Episode show notes
“It’s not about the ‘what’, it’s about the ‘how’, and I don’t think we’re doing enough with the ‘how’ at the moment in the private sector.”
As social value remains front and centre of public sector procurement, and grows in relevance in the private sector, are there more complexities and variables than ever when it comes to initiating successful procurement transformation?
The debate around transformation programmes, technology in procurement, social value, the role of aggregated data and more was the intriguing centrepiece of our Talent Talks Live event in March.
It was a pleasure to be joined by Guy Battle, Jonathan Bearn, Kathryn Gillard and Paul Bestford to take on the steps to achieving procurement transformation with buy-in from stakeholders and a platform set for future success.
This episode of Talent Talks covers:
- What procurement transformation entails, and how to achieve buy-in with key stakeholders
- The weighting of social value in procurement transformation programmes
- How technology can provide value beyond its primary purpose
- Whether we’ll see an increase in anonymous, aggregated data to help CPOs make key decisions
The Talent Talks Podcast is proudly sponsored by Barkers Commercial Consultancy. Barkers are a multi-award-winning ethical, procurement consultancy offering specialist services including cost and procurement transformation, contract lifecycle management, procurement managed services, bid writing services and digital procurement https://barkersprocurement.com/
Episode highlights
“When you look at procurement transformation, you should almost look at it as any other business change programme. As procurement professionals, we tend to overcomplicate how we describe it. If you treat it pure and simply as a business change programme, with a compelling case for change, that then lands with your audience. That’s what procurement transformation is all about.” – 3:00 – Kathryn Gillard
“Sometimes I think we want to always paint a very positive story, we want to be able to tell a story where there’s no problems at the moment and we’re just trying to make everything better. Sometimes, particularly with your business stakeholders, the best way to engage them is to talk explicitly about the problems that you’re trying to fix, and not shy away from being open about those problems.” – 9:05 – Paul Bestford
“My point is not to promote rivalry, but to promote a better understanding that each sector has something to learn from each other. I’ve come from the private sector, and my view is that the private sector looks down their noses at public sector procurement officers, that’s just my view. I’ve seen it often, yet I really think our public sector’s driving the most enormous change within their supply chain.” – 18:15 – Guy Battle
“Technology isn’t an end in itself; going and buying some technology is not the goal. There’s a real need to understand the business outcomes that we’re trying to achieve, then you need a technology that is going to support. Having said that, what I have seen from being on both sides, if you like, is that technology can also play a disruptive role in further transformation.” – 21:00 – Jonathan Bearn
“The information that tells me that I’m going to hit a traffic jam is not coming from my sat nav, it’s coming from everyone else’s. It’s the aggregation of massive data. I think there is still an untapped opportunity within procurement technology to anonymize but massively aggregate information. If you can do that, then you can make the information important and useful.” – 28:30 – Paul Bestford
“What else are you going to do for my community if I give you that job? That’s what the public sector wants. So it’s not about the ‘what’, it’s about the ‘how’, and I don’t think we’re doing enough with the ‘how’ at the moment in the private sector.” – 34:35 – Guy Battle
“In other environments and organisations, the first thing I prioritise is technology investment. But I do think it is worth a cold, hard look, not just at all the other things that you’re doing, but also within the technology space, about the specific investments and the specific order of investments that you want to make. You need to be super, super clear about outcomes.” – 36:20 – Paul Bestford
“Some of the big challenges that I’ve faced in the last 10 years, probably come from the investment of time to actually do a proper setup. There’s almost this feeling that you can just plug and play. The best technology I’ve ever used is really investing in the front-end in terms of setting every single thing you need up. So when you do switch it on, it should almost be like a bit of an Amazon experience where everything’s preset.” – 40:25 – Kathryn Gillard
“I’ve seen so many phenomenally clever, sophisticated technology implementations to do everything, but nobody uses them because they are clunky. So I think that for me, it’s usability above all else.” – 42:10 – Paul Bestford
Links & References
- Guy Battle – CEO of Social Value Portal
https://www.linkedin.com/in/guybattle/
- Paul Bestford – CPO of Nutreco
https://www.linkedin.com/in/paul-bestford-fcips-545a29/
- Jonathan Bearn – Customer Value Manager at Coupa
https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonathanbearn/
- Kathryn Gillard – Group Procurement Director at Landsec
https://www.linkedin.com/in/kathryn-gillard-6a72631/
- Martin Smith, Founder & Director of Talent Drive
https://www.linkedin.com/in/martinsmith2009/
