Author Archives: Jami Parent
In Part One, I introduced a discussion of some surprising trends I found when looking at supplier registration forms from a wide variety of companies across many industries. The first surprise for me was that so many of these companies are asking the same questions from supplier companies. In this post I’ll discuss the other unusual thing I discovered: some organizations ask potential suppliers essay questions. It’s not quite as open as the classic American “How I Spent My Summer … More
When organizations adopt formal supplier management programs, one of the first steps they take is to focus on a more disciplined approach to collecting and managing basic information about current and potential suppliers. I am interested in the kind of data they collect and how they use it to manage suppliers so I took a look at supplier registration forms for a wide variety of companies and I was surprised by a couple of things: First, the data requested from … More
If your company doesn’t have a good contract management process in place then you are missing out on some significant opportunities to improve your procurement processes, maximize negotiated savings, minimize off-contract spend, and leverage your full buying potential to get the best possible pricing from suppliers. How do you know if you need a better contract management process? Ask yourself these 10 questions and, if you answer yes to more than one or two, you should take a serious look … More
As part of our blog series highlighting advice offered by Jason Busch from Spend Matters in our recent, this installment discusses idea # 5: Advanced Procurement Strategies for Supplier Performance Management. Click to read Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4. Successful procurement groups are using their Supplier Performance Management (SPM) processes and tools to reap benefits far beyond basic performance data. SPM implementations have moved from simply collecting and monitoring supplier data on key performance indicators to … More
Not everyone can afford a Park Avenue address, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t treat your current property like anything less than prime real estate. Mukund Krishna, CEO of the global technology consulting firm, Suyati, says “You aren’t maximizing your website’s potential if you aren’t managing it like a good real estate property. Like real estate, good websites are attractive and can be reached in many ways, from many different places.” He continued his real estate metaphor by comparing a … More
Ron Bedwell from KMS Systems spoke with me last week about his opinion on the key drivers for achieving success. KMS Systems is a leading provider of industrial material handling equipment solutions and Ron has been there for more than 15 years. “There’s a lot of things you have to do to be successful in any given situation, “ Ron said. “But there are a couple of things that you should always do no matter what you’re working on. One … More
With a new year upon us, I hope you’re all taking the opportunity to assume a few risks, embrace some stretch goals, and try out a some fresh strategies to take yourself and your organization a little further than you went last year. As everyone revs into high gear to launch their 2012 initiatives, it’s a perfect time to incorporate some knowledge and experiences from those who have gone before you. With that in mind, we here at Iasta are … More
In the past few years, the procurement world has developed better ways to level the playing field between new suppliers and incumbent suppliers. Buyers have successfully driven costs down by embracing processes and technologies that increase competition between suppliers. Generally this trend has made it easier for suppliers to get “introduced” to buyers. Supply relationship management technology has also increased the pressure for incumbent suppliers to maintain competitive pricing. Clearly the risks associated with switching suppliers are commodity dependent. It’s … More
In the modern, data-centric world we live in, dashboards are all the rage. In fact, a dashboard is one of the most powerful tools that business-intelligence software can bring to users. The accessibility and user-friendly data offered by well-designed dashboards can increase transparency into key projects and improve resource tracking, to name only a couple advantages. As BI software continues to evolve, three key characteristics have emerged as best practices for developing successful dashboards: • Simple, but meaningful: The data should … More
Last week, Seth Balsam, Director of Global IT Sourcing at Ciena, contributed to Iasta’s Webcast, Using Spend Analysis to Smooth the M&A Path: 4 Steps to Consolidate Your Purchasing Power. When Ciena acquired Nortel’s Metro Ethernet Networks, Ciena literally doubled its size overnight: twice the revenue, twice the customers, and twice the employees. All those doubles don’t come for free. Even though spend data doesn’t get a lot of headlines in M&A news, the merger also resulted in twice the … More
As Steve Jobs walks away from his CEO position at Apple, the financial and technology world has been speculating about Apple’s future. Steve Jobs is largely credited with supplying the magic that made Apple products so successful. He brought an alien vocabulary to the consumer electronics business when he spoke of people wanting poetry in the objects they use. He built Apple’s brand based on the premise that not only would people pay for that poetry they’d pay a premium … More
Everyone in procurement knows that spend analysis is important. The problem is they also know that it’s hard. It means getting a lot of data that may come from multiple sources, determining a hierarchical classification system, and classifying each piece of data (usually each financial transaction). You’re also going to need software tools to compile the data in meaningful ways so that you can see spending patterns and identify opportunities for savings. It’s not about getting the data one time; … More
A recent article from the Iasta Insights sourcing newsletter listed twelve symptoms or indicators that your organization might be ready for a procurement transformation. According to the article, procurement organizations with five or more symptoms were probably ready. Read the complete article here: Diagnosing the Spend Patient: Twelve Symptoms that may Suggest a Procurement Transformation. The very first indicator, reverse auctions have become a strategy and not just a tool or tactic in a broader sourcing program, made me pause. … More
Iasta has been long at work researching trends and best practices in contract authoring because we’ve received a lot of requests to provide authoring to go along with SmartContracts®, our contract management software. The first obstacle we uncovered seemed to be an almost universal challenge: standardizing contract language. Many companies, regardless of size or industry, struggle to implement standard, approved language in all their contracts. The inclusion of non-standard language is a primary reason for contract rejection during the contract … More
On Tuesday February 22, Reuters reported alarming disruptions in operations at Libya oil ports. The subsequent impact on oil supplies and the general political unrest in the Middle East are raising the price of oil and hitting the U.S. stock market right where it hurts: in the delicately wary psychology of American investors. According to Dr. David Simchi-Levi, Professor of Engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and thought leader on supply chain management, there’s justifiable cause for concern. In a … More
