as well as the common disconnects that may prevent procurement from bringing marketing spend under management and cost marketing professionals the ability to make their budgets go further.
In this interview, Kathleen shares her point of view with Philip Ideson and Kelly Barner on: