Procurement - July 2022

July 2022 | procurementmag.com

Global procurement software companies

TRANSUNION:

Realising procurement savings and added value

SANTANDER UK:

Banking on dynamic digital transformation

BUDWEISER BREWING GROUP:

Sustainability at the world’s largest brewer

Putting authenticity

into healthcare

procurement Uncover Walgreens Boots Alliance’s procurement evolution, digitalisation journey and ethos, told by Jim Townsend, CPO

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The Procurement Team EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

GEORGIA WILSON EDITORIAL DIRECTOR

SCOTT BIRCH

PRODUCTION DIRECTORS

GEORGIA ALLEN DANIELA KIANIČKOVÁ PRODUCTION MANAGERS

ELLA CHADNEY PHILLINE VICENTE JANE ARNETA

CREATIVE TEAM

OSCAR HATHAWAY SOPHIE-ANN PINNELL HECTOR PENROSE SAM HUBBARD MIMI GUNN JUSTIN SMITH REBEKAH BIRLESON JORDAN WOOD CALLUM HOOD VIDEO PRODUCTION MANAGER

KIERAN WAITE

DIGITAL VIDEO PRODUCERS

MARTA EUGENIO ERNEST DE NEVE THOMAS EASTERFORD MARKETING MANAGER

KAYLEIGH SHOOTER PROJECT DIRECTORS

MIKE SADR CRAIG KILLINGBACK

MEDIA SALES DIRECTORS

JASON WESTGATE JAMES WHITE MANAGING DIRECTOR

LEWIS VAUGHAN

CHIEF OPERATIONS OFFICER

STACY NORMAN CEO

GLEN WHITE

FOREWORD

Uncertainty and the drive for sustainable practices Two trends dominating the procurement industry

“If you look at the disruption that’s taken place over the past two years, the foundations of responsible sourcing and supply chain resilience are very closely related” JONATHAN LAVERENTZ HEAD OF DIGITAL INNOVATION TRADESHIFT, INC.

Over the last year, uncertainty and sustainability have been key trends for procurement, something which is echoed in this month’s issue of Procurement Magazine.

Speaking with leading executives from Tradeshift, HICX, UiPath, HFS Research, DeepStream, PwC, Kissflow and Sievo, Procurement Magazine strips back the procurement processes to understand the value of technology adoption; unearth the fundamentals of responsible sourcing; navigate the complexities of vendor management; and determine how the function can develop ‘the right kind of culture’.

Procurement Magazine returns to London!

This October Supply Chain Digital and Procurement Magazine will be returning to London - this time at the Queen Elizabeth II Centre - for an all new event.

Held between the 12th and 13th of October 2022, PROCUREMENT AND SUPPLY CHAIN LONDON 2022 will adopt a EXPO style incorporating two zones - Supply Chain LIVE and Procurement LIVE. To find out more about PROCUREMENT & SUPPLY CHAIN LIVE LONDON 2022, click here.

GEORGIA WILSON PROCUREMENT MAGAZINE IS PUBLISHED BY

georgia.wilson@bizclikmedia.com

© 2022 | ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

procurementmag.com

5

CONTENTS

Our Regular Upfront Section: 12 Big Picture 14 The Brief 16 Timeline: The evolution of spend management 18 Trailblazer: Jennifer Moceri 20 Five Mins With: Vanessa Viet

26

50

Putting the authenticity into procurement

Developing the ‘right kind of culture’ in procurement

Walgreens Boots Alliance

Procurement strategy

84

Budweiser Brewing Group: World’s largest brewer AB InBev, in sustainability vanguard

58

Santander UK

Banking on dynamic digital transformation

100

Technology

The value of AI and RPA adoption in procurement processes

76

106

Navigating the complexities of vendor management

Driving faster & sustainable digital transformation

Digital procurement

Terzo Cloud

Performance.

Accelerated. ▶Role-based, practical eLearning for procurement and supply chain teams.

Created by experts and powered by science for you to apply in everyday workplace situations.

Visit Skill Dynamics

144 Top 10

Global procurement software companies

118

Sustainability

Fundamentals of responsible sourcing

156

TransUnion

Realising procurement savings and added value

126 Shell

How Shell’s Source 2 Contract digitalisation and AI boosts productivity

170 Doka

Lessons learned from COVID-19 to prepare for the future

Meet who runs the world.

A BizClik Media Group Brand

In Association with:

TOP 100

Women

in

PROCUREMENT

NEW ISSUE OUT NOW Read now

Creating Digital Communities

BIG PICTURE

12

July 2022

An era of perpetual uncertainty Europe

In an era of perpetual uncertainty, the time is now for organisations to reinvent their operations if they want to gain a competitive advantage.

Sitting at the heart of the European economy are supply chains and procurement, and the industry is shifting in how it operates.

Those that are looking to maintain business continuity and a competitive edge should look to enhance their operations in three areas: 1. Resilience 2. Relevance 3. Sustainability To find out more, click here. procurementmag.com

13

THE BRIEF “Retail and healthcare has revolutionised over the past five years, and the pandemic has further accelerated development within these sectors”

BY THE NUMBERS Top areas of focus for CPOs Source: www.raconteur.net

Vendor/Supplier Relationship Management Automation and Digitalisation

Jim Townsend

Chief procurement officer (CPO), Walgreens Boots Alliance

READ MORE

Procure-to-Pay (P2P)

Mauricio Coindreau

Head of Procurement and Sustainability, Budweiser Brewing Group

READ MORE

“The last couple of years have shown us that being on one side of the strategy – whether its globalisation or localisation – wouldn’t have helped; in fact, it would have hit us much more”

Analytics

25%

Purchasing

24% 24%

Sustainable Sourcing

16%

Contracting

8%

EDITOR'S CHOICE LEARN HOW YOUR ORGANISATION CAN EFFECTIVELY COMBAT MAVERICK SPEND Discover five ways procurement can combat maverick spend in their organisation, according to leading AP automation and payments software provider Medius.

READ MORE

Thomas Zsulits

PROCUREMENT RAMPS UP ITS INVESTMENT IN DIGITALISATION With 40% of businesses investing in software to tackle supply chain and procurement issues, discover what is at the top of the investment agenda for CPOs.

READ MORE

READ MORE

Director Global Supply, Doka

14

29% 27%

Talent Acquisition and Retention

“We're looking to become the first company to have carbon neutral operations in all of our UK breweries by 2022”

42%

July 2022

It’s difficult to predict the future when it doesn’t mimic the past

 SIRIONLABS SirionLabs secures US$85mn in a Series D funding round, ramping up its investment in intelligent enterprise

With the past two years representing a peak in uncertainty for many, post-COVID-19 planning complexity has left many leaders with even more multi-layered challenges.

“This is especially true for business leaders tasked with forecasting consumer expectations amid fluctuating demand and markets. Knowing what to plan for and what data to use to do it has never been more unclear,” said Anaplan.

‘New times call for new measures’ Anaplan believes that it will remain possible for organisations to forward-plan in a postCOVID-19 world, but it will require a change in how it is conducted and the data used to achieve such planning.

The leading software company recommends three focus areas for the function in a postCOVID-19 environment: • Get closer to the market • Use more granular data • Incorporate external data

contract lifecycle management.  KEELVAR

U P

Global intelligent sourcing and procurement automation solutions provider secures US$24mn in Series B funding round to radically improve the procurement function.

JUL

2022

 SKILL DYNAMICS Is procurement struggling to prioritise the planet over profit?

According to Skills Dynamics, 31% of organisations reported that objectives are linked to driving efficiencies and growth rather than improving sustainability.  HOME DEPOT Home improvement giant Home Depot

D O W N

faces pressures from investors to clean up its supply chain following allegations that some of its plywood has been sourced from vulnerable forests. procurementmag.com

15

TIMELINE THE EVOLUTION OF

SPEND MANAGEMENT From the Stone Age to the present day, discover the evolution of spend management through the years from its most basic activities through to advanced digitalisation

3,000 to 1,300BC

200BC to 1500AD

1800 1900s

The Stone Age and Bronze Age

The Iron Age and Middle Age

19th century and early 20th century

The most crude forms of procurement dates back to these time periods. To construct the pyramids, Egyptians used scribes to record the amount of materials needed and traded with local civilisations to exchange the goods and services required.

During this time, longdistance trade was limited to luxury goods.

With the invention of ships, long-distance trade became increasingly popular.

Currency was adopted for easy payment and records were kept to keep track of both payments and debts.

With the boom of the industrial revolution, supplier networks grew and purchasing became its own department. Despite this growth, companies struggled to effectively manage and analyse their spend to gain valuable insights. The industry lacked the systems required to address indirect spend, transparency, compliance, and manage spend ahead of time.

16

July 2022

1950s to 1960s

1970s to 1990s

2000s present

The Great Depression and WWII

Emerging technology and the dawn of the World Wide Web

Spend management in the 21st century

With purchasing as a standalone function, a new phase in finance was brought about: AP and procurement.

Events such as the Great Depression and WWII showed that prices, quality of materials and supplier performance affected transactions, which led to the requirement of legal and administrative work for all purchases.

It is during this time that the importance of spend management grew.

Many realised the value it provided when it came to shorter product life cycles, cutting costs and improving communication.The dawn of the World Wide Web by the 90s further accelerated the globalisation of supply chains and the impact technology can have on ensuring effective procurement processes.

The technology boom! Along with the introduction of advanced solutions, this tech boom increased production capacities and provided creative customisation. The last two years have shown the need for resilience, agility, transparency and effective spend management to maintain business continuity and a competitive edge.

The likes of cloud, AI and automation have increased the function’s ability to spend time on value-adding tasks instead of time-consuming manual processes. procurementmag.com

17

TRAILBLAZER

Jennifer Moceri

JOB TITLE: CHIEF PROCUREMENT OFFICER COMPANY: GOOGLE

A champion of diversity, equity & inclusion

As a leading executive and agent of change, Jennifer Moceri, CPO of Google, is a champion of diversity, equity and inclusion, with a passion for organisational transformation

F

or more than 25 years, Jennifer Moceri has been a part of the procurement world. She has proven herself to be a leading executive and agent of change with experience in consumer, automotive, and food ingredients industries.

Moceri is a highly accountable and resilient leader who builds collaborative relationships, with clear dedication to continuous

improvement and productivity, as well as a passion for organisational transformation and building talent to enable growth, profitability, and value.

Over the years, Moceri has worked for the likes of ZF Group, Borg Warner Automotive, Lear Corporation, Tate & Lyle, and Diageo.

Today, she is the Vice President of Global Procurement and Chief Procurement Officer (CPO) at Google.

Supplier Diversity at Google Under Moceri’s leadership, Google recognises its responsibility to promote diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I) across all aspects of its operations.

Surpassing its goal of spending US$1bn with diverse-owned suppliers in 2021 (spending US$1.5bn), Google has set its targets higher for 2022 with ambitions to grow its spend to US$2.5bn in 2022, as well as expand its programmes beyond the US. “We want to help build an inclusive economy that works for everyone. This extends within our company and accounts for the economic impact that we can have when we buy goods and services. That’s why

18

July 2022

“ We want to help build an inclusive economy that works for everyone” we’re providing access, development and investment in diverse-owned companies through our supplier diversity programme,” commented Moceri.

Maximising spend is just one piece of the programme; under Moceri’s stewardship, Google also plans to make additional investments in mentorship and training to help SMEs grow their business.

“Through our Google Tuck Digital Excellence Program, we’re providing resources that help develop digital skills and build an online presence. By the end of this year, we will have graduated more than 425 diverse-owned business leaders and awarded US$750,000 in scholarships as part of this programme,” said Moceri.

Committed to bringing such investments and commitments to life, Google strives to provide eligible supplier payment within 15 days as part of its Accelerated Payments Programme, and has established a Certification Access programme for financial support and the removal of administrative burden when obtaining a

diversity certification. “We’re continuing to find innovative ways to remove barriers; this includes encouraging existing suppliers to partner and create alliances with diverseowned businesses,” commented Moceri.

Moceri sees true progress as historically underrepresented businesses having increased access to equitable opportunities to grow their businesses. She is dedicated to continuing the organisations work of driving positive social and business impact.

“We are proud of exceeding our first spend goal and the programmes we have created to elevate diverse suppliers. Yet we know we have more to do and look forward to continuing that work and increasing our impact through our mentoring, development and partnership programmes, especially as we expand our programmes globally.

We’re excited about the opportunities and innovations that we can bring to this space as we continue this journey alongside our suppliers,” reflected Moceri.

Moceri ranked at number three in Procurement Magazine’s Top 100 Women in Procurement 2022.

2019

Joined Google

25+

Years in the procurement industry

#3

Ranking in Top 100 Women 2022 procurementmag.com

19

FIVE MINUTES WITH...

VANESSA VEIT INNOVATIVE, INVENTIVE, AND RESOURCEFUL, VANESSA VEIT – SENIOR DIRECTOR AT LACTALIS AMERICAN GROUP – HAS MORE THAN 20 YEARS OF EXPERIENCE IN THE PROCUREMENT INDUSTRY 20

July 2022

Q. PLEASE COULD YOU START

BY INTRODUCING YOURSELF AND YOUR ROLE?

» I’m an innovative, inventive, and

resourceful senior procurement director, with over 20 years of experience in procurement, supplier management, digital transformation, and sustainability in the food industry.

I’m never afraid to take my chance, and, because my mind allows me to venture beyond the obvious, I always entertain ideas about the best ways to reach a goal, increase productivity, or solve a problem.

As a strategic thinker, I easily pinpoint trends, identify problems or opportunities that many people overlook.

In the last few years, I have actively worked on Packaging Transformation Plans to minimise the environmental impacts of packaging – including recyclability, greenhouse gas emissions and even the reduction of food waste. One of my greatest professional accomplishments was to win the 2021 Sustainable Packaging Coalition Innovator Award in Recovery, helping to raise consumer awareness about the Stop Dropoff stream in the US.

Q. HOW DID YOU FIND YOURSELF TO BE IN THE PROCUREMENT INDUSTRY?

» I started my career in research and

development (R&D), but I realised very quickly that I wouldn’t be able to fully capitalise on my strengths in this function. It took me a few years to understand how I could leverage my creative mindset in my day-to-day work.

The product development process was too rigid for me, with engineering and R&D making design decisions in functional silos.

The focus was often on embedding advanced technology without enough input from

sales and marketing about what customers and consumers actually want or from procurement about what the supply market and supply chain have to offer.

Many companies focus on creating innovative products but struggle with escalating costs and inflexible supply chains.

With my dual background, I strongly believe in the power of procurement in shaping the next generation of products.

Improving cross-functional engagement is a common issue in the organisation, but procurement could play a major role by focusing on joint innovation with suppliers.

I had the chance to work for leading food industries and worked for direct and indirect categories in Europe and in North America.

Q. YOU HAVE BEEN IN THE INDUSTRY FOR MORE THAN 20 YEARS; WHAT IS THE BEST PIECE OF ADVICE YOU HAVE RECEIVED AND WOULD PASS ON TO OTHERS?

» The best advice I have received in my

career is to stay compassionate, driven and motivated, and focus on achieving my own goals. Don’t be afraid to make mistakes, just go for it.

Q. LOOKING BACK, WHAT ADVICE WOULD YOU GIVE YOUR YOUNGER SELF STARTING OUT?

» Be clear about your purpose and be driven by values. A leader’s role is to live by your personal values, explicitly promote them and make sure they are part of your day-today and never make any compromise.

Q. WHAT CURRENT TRENDS ARE YOU SEEING IN THE INDUSTRY?

» Forward thinking companies are

working on: • Full transparency – sourcing and procurement are well-positioned to procurementmag.com

21

FIVE MINUTES WITH...

provide centralised visibility into purchase requests, projects pipeline, and traceability of origin while building a data-driven roadmap for measuring and improving results in real-time and creating strategic impact for the enterprise. The pandemic has highlighted the need for greater purchasing data in all areas. Now there are tools and systems that can help provide a level of visibility never imagined before, but these tools need to be wellcoordinated in order to be used with relevant information. Unfortunately, most companies lack a centralised management system, with information on suppliers still siloed between business functions.

• Risk mitigation – with COVID-19, geopolitical changes, supply interruptions, new regulation and the increasing number of climate events, procurement is empowered to effectively manage risk and support compliance across the business. Enterprises are now recognising sourcing as a strategic partner, as well as the need to become much more agile in terms of making processes and systems accessible and usable for all employees. Executives now see what many procurement professionals knew already – the business impact of strategic sourcing.

• Supplier Relationship Management – the procurement function will need to build supplier evaluations and feedback mechanisms to allow for greater collaboration and alignment between the business and its supply base. Procurement needs stronger and more innovative partnerships with suppliers.

Q. WHAT DOES THE NEXT 12-18 MONTHS HOLD FOR YOU?

» With consumers increasingly aware of

and more vocal about their sustainability 22

July 2022

concerns, and with growing regulatory pressure, leading FMCG companies and retailers have made strong commitments to sustainability.

While this is moving us in the right direction, and technology is rapidly improving, it will require a real focus from the procurement processes, capabilities, and resources. Developing a systematic way to understand suppliers (risk, compliance and performance) will become crucial and those companies that invest in digital technology will have more visibility and more time to react in case of issues.

We will have in the next 12-18 month an opportunity to leverage automation to build a more resilient supply chain.

Q. WHAT QUALITIES MAKE A GREATER LEADER?

» A leader’s key role is to create energy

and momentum; my role is to help others see possibilities and potential, creating energy, inspiration, and vision for my team.

My role as a leader is to create the right environment for others to flourish in their jobs.

I have always tried to create a culture of compassion and empowerment that is accepting of diverse perspectives, backgrounds, and cultures. This unlocks people’s creativity, productivity, and happiness.

My role is also to stretch my team members to do better and realise more of their true potential.

I’m a big fan of helping women succeed through learning and development that builds on their strengths, helps them create the important networks that they need to succeed and gives them exposure to the right people.

Q. HOW HAS YOUR LEADERSHIP STYLE CHANGED OVER THE YEARS?

» My leadership style has evolved over

“ Don’t be afraid to make mistakes, just go for it”

time and has been influenced by my global experiences in Europe and the United States.

I have learned to choose the leadership style that suits the situation, and I had some great role models during my career journey.

I try to have a very open, inclusive and affiliative style. I want to make it clear to people that, while I have views and opinions, I don’t know everything and want to hear their ideas.As a leader, it’s important to role model behaviour but also to show that I’m adapting and continually learning about myself. I choose people in the organisation whom I trust to give me feedback on how I’m impacting the team, because if what I’m doing is not working, I need to know and will modify where needed. procurementmag.com

23

DISCOVER WHO MADE THE CUT. Top 100 Companies in Procurement Read Now

A BizClik Media Group Brand

Creating Digital Communities

26

July 2022

WALGREENS BOOTS ALLIANCE

PUTTING THE AUTHENTICITY INTO PROCUREMENT WRITTEN BY: JESS GIBSON

PRODUCED BY: GLEN WHITE

procurementmag.com

27

WALGREENS BOOTS ALLIANCE

WBA’s Chief Procurement Officer, Jim Townsend, details the company’s procurement evolution, digitalisation journey and ethos

W

herever you are in the world, it’s highly likely that you’ve either heard of, or been a customer of, Walgreens Boots

Alliance (WBA).

An integrated healthcare, pharmacy and retail leader that serves customers across the US, Europe and Latin America, WBA operates a plethora of consumer brands, of which one or two (at the very least) may already be familiar: Walgreens, Boots, Duane Reade, the No7 Beauty Company, Benavides (Mexico), and Ahumada (Chile).

This brand portfolio is further bolstered by WBA’s healthcare-focused investments in several countries, including major markets such as China and the U.S. In his role of chief procurement officer (CPO) for Walgreens Boots Alliance, Jim Townsend is an integral leader. Armed with considerable experience that he has accumulated in the course of varied roles, Townsend is ripe with knowledge – whether technical, business-focused, historical or about building self-belief for success.

“Every procurement professional should be bold, brave, and ready to take the right road rather than the easy road,” Townsend asserts, establishing his style of leadership and approach to conducting business.

His honest, straightforward nature lends itself well to the role of CPO and has fed 28

July 2022

Example of an image caption procurementmag.com

29

THE WORLD HAS CHANGED. HAVE YOU? Is it time to rethink how procurement delivers on your organization’s objectives? The world’s leading businesses trust Proxima.

Accelerating purposeful and profitable change

PURPOSEFUL AND PROFITABLE CHANGE WITH PROXIMA Proxima COO, Dan Collings discusses how suppliers are now finally being see as the “external enterprise” and why it is now or never for procurement Whilst the current economic environment is challenging, even today there is enormous value to be had in spending wisely and well. “Around seventy percent of company spend is on supply,’’ says Dan Collings, COO of Procurement and Supply Chain Consultancy Proxima. ‘Getting that spending right is a valuable differentiator for businesses in the good but especially in the not so good times. It is more critical than ever to ensure that suppliers are perfectly aligned to the rhythm of a business, and that every cent is working in pursuit of objectives”.

“And objectives evolve”, adds Collings. “Early in my career, nearly every client was asking us to focus on driving savings, something that we still excel at. Today, the definition of value can be much broader, aligned to the realization that suppliers are the ‘external

enterprise’. Whether it’s a question of cost, risk, resilience, ESG or innovation, invariably supplier networks are part of the answer”.

Walgreens is a perfect example of how Proxima partners with businesses, and ambitious CPOs. “We want to help CPOs to put procurement at the heart of driving profitable and purposeful change. With Walgreens this means helping them to achieve ambitious financial targets while at the same time supporting the transformation of procurement”.

“We were originally involved in assessing Walgreen’s property portfolio - everything from signage to snow clearing to the dayto-day operations of a Walgreens store. We are now into year seven of our partnership, and it’s one that we deeply value, based on trust and results delivery. What started in property now extends across a significant breadth of procurement and supply chain topics including sourcing, complex transformation and the deployment of deep subject matter expertise”.

And what of savings, are these a thing of the past? “Absolutely not, although perhaps today the job of procurement is more ‘Commercial Architects’ than savings chaser. There is still enormous financial value to be had in most organizations, if you know where to look”.

FIND OUT MORE

WALGREENS BOOTS ALLIANCE

Putting the authenticity into procurement

“ WHY WOULD ANYBODY WANT TO WORK FOR SOMEBODY THAT'S NOT AUTHENTIC?” JIM TOWNSEND

CHIEF PROCUREMENT OFFICER, WALGREENS BOOTS ALLIANCE

into the company’s digital procurement transformation, as well as its overall largescale transformation process, repositioning and renewing procurement, and ensuring success for the company.

WBA’s procurement process underscored by company values Though the modern iteration of the company formed back in 2014 when 32

July 2022

Walgreens joined forces with Alliance Boots, the cumulative history of WBA adds up to over 170 years.

The journey began in 1849 with John Boot opening the first Boots drugstore in Nottingham, UK. This was followed over 50 years later in 1901 by Charles R. Walgreen Sr purchasing the Chicago, US, drugstore in which he worked as a pharmacist. By 1909, this drugstore had developed into Walgreens Co, kickstarting the drugstore chain expansion with the opening of a second store. Multiple mergers and developments followed over

JIM TOWNSEND TITLE: CHIEF PROCUREMENT OFFICER INDUSTRY: PROCUREMENT LOCATION: USA

the next century, and the rest is, as they say, history.

With such an impressive history to its name, WBA has what Townsend refers to as “a really strong heritage in health, pharmacy, beauty, and retail”, which makes it a brand that consumers know they can trust. Right now, though, the company is more focused on the future ahead.

“We've got a really exciting future in terms of where we're heading and one that will be immersed in omnichannel, expanding our health solutions and doing everything we can to make healthcare affordable,” says Townsend.

EXECUTIVE BIO

Prior to joining Walgreens Boots Alliance, he worked for Anglo American and General Electric also within commercial procurement. He has worked overseas extensively, in both manufacturing and retail environments.

He holds an MBA in Strategic Procurement from the University of Birmingham, UK and a bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering.

Leave tail spend to us.

Tail Spend can no longer be ignored. Unlike other procurement tools, Fairmarkit uses a unique AI-based supplier recommendation engine to find right suppliers for the request and removes manual touchpoints completely.

Learn More

Taming tail spend: Fairmarkit helps WBA cut costs and cycle time

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Establishing its procurement arm as a disrupter, Townsend describes WBA as “challenging in a truly positive way, in terms of the assumptions that are being made and the direction that's being taken” in procurement, while also building connections among colleagues and within the communities it serves.

“This is about being connected with where we are heading, with what's happening within the communities that we serve, 36

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understanding our customers and patients, and, equally as importantly, our fellow team members,” he says, a sentiment that also extends to the key players around the organisation.

“It’s really about how you turn up, about acting with integrity, bravely stepping forward into the future, about having the desire to continuously learn and use this to create new opportunities,” Townsend continues. “If I look at the procurement side,

WALGREENS BOOTS ALLIANCE

The onset of the pandemic shut down the vast majority of society, with only those businesses deemed essential still running; WBA, based predominantly within the remit of healthcare, was one such business.

Nevertheless, while “COVID was unquestionably one of the most challenging periods in all of our careers”, Townsend also feels that he has been lucky that WBA had “the incredible opportunity to serve patients and customers in perhaps the greatest era of collective need”.

“We've administered nearly 65 million vaccines, more than 12 million boosters, and more than 30 million tests. In parallel with that, we've witnessed huge growth in our digital sales. We've also developed some truly innovative health and retail solutions as we've navigated through this period.

“Again, on top of that, not only have we worked all of that space, but we've also focused extensively on our ESG agenda and how to expand our role in the community,” Townsend says.

This focus on ESG led to the company developing a solid set of values to model and aspire to: Courage, Connectivity, Commitment and Curiosity.

Despite the opportunities presented to WBA, for Townsend himself – used to

our teams have had to learn new things and really develop as professionals to find solutions that fit this new environment that we're in. Curiosity is incredibly strong, anybody within procurement should have that – the very best procurement people are incredibly curious.”

It’s exactly this curiosity and integrity that have led to WBA being an indispensable help and connection to the outside world during what has been a bumpy few years.

“ SOMETIMES YOU NEED TO MAKE SOME TOUGH CALLS THAT NOT EVERYBODY WILL AGREE WITH” JIM TOWNSEND

CHIEF PROCUREMENT OFFICER, WALGREENS BOOTS ALLIANCE procurementmag.com

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GEP DRIVES GREATER COLLABORATION AND VISIBILITY FOR WBA Paul Blake, Senior Director of Engagement at GEP, discusses how the company is working with WBA to drive greater collaboration & transparency in procurement Supply chains today are more complex than ever before. Transparency and collaboration are key to supply chains’ future in order to get the right footing in a more vulnerable and uncertain environment.

For 10 years, Paul Blake has worked for GEP; today, he is the Senior Director of Engagement. Blake explains: “Our approach to working with our customers in this kind of environment is multifaceted.

Firstly, we help our customers define what a 21st century modern supply chain should look like.”

He adds: “At GEP, we bring information to the forefront with intelligent solutions to ensure that our customers make the right decisions when it comes to the suppliers that they work with.”

GEP AND ITS PARTNERSHIP WITH WALGREENS BOOTS ALLIANCE Like many customers of GEP, Walgreens Boots Alliance (WBA) has an abundance of complexity within its operations and a legacy of handling a lot of information in different systems, as well as offline.

“With WBA we have provided a technology platform that allows them to achieve a single source of truth, a central system that allows multiple different project types, stakeholders, territories, and regions to collaborate with, within a single framework that can be continuously improved,” says Blake.

He adds: “So it’s about taking data from the company’s historical records of what has been spent on what and with whom, and then providing the means to analyse that data for opportunities. We also provide a system that allows those opportunities to be turned into actionable projects for forecasting and setting goals.

Bringing together all this information into the GEP SMART provides organisations with greater visibility and brings contracts to life, rather than being a static document.”

With this implementation, GEP SOFTWARE provides a much greater coherence in the end-to-end process allowing collaboration between the different stakeholders within the procurement operation, with improved collaboration between procurement and the supply base, too.

WALGREENS BOOTS ALLIANCE

networking and negotiating with other professionals on a daily basis – isolation and social distancing has been difficult.

“Personally, I've missed the face-toface human interaction over the last couple of years that many of us derive a lot of personal energy from,” he says.

“And those conversations that generate new opportunities and new ways of thinking, inspiring us all to do something different – that's definitely more difficult in the virtual world.

“ RETAIL AND HEALTHCARE HAS REVOLUTIONISED OVER THE PAST FIVE YEARS, AND THE PANDEMIC HAS FURTHER ACCELERATED DEVELOPMENT WITHIN THESE SECTORS” JIM TOWNSEND

CHIEF PROCUREMENT OFFICER, WALGREENS BOOTS ALLIANCE

Townsend adds: “I'm not suggesting it can't be done, but the whole thing about a virtual meeting is that it’s typically very structural, targeted with a particular outcome. It's about, ‘let's think about where we'll go tomorrow’; it's rarely that kind of broad conversation you’d have in person where you strengthen connectivity and develop your left-field thinking.”

Regardless of the rigidity that can halt creativity in digital meetings, Townsend has a more ebullient attitude about technology in general, recognising its role in WBA’s strategy and transformation over the last few years.

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9

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More than 315,000 team members

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procurementmag.com

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“ CURRENTLY, WE USE A SUITE OF DIFFERENT PROCUREMENT TECH TOOLS; AT THE HEART OF THIS IS GEP’S SMART SUITE” JIM TOWNSEND

CHIEF PROCUREMENT OFFICER, WALGREENS BOOTS ALLIANCE

The procurement evolution and digital strategy “WBA’s been very progressive with its large-scale transformations in terms of the core elements of business and its digital transformation, but also in procurement,” Townsend says.

That much is certainly evident, but what exactly instigated this and how has it added business value to customers? “Retail and healthcare have revolutionised over the past

five years, and the pandemic has further accelerated development within these sectors. Customers and patients expect increased convenience through digital omnichannel experiences, as well as greater value, transparency, sustainability, and diversity,” Townsend outlines.

Change has been a prevalent theme throughout the last decade, with much of society opting to purchase through multiple channels and maximising the opportunity of the online spaces to match the needs and expectations of generations brought up in a technological world; the pandemic merely illuminated and sped up this shift.

Explaining the process further, Townsend says: “We recognised that strategic supply partnerships were crucial to delivering a new sustainable customer offering and that the investments needed to be funded through procurementmag.com

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WALGREENS BOOTS ALLIANCE

operating efficiencies. We were charged with jointly identifying, structuring and developing these partnerships.”

“To achieve this, we had to transform our organisation. We had to attract, grow and retain talent and reposition ourselves within the organisation, as well as grow our ambition to levels past thought of as unthinkable.”

The first stage of this transformation began back in 2017 and focused on a ‘back to basics’ approach: getting the core procurement operating model firing on all cylinders and delivering what the business needed – and not what procurement thought it needed. They made a small number of dedicated digital investments during this initial phase, preferring to 44

July 2022

pick the right moment in time for a more comprehensive digital transformation.

Developing the core four strategic themes to innovate procurement In 2017, WBA’s procurement team developed four strategic themes for its digital innovation and company-wide evolution.

The first of these strategic themes focused on growth partnerships and the company repositioning itself within its existing markets; the second was based around a relentless focus on ESG and efficiency for sustainability purposes; the third was devoted to building procurement’s executive influence and functional centrality; the fourth and final theme detailed the transformation of the procurement

operating and partnering models, in addition to its capability, environment, supplier relationships and team engagement.

“The executive leadership team supported and sponsored the new procurement model, which in turn aligned with the wider organisation. Policies were overhauled and embedded,” Townsend says of the process.

“We defined new practices and found a way to drive end-to-end procurement engagement in a different way. Success was essentially enabled through an innovative business partnering model that built on business partnering with functional teams.”

“To drive the strategic agenda and leverage sustainable growth opportunities, we put in place collaborative, crossfunctional teams that identified a

pipeline of prospective partnerships and entrepreneurship. Furthermore, this was supported by a group-wide Procurement Efficiency Programme enabling the wider ‘Total Cost Management’ programme.

“We ensured that this landed within the respective budgets by making those necessary adjustments and, similarly, we made some significant balance sheet improvements that we tracked to validate cash release as we executed on each of our initiatives.”

The Procurement Efficiency Programme was formed in collaboration with these crossfunctional teams and has since delivered approximately 600 initiatives each year.

“Delivery of these outcomes rested on the capability transformation within procurementmag.com

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Procurement, enabled through changes to the operating model, investing in the team via the Procurement Academy, and disciplined execution,” says Townsend.

But what about the technology aiding this transformation?

“Currently, we use a suite of different procurement tech tools; at the heart of this is GEP’s Smart Suite,” he says. “This enables us to focus on our role, the partnering and commerciality of what we do. We heavily utilise the programme management module for, among other things, tracking benefits, the e-sourcing tool and the contracts repository. How we drive our programme is key to our success, our day-to-day operations, as well as our strategic initiatives.

“By design, business processes, requirements and partnerships, as well as technology growth partnerships – through optimising for sustainability impact, for example – facilitated Walgreens to much better reach the socially vulnerable, which has been critical during the pandemic,” Townsend explains, the notion of supporting the socially vulnerable having helped shape the company’s overall ethos of making healthcare more affordable.

“This really sets the drum beat of the organisation.”

Talking of the near-future, Townsend excitedly tells us: “We’re building out the future digital environment for our team members, this will focus on delivering material value growth and retention to WBA. “The next phase will see us optimising our existing Ariba platform, implementing a comprehensive end to end contract lifecycle management solution, optimised buying channels and an intuitive low value sourcing solution. The real prize here is figuring out how to stitch this 46

July 2022

“ WE’LL CONTINUE TO BUILD OUT OUR NEW OPERATING MODEL TO EXTEND THE VALUE CYCLE AND BROADEN THE SCOPE OF WHAT PROCUREMENT IS ABOUT WITHIN OUR ORGANISATION, WHILE BUILDING AN EVEN STRONGER TEAM WITH SPECIALISED TALENT” JIM TOWNSEND

CHIEF PROCUREMENT OFFICER, WALGREENS BOOTS ALLIANCE

ecosphere together to make the process of procurement seamless and connected.”

A focus on ESG and planning for the future As already established, the onset of the pandemic offered the opportunity for the world to pause and reassess. It exposed the overwhelmingly negative impact of human activity on the environment, as well as the vast racial, gender, and social inequalities plaguing the world, in ways that people could no longer ignore. Soon, demand for much more accountability and transparency from brands across the spectrum of industry began to swell – and businesses had no choice but to comply.

WBA wasn’t exempt from this turning of the tide and swiftly got down to business identifying ESG initiatives, focusing its procurementmag.com

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forward-facing company-wide strategy on environmental and social issues, while overhauling its management strategy.

“We made a commitment to expand our understanding of climate-related risk and the opportunities around that. And we're on track to reduce our absolute scope two emissions through some of our initiatives,” Townsend states proudly. “60% of WBA waste is recycled – we've increased that by 6% since 2019, while also reducing our carbon emissions by almost 15% compared to 2019.

“Within the Boots UK arm of the business, less than 1% of our waste went to landfill for

the third year in a row. About 6.3% of energy consumed across the organisations comes from renewable sources. We have a strong focus in this space and a very clear clue around where we're heading, from an ESG perspective.”

This attitude of constantly doing better and dedicating yourself to the betterment of others is core to Townsend’s personal approach.

He feels that, while a good leader should be driven, focused and courageous, it is more important to be authentic, grounded, fun to work with and, above all, genuinely caring – attributes that have had a significant hand in WBA’s transformation and future focus.

“Why would anybody want to work for somebody that's not authentic?” Townsend questions, hitting the nail on the head in terms of identifying the company culture that potential employees and customers are looking for these days.

So what’s in store for WBA’s procurement team in the next couple of years? Well, it’s guaranteed that ESG initiatives and strategies will be central in the company’s future plans.

According to Townsend, this will be joined by a commitment to being “customerfocused”, “socially responsible” and, to some degree, “technology-led”.

He concludes: “We thought through where we want to be, and it was around end-to-end digitalisation and being insights driven. We’ll continue to build out our new operating model to extend the value cycle and broaden the scope of what procurement is about within our organisation, while building an even stronger team with specialised talent.

“As part of that, we’ll continue making WBA an even better place to work.”

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DEVELOPING THE ‘RIGHT KIND OF CULTURE’ IN PROCUREMENT

Leading executives from Kissflow, Sievo and PwC discuss the development of the ‘right kind of culture’ in procurement to drive greater value creation WRITTEN BY: GEORGIA WILSON

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PROCUREMENT STRATEGY

Prasanna Rajendran (PR) Vice President, Kissflow

Atro Ranta-aho (AR) Vice President of Value Enablement, Sievo

Dr. Bashar Eljawhari (BE) Consulting Partner at PwC Middle East

I

t’s fair to say that the disruptive nature of the last two years has altered the perspectives of many when it comes to procurement. The culture surrounding its value has positively influenced the function, with many CEOs looking to ramp up their investment.

Speaking with leading executives from the world of procurement, we look at how an organisation can develop the ‘right kind of culture’ to gain the most value. procurementmag.com

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PROCUREMENT STRATEGY

“ THE PANDEMIC, SUPPLY CHAIN DISRUPTIONS AND THE FOCUS ON SUSTAINABILITY HAVE CHANGED THE PERSPECTIVE PEOPLE HAD ABOUT PROCUREMENT” PRASANNA RAJENDRAN VICE PRESIDENT, KISSFLOW

How is workplace culture changing when it comes to procurement, and what is driving this shift?

PR: The pandemic, supply chain disruptions, and the focus on sustainability have changed the perspective people had about procurement. Many have started to appreciate the value that it creates, which is having a positive influence on procurement leaders where they are shifting their focus from cost savings to value creation.

This shift is making procurement leaders re-evaluate their priorities, in terms of the

skills and core values they are expecting from their teams. And, when it comes to suppliers, they are slowly moving out of the ‘cost savings at all costs’ mindset, and are focusing on building a strategic relationship instead.

AR: A lot has changed. Procurement is seen as a value-adding function with high business contribution, as opposed to a function that only acquires needed products and services at the right time and place. The type of people, tools and mindsets that are needed are also changing.

This shift is being driven by technical development, pressures for agility in dynamic environments, and transformation in generations, from high substance knowledge culture to generalist culture with access to data. Classification and procurement insight requires silent knowledge, but this can be taught to AI later on and automated.

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“ PROCUREMENT ORGANISATIONS ARE AS UNIQUE AS THE COMPANIES THEY OPERATE IN; A FORWARD-LOOKING, OPENMINDED ATTITUDE IS A MUST FOR PROCUREMENT IN TRANSITION” ATRO RANTA-AHO

VICE PRESIDENT OF VALUE ENABLEMENT, SIEVO

BE: In the Middle East, procurement has traditionally been a transactional function that focuses mostly on procuring goods and services to meet the specified technical requirements at the lowest price possible.

Now, we see a few new trends shaping procurement and workplace culture.

There is more focus on end-user demand planning, a stronger introduction of category management and strategic sourcing, and a shift towards analytics and digital procurement to drive value.

This shift in procurement-related culture is primarily driven by government entities and companies exploring ways to optimise their operational costs, of which procurement is an important component.

Another key driver has been COVID-19.

The disruption to global supply chains put more emphasis on the localisation of goods and services. Category management and consolidated demand through procurement enabled import substitution and supported localisation efforts.

What do today’s workers want from the procurement function?

PR: With more and more digital natives entering the workforce, it is crucial to be a tech-first organisation. The pandemic 54

July 2022

accelerated this trend, with people looking for increased flexibility at work to manage work-life balance, more so than bonuses and perks. So, they naturally opt-in for employers who offer flexibility in terms of the way they work – including fully or partially remote work options. Becoming a tech-first organisation can help you to do the same.

BE: With the drive for value through procurement, professionals are expecting to upskill their analytical and negotiation skills, as well as training on sourcing strategies. Furthermore, they are looking for spend analytics tools and digital procurement solutions to help them gain insights and identify savings opportunities.

PROCUREMENT STRATEGY

What is considered ‘the right kind of culture’ to have in procurement?

PR: Create value through procurement and don’t just focus on savings. For so long, procurement has been seen as a ‘cost centre’, but the pandemic has really changed that perspective, to the point where people have started to see the kind of value they bring to the table. So it’s important to approach procurement holistically rather than as a tactical and transactional operation.

AR: There is no right or wrong. The ‘right culture’ is in line with a company’s culture and employee values. Procurement organisations are as unique as the companies they operate in. Forward looking and open-minded attitude is a must for procurement in transition.

BE: It is difficult to say what is the ‘right procurement culture’. Each company or government entity has its own needs.

However, the general trend is towards valuecreating, digitally-enabled procurement.

How can organisations achieve this culture?

PR: Building the right culture is not done by putting out posters and employee onboarding brochures. At Kissflow, we invest a lot of time and effort into building the right culture at all levels, with a dedicated team led by our culture shepherd (a role we created). Coming up with the list of core values and accepted behaviours is the easiest part; communicating and putting it to practise is the hardest part and where most organisations fail. procurementmag.com

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PROCUREMENT STRATEGY

Based on our own experiences, you need core values that are relatable to your employees, a bunch of culture evangelists who can take it to all levels of the company, and you need to build multi-level interaction programmes to educate and enable people to practise.

But coming up with a framework for the right kind of culture is one thing; implementing it is another. You need to have the right technology to adapt the processes and policies that meet your cultural values. It helps you to enable employees to demonstrate culturally acceptable behaviours with ease.

AR: At the end of the day, procurement is a people business, too. Strategies and policies

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are one thing, but people must align and buy into the statement, otherwise it’s just a piece of paper. Nurturing and leading change is critical with existing teams to keep everyone engaged (especially ones with longer careers). Recruiting people with culture in mind drives the wanted change.

Seeking profiles that bring the best out in the whole team enables culture change and growth. Positive challenging of status quo and continuous improvement is needed, too.

Outside of talent, the role of technology is also essential for enabling the right kind of culture. Without suitable solutions there is the will but not the way, which can lead to

PROCUREMENT STRATEGY

frustrations and, eventually, people leaving for environments where they can have the best tools. Professionals seek the type of cultures where they can best express themselves professionally. Tools save time from robotic tasks, freeing time for humanto-human collaboration, insights, planning, value-adding work and strategic thinking.

BE: It is important to have the right performance indicators to shift procurement culture and drive value out of it; employees must be held accountable for targeted performance. It is even more critical to think of procurement as part of the whole integrated process, which starts from the end-user identifying

requirements until finance pays received supplier invoices.

Technology is also a critical enabler of procurement’s shift towards being a datadriven, value-creating function. As an example, the use of an AI application to extract bills of quantities from over 400 scanned contracts at one of our clients increased procurement’s productivity, enabling the extraction and classification of data with minimal human intervention.

This use of technology allowed procurement professionals to concentrate on more value-adding activities, such as sourcing strategies, rather than the tedious task of manually extracting data.

“ WITH THE DRIVE FOR VALUE THROUGH PROCUREMENT, PROFESSIONALS ARE EXPECTING TO UPSKILL THEIR ANALYTICAL AND NEGOTIATION SKILLS, AS WELL AS TRAINING ON SOURCING STRATEGIES” DR. BASHAR ELJAWHARI CONSULTING PARTNER AT PWC MIDDLE EAST

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SANTANDER UK

SANTANDER UK BANKING ON DYNAMIC DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION

WRITTEN BY: SCOTT BIRCH PRODUCED BY: GLEN WHITE procurementmag.com

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SANTANDER UK

Nick Jenkinson, Chief Procurement Officer at Santander UK, on the challenges faced undertaking a complete digital transformation at the financial giant

F

ew procurement professionals have a career as broad and diverse as Nick Jenkinson, currently driving transformation at Santander UK. While using the word ‘currently’ may seem odd, like referring to your ‘current partner’, Jenkinson is the first to admit that he is constantly striving to make himself surplus to requirements.

“I've worked in procurement for more years than I wish to remember and I've got a slightly strange CV in that I've worked across seven companies and seven industries for more than 20 years,” he says.

“I've learned a lot over 13 years of doing transformation activities, but being able to walk away and know that you have truly left something in a better place than where you found it that's recognised within the organisation, that's recognised within the team, I guess that’s my perfect scenario.

I can walk off into the sunset knowing I've created a great team. I've created the strong leadership. I've created the next step up for people within that team and then I’ll be able to move on to another challenge.”

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Nick Jenkinson, Chief Procurement Officer at Santander UK

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SANTANDER UK

Jenkinson makes references to the New Zealand rugby team and its ethos that made them one of the greatest sporting teams of all time – ‘sweeping the sheds’. The simple act of cleaning the dressing rooms after a game, having that personal discipline and not considering you are above a task and someone else should do it just because you are one of the best players on the planet.

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“ We're really undertaking openheart surgery” NICK JENKINSON CPO, SANTANDER UK

“I'm not hierarchical in the slightest from a leadership perspective, so I like to get involved,” says Jenkinson.

“But in those early stages of driving transformation, you will often look around and you haven't got all the people that you want or need within the organisation and therefore you have to look in the mirror or it doesn't happen.”

Automotive roots Twenty years is a long time in procurement, and the rapid digitisation in recent years has only accelerated that. So has the function changed beyond recognition in Jenkinson’s time? He says both yes and no. He started his career in the automotive industry which he admits was probably more advanced than most at that point in time. procurementmag.com

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Doxim provides modern, flexible solutions for CCM James Hall, Commercial Director at Doxim, advocates flexible, accessible print and digital communications for businesses everywhere Doxim is a global customer communications management provider with over 2800 clients, providing both print and digital communications to its customers.

“We provide everything from email and SMS, to a letter in the post,” says Hall, Commercial Director at Doxim. “We have over 20 years of experience in customer communications. Clients are essentially looking to outsource the complexity to Doxim so that they can focus on their core competencies.”

Doxim provides a wide range of solutions that include everything from a document’s creation and personalisation, to its storage and delivery in both print and digital formats – enabling its clients to save money, increase revenue and wallet share, and give their customers the best possible experience.

Asked about industry trends, Hall says: “We’re seeing a shift to cloud-based customer communication management.

Businesses want to move away from large on-premises solutions to save money,

move with the times and be more secure.

AI and data analytics are becoming ever more present in all technology, and this includes the CCM market. There’s also a trend towards communications becoming accessible to those with assistive devices.

Vendor consolidation is a key driver in the CCM market, as businesses look to become more efficient, save money and focus on the customer experience.”

Doxim delivers over half a billion emails for partner Santander every year, with a greater than 99% delivery rate. “The marketing project that we work on with them, is driven by an Artificial Intelligence engine and that helps determine next-best-communications to send the customer,” he says.

“We very much work in partnership with Santander to constantly improve the customer experience,” says Hall. “And, really, the key to success with all communications projects is working in partnership, just as we do with Santander.”

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Jenkinson was in direct materials and says services and indirect materials were seen very much as the poor relation.

It is only since he moved into the world of services procurement where Jenkinson says he recognised a difference as the function and use of technology has evolved.

“I'm not going to say it's more complex as there are just different types of complexity in indirect and direct, and because I've been able to move across different industries, I've been able to see what different industries do well and also, not so well,” says Jenkinson.

“In discussing digital, I can get a bit cynical sometimes because I think people can get confused when defining digital procurement.

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I think people get too lost in AI, RPA, NLP and the future of digitisation without sometimes understanding the drivers within their own organisation and the problems they are trying to solve – I am not a big fan of technology for the sake of technology. Some people are still at the level where they need to get the technology foundation, but whichever way you look at it, we all use technology every day and it has greatly changed our approach.

Nick Jenkinson TITLE: CPO COMPANY: SANTANDER UK INDUSTRY: PROCUREMENT, BANKING LOCATION: UNITED KINGDOM A forward thinking, selfaware, results driven and highly dynamic leader, who has demonstrated an ability to inspire, motivate and drive change through a focus on people, customer engagement and innovative strategies.

Highly inquisitive and has a passion for change and building high-performing teams that can challenge the status quo and deliver tangible and transformative business outcomes.

Key skills and achievements include: • Transformative Procurement • Business leader

EXECUTIVE BIO

• P assion for driving significant change • T rack record of delivering significant, sustainable value • A relentless focus on digital enablers • L eadership of multi-award winning regional and global transformations

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Tech ‘about evolution, not revolution’ - Coforge

It is about delivering business value for stakeholders, including shareholders, customers and employees.”

Gautam Samanta, Coforge EVP and Global Head of Banking and Financial Services, stresses that digital transformation is all about delivering value.

Samanta adds that Coforge’s approach is effective because its solutions also “absorb the realities of our customers’ enterprises” - the reality being that “the old and the new often coexist in business processes that can sometimes be decades old”.

Coforge is a global digital services and solutions provider, and helps its clients embrace emerging and new technologies to achieve real-world business impact.

The company’s proprietary platforms power critical business processes across a select number of sectors, and it has a presence in 21 countries, with 25 delivery centres across nine nations.

One of the sectors in which Coforge is a key player is banking and financial services (BFS), where it is helping its BFS clients on the digital transformation journey by making the road as straight and smooth as possible.

“Digital transformation is an evolutionary process, not a revolutionary one,” says Samanta. “So we do not see it as disruptive.”

He adds that having a clear vision of what digital transformation is - and isn’t - is what shapes the solutions that help Coforge’s clients achieve their goals.

“For us, digital transformation is not just a marketing phrase to wrap around software services. It is not about the technology.

“One of the things that differentiates us is that we are pragmatic in our approach to helping clients,” Samanta adds. “Yes, we transform with the new, but not at the expense of the old, which often has value.”

It helps, too, that Coforge has a deep understanding of what value looks like in BFS, because the company has chosen to focus its attention on this sector, as well as a small number of other verticals.

“We focus on very select industries, and have a deep understanding of the underlying processes of those industries, which provide us with a distinct perspective,” says Samanta.

Learn more ›

SANTANDER UK

Nick Jenkinson, CPO Santander UK, on digital transformation

“It’s about putting the right people in place, doing the right things, with the right enablers and right positioning and the success will follow” NICK JENKINSON CPO, SANTANDER UK

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KEY PARTNERSHIPS

SANTANDER UK

A key element of our new operating model is our approach to developing and partnering with a supplier ecosystem who can truly help support and drive our business goals. I’m a big believer in the notion that you are what you eat and, as a result, we have developed an operating model where ~40% of our people are dedicated to supplier collaboration and risk management.

Given this approach and belief, we are working with some great partners across a number of areas to drive our technology, digitisation and talent goals.

Those partners include:

THE SCOTTISH BRAILLE PRESS The Scottish Braille Press is a long standing supplier of alternative format customer communications to visually impaired Santander UK customers.

The Scottish Braille Press is part of the charity Sight Scotland, therefore all profits and fundraising are used to support the charity. In addition, they are an employer that supports people with disabilities.

PARAGON Santander UK has a well-established partnership with Paragon rooted in transactional print, but more recently expanding into the management of our mailroom operations. This has presented an opportunity for us to deepen our strategic partnership through transformation to a digital outsourced mailroom.

DOXIM Doxim have provided a critical service to deliver both operational and marketing email communications to customers on behalf of Santander UK since 2017.

Doxim have been a vital partner in helping Santander transform the efficacy and efficiency of our digital email customer communications.

COFORGE Coforge were selected as a key partner given their expertise in emerging technology, data and digital and through the partnership, have supported a significant global workforce transformation initiative and new customer innovations.

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We all need balance in our lives.

As a strategic communications partner, it’s our purpose to create better days for you and your team.

We help you deliver at work, so you can deliver for them.

#betterdayswithpcc www.paragon-cc.com/en-gb

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Better days at work with

SANTANDER UK

“ I am not a big fan of technology for the sake of technology” NICK JENKINSON CPO, SANTANDER UK

“Ultimately there are significant technology enablers that I'm bringing into our organisation and really that's all about creating the time, the headspace for people to be able to be more effective in their roles and to be able to drive a different value proposition.

“Despite the access to these significant enablers, I still seem to often hear the same dull conversation of where should we be sat in the organisation. As a function, we can be a bit self-indulgent if I’m honest. We like to

tell everybody else in the profession how well we're all doing but we still come on to some of those same boring conversations which, if we're still having them, then clearly we haven't evolved as much as we should have done.”

Total Transformation When it comes to the challenge at Santander, Jenkinson says the banking giant is going through a major transformation programme.

His own impatience means he admits they are trying to drive change from multiple angles and that is one of the reasons why he was attracted to this latest passion project. procurementmag.com

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SANTANDER UK

“I've been able to move across different industries, I've been able to see what different industries do well and also, not so well” NICK JENKINSON CPO, SANTANDER UK

“We're really undertaking open-heart surgery,” says Jenkinson. “We've got a number of different technology upgrades that we're going through. We've really looked at everything to do with the current operating model – including people, processes and systems – and looked at where those challenges are.”

Jenkinson and his team are implementing new tools around sourceto-pay and making a lot of enhancements within risk management and supplier collaboration, not to mention sustainability.

When undertaking such a transformation, it’s essential to understand how these pieces of the jigsaw come together to provide a seamless solution for the user. He is improving processes and then overlaying those technologies in order to drive the agenda forward at pace.

He believes the key element about transformation is about having business confidence, being viewed as a true partner, fully engaged in all areas of the organisation, and seen as driving a broad value proposition. This is backed up, inevitably, with KPIs and scorecards but Jenkinson judges success on a different level.

“For me, it's the human side that’s critical,” he says.

So the big question may well be, when is Jenkinson expecting to move to the next challenge?

“Being able to leave a legacy behind that you're proud of is crucial. I'm very self-aware and self-critical and so I ask myself have I delivered something that I can truly, hand-on-heart say is a great solution I'm proud of. The teams you leave behind are also critical – have I created an environment where they can flourish for the future.. It’s about putting the right people in place, doing the right things, with the right enablers and right positioning and the success will follow .”

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DIGITAL PROCUREMENT

NAVIGATING THE COMPLEXITIES OF VENDOR MANAG

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GEMENT

DeepStream’s founder and CEO, Jack Macfarlane, discusses the complexity of vendor management and technology’s role in navigating the procurement function

WRITTEN BY: GEORGIA WILSON

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mpowering organisations to effectively control costs, reduce risks, ensure excellent service, and derive long-term value, vendor management can – when done correctly – generate great success and value for organisations by building, maintaining, and strengthening mutually-beneficial supplier relationships.

While the benefits are clear, the multidisciplinary nature of the procurement function leaves many organisations grappling to navigate the stressful and complex process.

So, what is driving this complexity?

DeepStream’s founder and CEO, Jack Macfarlane explains: “There is a need for change in simplifying processes and making them more transparent. Although client and customer communication have long been managed using the latest client relationship management software, vendor relationships have been held back by antiquated and opaque systems. Most of this has been – and, in many cases, still is – managed through old fashioned methods of communication and storing information, such as email and spreadsheets.” procurementmag.com

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DIGITAL PROCUREMENT

“ There is a need for change in simplifying processes and making them more transparent” JACK MACFARLANE FOUNDER AND CEO DEEPSTREAM

With many existing solutions failing to step-up to the mark, “a lack of transparency is causing knowledge silos between departments,” adds Macfarlane.

“Even at the highest enterprise level, in companies that have otherwise embraced new technology, managing vendor relationships and assets in a single location has remained a significant challenge.”

Another challenge for industries is the depth of specialism that the function now requires. “As keeping and maintaining

sufficient breadth and depth of data on suppliers becomes increasingly important, vendor management has evolved into a digital ecosystem consisting of multiple bestof-breed solutions,” explains Macfarlane.

“Vendor management is largely about gaining the commitment of your vendors to assist and support the operations of your business, while also meeting their expectations of you, your services and your own commitment to them. With collaborative technology, which can enhance the ability to ask questions and compare line items, one can unlock full visibility, making transparent and smarter decisions easier to execute. This way, accepting competitive bids – rather than blindly accepting any price pitched – also becomes easier to oversee and carry out.” procurementmag.com

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DIGITAL PROCUREMENT

Next Generation Vendor Management

“ A lack of transparency is causing knowledge silos between departments” JACK MACFARLANE FOUNDER AND CEO DEEPSTREAM

One of the most important and valuable aspects of technology is to eliminate guesswork; this can be achieved with innovative solutions that maximise the value across all managed suppliers. “Technical innovations can power all the vital aspects of a specific vendor, from maintaining a healthy relationship to establishing mutually beneficial commitments, through streamlining, automating and improving 80

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processes across a variety of business operations, including contract management, risk performance, compliance, innovation and sustainability,” says Macfarlane.

Adoption of digital solutions leads to higher maturity Leading procurement functions that have implemented digital solutions are now sitting higher on the company maturity curve. Macfarlane explains: “such maturity allows for contract compliance to be strengthened and better purchasing insights delivered, all in all, setting up procurement as a profit centre rather than a cost centre, results in a potential competitive advantage.”

Macfarlane adds: “Teams that are capable of implementing new solutions and promoting their adoption have reaped

JACK MACFARLANE, FOUNDER AND CEO OF DEEPSTREAM

the benefits. By embracing the alignment of people, processes and technology, we've seen that teams are significantly improving the value case and perception of procurement within their organisations.

This means that best-of-breed solutions are used to accelerate value delivery in specific procurement processes.”

But it’s not all about technology. While these solutions can be used alongside S2P platforms to provide a seamless experience, it will be vital for organisations to gain the right talent to ensure the smooth running of these operations. This shift in focus from traditional transactional procurement towards value-added activities is creating a surge in automated manual processes, leaving more time for organisations to focus on improving strategic efforts; but

I am the Founder and CEO of DeepStream, a cloud-based software company that streamlines the RFx (Request for Anything) processes into one system, making procurement easier, faster and more transparent.

I started my career as a graduate in investment banking in London at UBS, initially in M&A before moving into equity capital markets, then equity derivatives and special sits financing – ending up running this desk for Latin America, based in NYC. After eight years, I made a (quite drastic) change in taking on an opportunity to run DeepStream, with a vision of using technology to enable businesses to communicate and transact seamlessly with one another – something that I saw as being critical on how global commerce operated.

The playground where I saw the largest scope for a new paradigm to emerge was in procurement, the epicentre of where businesses spent money in transacting with counterparties.

Today, my role revolves around ensuring that our team delivers on our vision, ensuring that we are developing the most cutting edge product for our users, and that it is brought to market in the most efficient way. I love working with our clients, such as Britishvolt, Northvolt, and Xos in ensuring that we have the most usercentric approach in delivering clear value for procurement operations.

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Benefits of vendor management 1. Better selection of vendors 2. Enhanced contract management 3. Improved performance management 4. Enriched vendor relationships 5. Greater value Source: Zycus

the function will need to conquer the war on talent to ensure that their adaptability and technological advancements to gain a competitive and strategic edge is not in vain.

Similarly, organisations should also pay close attention to their communications.

“We know that vendor relationships directly impact a company’s success, and these relationships require collaboration. Paying close attention to your suppliers, in the same way as you do with customers, adds value and complements existing practices and systems,” explains Macfarlane.

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ways of working and can ensure that healthy relationships are maintained.

Long-term vendor relationships can be just like a marriage: they can be difficult to sustain and require a great deal of effort, adaptation and compromise. As such, vendor relationships must be protected by focusing on win-win situations, because if only one party benefits, the relationship will quickly become unbalanced.

“It's critical not to see the introduction of innovation as a cost-cutting exercise, but rather as an opportunity to add value to a long and healthy partnership.”

DIGITAL PROCUREMENT

“ Paying close attention to your suppliers, in the same way as you do with customers, adds value and complements existing practices and systems” JACK MACFARLANE FOUNDER AND CEO, DEEPSTREAM

What’s in store for the future?

Digitalisation. With 40% of businesses investing in software to tackle supply chain and procurement issues, technology is driving change in how competitive and efficient the supply chain is.

“Managing vendors in a streamlined way means that more vendors can be engaged for transactions, meaning procurement teams get better terms and drive profitability for their respective businesses,” says Macfarlane.

He concludes: “We are moving away from a fairly static buyer-vendor relationship to a more fluid and dynamic relationship type.

Whilst COVID-19 drove an acceleration in digital adoption by many businesses, the relevance has increased even further with the recent supply chain disruptions we have seen in the market.

“Our team was at the Intersolar conference in Munich recently, and the overwhelming sentiment from procurement teams was around how rapidly vendor availability was changing – the need for a transparent, open and dynamic way of engaging with alternative suppliers is being seen as something that can mean a business survives or has to cease procurement operations for lack of vendor visibility.” procurementmag.com

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BUDWEISER BREWING GROUP

WOR

BR Y: T B EN ROF T IT HC : WR AS N BY A D E R SE UC GGE D I O PR EN W B

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S

RLD’S LARGEST

REWER, ABINBEV, IN

SUSTAINABILITY VANGUARD

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BUDWEISER BREWING GROUP

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Budweiser Brewing Group is meeting goals on sustainability, with ambitious measures on water use, agriculture and renewable energy

A

nheuser-Busch InBev (AB InBev) is the world’s largest brewer, both by volume and revenue.

A truly global company with local brewing operations across 150 countries and 170,000 staff worldwide.

Businesses don’t get much bigger, and neither do sustainability undertakings.

AB InBev was formed in 2008, when Budweiser brewer Anheuser-Busch joined with Stella Artois-maker Interbrew and Brazil’s AmBev. Budweiser Brewing Group (BBG) UK&I remains a proud part of AB InBev globally.

In the UK, BBG Budweiser Brewing Group employs 1,400 people in its three breweries in Magor, South Wales, Samlesbury, Lancashire and Enfield, North London and in its local headquarters in central London.

The organisation continues to grow, following acquisition of a number of US and international craft brewers, including Goose Island, Blue Point, and Camden Town Brewery and is innovating and growing the Beyond Beer category.

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Helping to decarbonise customer supply chains As a member of the Science Based Target Initiative and a signatory to the UN Global Compact and its sustainable development goals, EV Cargo has powered the introduction of sustainable initiatives for many of its key customers to help reduce carbon emissions associated with their distribution operations.

@EVCargo www.evcargo.com

EV Cargo initiatives drive decarbonisation of AB InBev distribution Debbie Oram, Account Director at EV Cargo, discusses its partnership with AB InBev, which is driving sustainable transport of the brewer’s products The consumer goods industry is increasingly reliant on logistics and, with almost a third of global greenhouse gas emissions coming from transportation, this is a major area to be decarbonised to meet climate change targets.

Debbie Oram, Account Director at EV Cargo, explains the company’s focus on sustainability, the support for its partnership with AB InBev and how it has helped reduce carbon emissions associated with the brewer’s distribution operations. Oram oversees the

account for AB InBev at EV Cargo, which covers logistics and warehousing solutions in the UK, global supply chain management and related technology solutions for the world’s leading brands.

EV Cargo promotes a sustainable future Sustainability has become embedded in the organisation’s overall operation and is driving

its work with partners. “Our sustainability strategy is driven from the top, with CEO Heath Zarin and the sustainability committee responsible for all sustainability practices,” says Oram.

EV Cargo is a signatory to the UN Global Compact and supports the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. It endorsed a global memo of understanding at COP26 to achieve 30% zero-emission new truck sales by 2030, increasing to 100% by 2040. It is participating in the UN’s Science Based Targets initiative for reducing emissions and committing to targets that will help limit global warming. EV Cargo is aiming to achieve carbon neutrality across Scope 1 and 2 emissions by 2030, by implementing an ambitious decarbonisation roadmap. As a critical logistics partner of AB InBev, EV Cargo carries more than 65% of its current capacity across the UK. “EV Cargo led the introduction of hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) fuel, a direct replacement for

traditional diesel, at Budweiser Brewing Group UK&I, part of AB InBev. Distribution trucks at Budweiser’s Magor brewery in Wales switching to the replacement fuel delivered an immediate 92% reduction in CO2 emissions,” says Oram.

Learn more

BUDWEISER BREWING GROUP

AB InBev’s global headline targets on sustainability were set as far back as 2017, and it aims to achieve these by 2025. Its goals in this area comprise four pillars: Packaging, CO2 Emissions, Water, and Agriculture In 2021, following the COP26 United Nations Climate Change Conference, it set out a new goal: to become net-zero by 2040.

“We want to lead by example,” says Mauricio Coindreau, Head of Procurement and Sustainability for Budweiser Brewing Group (BBG), the UK arm of the business.

“We're looking to become the first major brewer to have carbon neutral operations in all of our breweries in the UK in 2026.

We're looking at many different ways to achieve that commitment.”

One of those ways is through renewable electricity. In 2019 BBG signed the largest private solar power deal to build solar farms which now, in combination with the wind 90

July 2022

turbine constructed near their Magor site, meaning all beers are brewed with 100% renewable electricity.

Its investments in renewables mean BBG produces more electricity than it needs, which has enabled it to donate to good causes.

BBG is also investing in new technologies, such as green hydrogen with plans to build a first of its kind green hydrogen plant to power brewing and logistics.

Already there is a comprehensive program of projects to reduce brewing emissions, including the world’s largest wort cooler at its brewery in Wales.

Packaging biggest sustainability challenge for Budweiser Brewing Group Coindreau says the biggest sustainability challenge faced by BBG is its packaging, which accounts for almost 40% of its total CO2 emissions. In 2021 it went 100% plastic ring free and there are ongoing projects to minimise plastic in tertiary.

MAURICIO COINDREAU TITLE: H EAD OF SUSTAINABILITY & PROCUREMENT INDUSTRY: MANUFACTURING

EXECUTIVE BIO

LOCATION: UNITED KINGDOM Mauricio has 10 years of international experience in sustainability, entrepreneurship, consulting, e-commerce/retail, blockchain and procurement. He also has a successful track record in team leadership towards developing new products and services.

Mauricio joined ABInBev in July 2019 and in January 2021 was appointed the Head of Procurement & Sustainability for Budweiser Brewing Group.

He holds an MBA in Business Administration and Management from London Business School and University of Hong Kong.

Within Budweiser Brewing Group, he is responsible for all procurement operations across the Business Unit, which covers functions such as: packaging, raw materials, renewable electricity, transport and value creation. Mauricio also leads a team working across Budweiser Brewing Group’s multiple sustainability initiatives, including the 2025 Global Sustainability Goals set

by ABInBev around Circular Packaging, Climate Action, Smart Agriculture and Water Stewardship.

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Leading the way in sustainable logistics Howard Tenens delivers exceptional service whilst embracing carbon reduction initiatives with investments in: y Solar photovoltaic panels and battery technology y Introduction of Hydrotreated Vegetable Oil

in place of diesel

y Compressed Natural Gas rigid trucks y BioLPG y Green energy supply y Recycling waste materials

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BUDWEISER BREWING GROUP

“OUR BIGGEST SUSTAINABILITY CHALLENGE IS AROUND PACKAGING” MAURICIO COINDREAU

HEAD OF SUSTAINABILITY & PROCUREMENT, BUDWEISER BREWING GROUP

Every year it is taking hundreds of tonnes of plastic out of circulation.

One of its targets is to have 100% of its packaging come from recyclable and reusable materials. But this is easier to achieve in some countries than it is in others, according to Coindreau.

“For example, in the UK, every time someone consumes a drink from a glass bottle, they chuck it in the bin and it goes into recycling,” he says. “But imagine if we could make this a returnable system, so that every bottle gets used maybe up to 30 times. That’s the most sustainable way to package beer, other than a keg. Another way is through renewable electricity so it is also investing in new technologies, such as green hydrogen.”

Such a system requires a high level of collaboration, because the majority of consumers need to be on board. Coindreau

says that this is why sustainable drink packaging is a challenge for the entire drinks industry.

“We need to convince retailers and other players in the drink industry to create a single approach, because consumers will respond best if it is easier for them to also participate, which it would be if there was just a single approach.”

“Beyond this, we are also exploring lots of innovations around packaging,” says Coindreau. “Last year for example, we introduced the world's lightest beer bottle, and also a low carbon can.”

‘Smart’ programmes around water and barley For a brewer of such scale, the main raw ingredients that make up beer – grain and water – also present significant sustainability challenges, which is why the global business, AB InBev, has ‘smart’ sustainability programmes both for agriculture and water. procurementmag.com

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BUDWEISER BREWING GROUP

The goal of its Smart Agriculture Programme is to ensure 100% of its grain farmers are skilled, connected, and financially empowered by 2025.

“Climate change is affecting many of the regions that we work in; we want to minimise those risks and build resistance through crop management,” explains Coindreau.

“We know that, from high-quality crops comes high-quality beer, and so we want to continue working with the same growers.

We are taking a farmer-centric approach and supporting sustainable agriculture to help our farmers increase productivity and profitability, and also to efficiently use natural resources, such as soil and water, along the way. It's about giving them access to data, to technology, and supporting them throughout the process.”

Another strand to its Smart Agriculture Programme is to use locally grown crops – as BBG currently does in the UK, where in 2020, all its barley was locally came from British farms.

Water stewardship vital to AB InBev Beer’s primary ingredient is of course, water, and on this front, AB InBev’s Water Stewardship Programme is vital to its sustainability efforts, because a number of its operations are based in high-water-stress areas, where water availability and quality are issues.

“Water is not only a critical ingredient to beer, but it's also a critical ingredient to economies,” Coindreau says. “For humankind, water is one of the basics of wellbeing. Because of this, our challenge is to look beyond our operations and to increase water availability for all the communities with whom we operate.”

He continues: “Sometimes, this is about helping communities dig wells, or it can be about bringing piped water in from cities. But it is also about reducing the amount of water we use, per beer.”

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“WATER IS NOT ONLY A CRITICAL INGREDIENT TO BEER, IT'S ALSO A CRITICAL INGREDIENT TO ECONOMIES” MAURICIO COINDREAU

HEAD OF SUSTAINABILITY & PROCUREMENT, BUDWEISER BREWING GROU P

On that note, in some countries, AB InBev uses roughly two litres of water for every litre of beer it produces. On average, just five years ago, this was as high as four litres.

“It's all about finding efficiencies,” says Coindreau.

Energy efficiency measures are a focus in another area of its business: logistics. The company has a mammoth fleet of delivery and service vehicles worldwide, and its use of electric vehicles – and vehicles using renewable fuel – is a key plank of its drive towards net zero carbon emissions.

Partnering with EV Cargo on sustainable transport For example, the Budweiser Brewing Group building on previous route optimisation projects to reduce traffic and emissions, recently announced the launch of a sustainable transport initiative with a number of its industry partners, including EV Cargo, which offers solutions around international freight delivery, warehousing and distribution. procurementmag.com

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See environmental compliance differently We enable UK businesses to make sustainable packaging decisions Support achieving ESG goals Preparing for Extended Producer Responsibility Packaging data collection and insights Modelling environmental costs

Learn more

Ecosurety In the climate crisis that we are facing, citizens, businesses, and governments, all have a critical role to play to mitigate climate change before it’s too late. Product manufacturers can be part of the solution by reducing the impact of their product lines and packaging on the environment.

Through and beyond environmental producer responsibilities existing across the world, manufacturers have the opportunity and the power to make a genuine impact by using business as a force for good, towards a circular economy.

• By thinking reuse, repair, before recyclability • By thinking recycled content • By thinking packaging material switch and minimisation.

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At Ecosurety we support UK manufacturers to make sustainable packaging decisions and therefore contribute to achieving their sustainability goals.

We help businesses with their packaging data collection, creating dashboards for them to reveal insights triggering decision making, modelling environmental costs and facilitating supply chain engagement.

As a B Corp certified business, our purpose is to accelerate change towards an environmentally sustainable world, where we waste less resources and we recycle more.

If you share the same values and would like to discuss how your organisation can reduce the environmental impact of your products and packaging, please get in touch at: www.ecosurety.com

BUDWEISER BREWING GROUP

The initiative is designed to create modes of transport that can be powered by fuel made from hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO), a biofuel that can be produced from a range of different vegetable and non-vegetable feedstocks, including used vegetable cooking oil, animal fat residue and ‘tall oil’, a by-product of wood-pulp manufacture “We have a longstanding partnership with EV Cargo,” says Coindreau. “As a company, this helps you move past operational work and allows you to collaborate on strategic goals, such as finding efficiencies throughout the supply chain, such as with HVO. The next step is green hydrogen. If we're able to power our fleet with green hydrogen, which has no emissions, our supply chain in the UK will truly be sustainable, end-to-end.”

But Coindreau admits that a lack of charging infrastructure is “is a problem” with EVs and that “we’re not in complete control of this”.

He adds: “For example, with our solution for green hydrogen we will have filling stations inside our breweries, where trucks pick up the beer. But we also need to convince one of our retailers to add a strategic filling point en route, because this is the only way you can get the range needed.”

For shorter routes, he says, BBG will depend “heavily” on electric vehicles, where the need for infrastructure is greatest.

If the infrastructure is slow in materialising then BBG will fall back more heavily on HVO as a diesel replacement fuel, because this produces 92% fewer emissions than diesel.

Coindreau also says that AB InBev makes the choices that achieve the most sustainable outcomes taking into account all the features of the local environments.

“Electric vehicles will make sense in some countries but in others it might be that rail is the way to go, or green hydrogen.”

Key collaborations with Ecosurety & Howard Tenens Across all its sustainability initiatives, Budweiser Brewing Group places great stock by collaboration with its partners, along similar lines to its work with EV Cargo on fleet sustainability.

Such a key partner is Ecosurety, a company that partners with food and drink brands to ensure sustainability compliance.

“We've been working with Ecosurety for over seven years,” says Coindreau. “They have become an extended part of our procurement and sustainability team.”

“After working together for so many years we've come to see them as an expert in so procurementmag.com

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many areas, such as eco taxes and packaging measures. They are a strategy partner that helps us get a better sense of the everchanging future.

“It also helps that they are certified by B Corp, which is a global non-profit network helping transform the global economy to benefit all people. So this gives us the assurance they are looking for a better future.

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Another of BBG’s ABInBev’s key collaborative relationships is with logistics company Howard Tenens, with whom it has been working for three years.

Coindreau says: “They help us with some of our warehousing, both for materials and finished goods. We've always had a strong working relationship, whereby they're able to provide solutions for the ever-changing flow we're seeing in UK logistics.

“For example, when supply chains were being bottlenecked at ports, they were able to support us massively by bringing their warehouse throughflow to more than 250% of their initial capacity.”

The present is challenging enough around sustainability, but does Coindreau see happening on this front in the upcoming 18 months?

“I think we will see some really interesting solutions come into play,” he says. “Because when we set our 2025 goals in 2017, even though it was early in the game, we had a good sense of what was to come.”

BUDWEISER BREWING GROUP

T N A ISE E WNIM E S “W MI AT ISK M TO CLI GE R ING D CE P N L I A U AN RO H C Y B IST C NT” B ES GH E R OU EM REAUITY R AG OINDNABILT, OUP H T AN ICIO CUSTAIEMEN G GR M MAURD OF SOCURREWIN HE

A

BU

R B & P SER EI DW

He adds: “Today, we need to be thinking about net zero at 2040, and it will be all about where we are going to find innovation and collaboration across the supply chain to solve global sustainability issues. Every year it funds and mentors entrepreneurs innovating in sustainability via its Accelerator competition. This year one of the winners was a small business working on washing and reusing packaging.

“I think this is a massive challenge for the industry and for the world as a whole. This is the biggest single issue that we will face in the near future. But we are all facing it together, and so we need to come together to find the solutions.”

He concludes: “We're thrilled with the progress we've made on our sustainability goals for 2025, and we’re very excited to continue our work towards a net zero target.

Looking forward to a more sustainable future with more cheers”

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THE VALUE OF AI AND RPA ADOPTION IN PROCUREMENT PROCESSES

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TECHNOLOGY

Discover the value of both AI and RPA in procurement and how the two can deliver greater value to the function when used together WRITTEN BY: GEORGIA WILSON

Robotic process automation (RPA) A form of business automation technology, robotic process automation (RPA) uses software robots to handle repetitive business processes, freeing up time for employees to focus on the tasks that add greater value.

RPA is designed to continuously perform the same tasks in the same way, removing the need for human-beings to intervene in such processes. The automation of essential-but-repetitive tasks can reduce the potential for human errors and increase the delivery time speed.

The benefits of RPA For any organisation, efficient procurement operations are essential to success. However, procurement processes are frequently hindered by manual processes, paperwork, and human error.

With the help of RPA, organisations can remove the repetitive, low-value-adding tasks from the day-to-day agendas of their employees. In doing so, businesses can realise both cost and time savings, as well as improve their accuracy and productivity.

RPA helps organisations to carry out tasks faster and place their focus on the valueadding tasks, instead.

Common areas of use for RPA include functions such as accounts payable, procureto-pay (P2P), invoicing and purchase orders.

Artificial intelligence (AI) In comparison, artificial intelligence (AI) is a technological solution that enables machines to mimic human intelligence to perform tasks, by continually learning and improving its own performance.

AI is a far more complex technology compared to RPA, with a popular use being machine learning for the analysis of data.

Algorithms can identify patterns, generate insights and even action some responses to the information. Other forms include computer vision, which can make sense of images just like the human eye can; natural language processing that is common for voice assistants; and deep learning, which can make connections among unrelated data points.

The benefits of AI Similar to RPA, AI can help organisations to free up time and resources for employees, as well as digitise manual processes.

In addition to this, however, AI can provide some more advanced capabilities for organisations including the ability to make better, data-driven decisions; it can also identify new opportunities; improve and streamline operations; capture and apply knowledge and data; identify new suppliers and markets; and help organisations optimise their supplier relationships. procurementmag.com

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Supplier performance. Supplier risk.

Supplier diversity and ESG. You've got big plans; Vendorful has the tools to help you execute.

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TECHNOLOGY

“ Sometimes, we look at the shiny new tool and then try and find a problem for that tool, and that's when I've typically seen buyer's remorse” SAURABH GUPTA

PRESIDENT, RESEARCH AND ADVISORY HFS RESEARCH

The value of adopting both AI and RPA into your procurement function Speaking with Gavin Mee, managing director Northern Europe at UiPath and Saurabh Gupta, president, research and advisory at HFS Research, the two agreed that software robots are great at completing routine and repetitive work, but with AI, they can do a lot more.

“When combining AI and RPA, organisations can start to take on the tasks of automating some of the more complicated processes,” says Gupta.

Mee adds: “For example, they can start reading documents and emails, analyse language and images, and even understand speech. AI helps RPA software robots to perform cognitive tasks, navigate uncertainty, and resolve inconsistencies.”

Gupta continues: “There's tremendous value in using AI and RPA together. The base value is that you can improve the employee experience; our research at HFS Research suggests that procurement teams spend 70% to 80% of their time just processing transactions, with only 20% of their time focused on value added work.

“Using these technologies can help flip that around where you can gain back time for your employees to complete tasks that are strategic in nature and will help make procurement a strategic partner procurementmag.com

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INNOVATIONS IN AI AND RPA APPLICATIONS IN PROCUREMENT

GAVIN MEE, MANAGING DIRECTOR NORTHERN EUROPE AT UIPATH There is a lot of innovation occurring in this space, impacting every stage of the procurement process. When gearing up for negotiations, instead of a sourcing manager spending a huge amount of time digging through data, RPA robots can pull and collate data quickly and accurately, allowing the sourcing manager to focus on negotiation strategy, saving managers’ time and the business money.

When it comes to onboarding a new supplier, the manual process can take weeks to complete. AI-powered RPA robots can ‘read’ through the multiple documents that need to be processed, extracting and interpreting that information to allow faster, more efficient onboarding.

Other examples include requisition requests, where an RPA robot can be set up to guide business users through the process, ensuring higher accuracy and a smoother transition from requisition to purchase order. Once a purchased item arrives, they can help streamline the receipt process by populating information scanned from a receipt into the necessary systems almost instantaneously, eliminating time lags to ensure prompt vendor payment.

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“ When combining AI and RPA, organisations can start to take on the tasks of automating some of the more complicated processes” SAURABH GUPTA

PRESIDENT, RESEARCH AND ADVISORY HFS RESEARCH

to the business. In addition to employee experience, procurement can address the effectiveness and efficiencies of their processes, and improve decision-making capabilities. Manually, it is very hard to understand and interpret large quantities of data; in order to be data-driven in these modern functions, you need some form of AI.” So where is the best place to start when looking to adopt AI and RPA solutions?

Gupta explains the importance of not ‘putting the cart before the horse’. “Instead of looking at the technology, you need to look at the business problem,” says Gupta.

“Procurement professionals should determine what the problem is that they are trying to solve, then, once you have the business problem in front of you, you can start to identify which technologies will best help to solve the problem.

“Sometimes, we look at the shiny new tool and then try and find a problem for that tool, and that's when I've typically seen buyer's remorse, as they don't know how to justify the investment. So I would always recommend starting with a problem – the why – and then start to figure out the solution for solving that problem.” procurementmag.com

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DRIVING FASTER & SUSTAINABLE DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION AD FEATURE WRITTEN BY: GEORGIA WILSON PRODUCED BY: JAMES WHITE procurementmag.com

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TERZO

Brandon Card, CEO & Founder of Terzo, introduces the company's digitalisation mission, achieving sustainability in supplier management & its future plans

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ith a keen natural interest in technology and a stroke of perfect timing, Brandon Card (CEO) founded Terzo in 2022 with a vision to help large organisations drive sustainable digital transformation.

Leveraging data across the entirety of an organisation's operations, Terzo helps enterprises optimise their relationships with critical suppliers, generate cost savings and drive faster innovation.

“Terzo is a supplier cloud platform.

We offer three key solutions,” says Card.

“We primarily work with Fortune 1000 companies, helping them with contract management, spend analytics, and ESG programme management.

“For many years, I heard of the difficulties when it comes to managing the third-party supplier ecosystem. The need for a new supplier cloud platform to centralise all critical supplier data is what drove me to build Terzo.”

Card believes that it is the platform’s consumer-grade user experience that makes it stand out from others out there on the market. “We’ve developed this product with a lot of design thinking,” he says.

“We are very passionate about providing a simple, intuitive user experience to our customers, and one of the big differentiators 108

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“We are very passionate about providing a simple and intuitive user experience to our customers” BRANDON CARD

CEO AND FOUNDER, TERZO

Example of an image caption procurementmag.com

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TERZO

between Terzo and some of the other legacy players in the industry is our contract intelligence and AI. “We take complex metadata out of vendor contracts to provide intelligence and insights – this is the big gap that we're filling. We are bringing intelligence to these companies so they can better understand where their money is going and the associated risks. Terzo is a very flexible platform for our customers to drive faster and more sustainable digital transformations.”

Helping customers make smarter decisions Delivering on its promise to provide instant visibility across supplier contracts is central to the Terzo mission. By centralising siloed data across an organisation's operations, Terzo provides a 360 dashboard view of supplier data for its users.

Card explains: “With this capability, leaders can make smarter decisions when 110

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2020 Year founded

$1mn-$10mn Revenue

65+

Number of employees

WHY DOES AN ORGANISATION NEED CONTRACT INTELLIGENCE?

it comes to the likes of rationalising its portfolio or finding redundant services and software. Organisations can also drive greater efficiencies and cost savings, as well as mitigate risk.

“So it's a combination of helping customers optimise cost and waste, but also providing the ability to reallocate that waste and spend on new innovative strategic projects instead.”

“Contract management is one of the biggest challenges in the enterprise,” says Card. “Having thousands of agreements with thousands of suppliers hidden in emails, file storage or machines results in such large quantities of data with untapped potential.”

He adds: “At Terzo, we try to unlock these insights by using AI to bring metadata into our platform, making it useful within minutes. In doing this, we help organisations manage their siloed data, reducing the risk of wrong payments and unnecessary spend.”

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TERZO

BRANDON CARD TITLE: CEO AND FOUNDER INDUSTRY: SOFTWARE

EXECUTIVE BIO

LOCATION: CALIFORNIA, USA

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With a keen natural interest in technology and a stroke of perfect timing, Brandon Card (CEO) Founded Terzo in 2020 with the vision to help large organisations drive sustainable, digital transformation.

Coming out of school, Card had a desire to work on Wall Street, but in 2008 the economy crashed, so he turned his attention towards other opportunities.

“I made a bet on technology, and I got excited about the opportunity to go into software. My Career began at Oracle.”

Prior to founding Terzo, Card worked for IBM and Microsoft before founding Terzo, a data leveraging organisation that helps enterprises optimise their relationships with critical suppliers, generate cost savings and drive faster innovation.

TERZO

Automating contract renewal tracking An important element of Terzo’s offerings, the automation of contract renewal tracking enhances the manual process with alerts and intelligence that increase the buying cycle speed. “This reduces the risk of missing important contract renewals and increases the time to be proactive and negotiate,” says Card.

“That's one of the important elements of Terzo: being able to give people enough time to renegotiate, get the right people to the table, and be able to optimise the value from these agreements.”

Helping customers improve their data For many organisations, data lives in various different silos. Email and spreadsheets are the most common ways that organisations manually gather data. With Terzo’s ability to integrate with more than 800 applications, the company helps customers to gain insights into this scattered data.

“We understand that data lives in many different silos, and our goal is to centralise that data for our customers using our API

“ We are bringing intelligence to these companies so they can better understand where their money is going and the associated risks” BRANDON CARD

CEO AND FOUNDER, TERZO procurementmag.com

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TERZO

“ We understand that data lives in many different silos, and our goal is to centralise that data for our customers using our API integrations and supplier 360 dashboard” BRANDON CARD

CEO AND FOUNDER, TERZO

Title of the video

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integrations and supplier 360 dashboard.

This allows us to bring all this data to the forefront so people can make smarter decisions and reduce the amount of errors that come from manually moving data,” says Card.

Providing spend management insights Aside from its core offerings – contract management, contract renewal and forecasting – Terzo helps its customers to effectively analyse their spend.

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“ We believe that partnering with great companies that are doing well in areas like risk or compliance is important to our long-term strategy” BRANDON CARD

CEO AND FOUNDER, TERZO

TERZO

Terzo the future ERP for ESG Currently concentrating on the social aspect of ESG – important in light of government and investor focus on this area – Terzo helps organisations to track their tier one and two supplier diversity, to help companies reach their goal of spending more money with diverse suppliers across their ecosystem.

Looking to the future, Terzo plans to expand its ESG programme management and goal tracking to include carbon tracking and reductions. “We plan to help organisations track their multi-year emissions reduction projects with our software, centralising all stakeholders, budgets, projects, activities, and tasks required over a given period of time to ensure the success of their reduction targets. We will allow them to manage the entire life cycle of those long-term projects,” says Card.

TERZO AND ITS PARTNERSHIPS

Pulling together the spend data from multiple systems, such as ERP, finance systems and procurement platforms, Terzo provides intelligent insights to its customers.

Such insights include supplier diversity spend and the amount of spend generated by individual departments or business units, to ensure that organisations stay on track and meet their budgets.

“We are also very excited about rolling out our new ESG programme management to help organisations manage their sustainability, diversity, equity, inclusion and social goals,” explains Card.

“This is a new area for us that we're rolling out this summer, but it will complete the supplier cloud platform having contracts, spend and ESG all together in one solution.”

At Terzo, the organisation has a handful of key partners it works with.

“We believe that partnering with great companies that are doing well in areas like risk or compliance is important to our long-term strategy of being able to centralise and aggregate data for our customers,” explains Card.

He adds: “It's all about our customers.

We want to complement the existing systems they're using today, as well as be able to bring in as much data to the 360 dashboards for them to make their lives easier and more efficient.

“So when we look at a partner, it's important to know that we have a similar enterprise customer base, but it’s also important that we can complement the platform and not compete, therefore providing a better user experience to the customer.”

With there being so many different solutions out there that customers are using, Card believes that it is important for Terzo to partner with other technology companies.

“Ultimately, we want to be able to give the best experience to our customers. If these solutions do not work well together offering seamless integration, then a very complex, inefficient way of working is created,” says Card.

“So the number one thing we look for is complementary platforms.

Platforms that can help our customers do their jobs easier by bringing data into the Terzo solution, and that is one thing that we see as being extremely important.”

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THE

FUNDAMENTA OF RESPONSI SOURCING

With the world’s eyes collectively focused on businesses ESG initiatives, we take a look at the fundamentals of responsible sourcing within procurement WRITTEN BY: GEORGIA WILSON 118

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ALS IBLE

SUSTAINABILTY

R

esponsible sourcing is a conscious effort made by organisations to ensure that, at each stage of the supply chain, goods and services are produced or executed in an ethical, sustainable and sociallyconscious way.

“If you look at the disruption that’s taken place over the past two years, the foundations of responsible sourcing and supply chain resilience are very closely related,” says Jonathan Laverentz, head of digital innovation, Tradeshift, Inc. “Could an organisation say they were truly responsible when, until the pandemic, most large organisations based their entire supply chain and procurement strategy on the premise that ‘nothing bad will ever happen’?

Similarly, is it really responsible to ship parts and materials back and forth across the world, rather than looking at more diverse, localised production methods?

“The pandemic cast a pretty damning spotlight on what happens when you build supply chains hardwired for cost savings and efficiency gains. Ultimately, if something is cheap, someone or something somewhere is paying for it – likely in less than responsible ways,” adds Laverentz.

What makes responsible sourcing fundamental to procurement and the supply chain?

In today’s modern business environment, it is becoming increasingly clear that those companies with solid ESG credentials fared better during the pandemic than those who didn’t. “In other words, resilience and ESG go hand-in-hand,” says Laverentz.

“Even if we strip out moral and ethical considerations from this discussion, procurementmag.com

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SUSTAINABILTY

“ THE FOUNDATIONS OF RESPONSIBLE SOURCING AND SUPPLY CHAIN RESILIENCE ARE VERY CLOSELY RELATED” JONATHAN LAVERENTZ

HEAD OF DIGITAL INNOVATION, TRADESHIFT, INC

businesses that ignore the principles of responsible sourcing simply won’t survive in a world where volatility and disruption are norms.”

How can organisations be more responsible in their sourcing?

With procurement and supply chains being best placed to enable the wider organisation to source responsibly, Costas Xyloyiannis, CEO and co-founder of HICX, emphasises that “they are likely to be the only teams with the remit and skill to deliver on a responsible sourcing agenda.”

To be more responsible, Xyloyiannis explains: “In the first instance, organisations need to know who their suppliers are. For manufacturers with large, complex supply chains, this is a major challenge. So the first step is to establish visibility.”

To achieve this, organisations need to create a single source of truth in supplier data, by centralising supplier data management and restricting access to a single-entry point. “Good data enables transparency,” says Xyloyiannis.

“From this vantage point, organisations can remove operational friction to offer suppliers a positive experience,” he adds. “With a solid data foundation and positive supplier experience in place, procurement can receive better supplier innovation, be more compliant and drive more meaningful sustainability programmes.” procurementmag.com

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SUSTAINABILITY

“ GOOD DATA ENABLES TRANSPARENCY” COSTAS XYLOYIANNIS, CEO AND CO-FOUNDER, HICX

Agreeing with Xyloyiannis, Laverentz says: “You can’t fix what you can’t see, and for many businesses, getting a better picture of their supply chain ecosystem is the first step on the journey.”

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While most companies set out to do the right thing, the complexity and disconnected nature of modern supply chains makes it difficult for organisations to isolate and address unethical behaviours that are deep within their extended supply chains.

“Many of these issues stem from a lack of data available across the supply chain ecosystem,” says Laverentz. “Digitalising the relationships across supply chains will go a long way to giving businesses the kind of transparency they need to ensure their best intentions are matched by best practices.”

Another critical part of responsible sourcing is in establishing supplier diversity.

Laverentz explains: “By creating a diverse

SUSTAINABILTY

JONATHAN LAVERENTZ, HEAD OF DIGITAL INNOVATION, TRADESHIFT, INC. I’m responsible for all aspects of product marketing and strategic positioning at Tradeshift. I am passionate about uncovering ways our platform can empower strong, sustainable, and healthy relationships between buyers and suppliers.

and redundant supply chain an organisation is more able to impose greater restrictions or even discontinue a business relationship with a supplier that may have a moral ambiguity to the way they manufacture or acquire goods or services.

“In choosing to rely on a static supply chain, a buyer makes a deliberate choice to tether themselves to a supplier. In doing so, they must face ‘guilt by association’.

Whether they choose to do business in an ethical or moral way is of little consequence.

By continuing to do business with a supplier who acts irresponsibly, they are actually financing – and thereby supporting – the negative operational practices.”

COSTAS XYLOYIANNIS, CEO AND CO-FOUNDER HICX As CEO and co-founder of HICX, the supplier experience management platform, my goal is to transform the way major companies think about supplier experience and data.

HICX is a fast-growing company, so it’s my responsibility to drive the vision and strategy, to ensure everything we do is scalable, and to build a great leadership team.

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SUSTAINABILITY

What has been driving the demand for more responsible sourcing?

The real answer is that there is no single factor; the spotlight on this problem comes from multiple angles.

“Shoppers are more heavily scrutinising the source of the goods they buy and expect manufacturers to provide the answers,” says Laverentz.

“According to one recent study from Mastercard, 58% of consumers say they have grown more conscious about their impact on the environment since the pandemic. A quarter said they’d refuse to shop with an

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organisation that couldn’t back up ethical claims with sound evidence. This scrutiny is echoed in a new generation of younger consumers who are more environmentally and socially conscious than ever before.

“Banks and financial institutions are also rolling out programmes that reward more ESG-driven businesses and are creating barriers to access capital for businesses that fail to show evidence of responsible sourcing practices, as well as increasing regulatory scrutiny over sourcing practices. Regulation will help to accelerate the transition towards a more digitally-connected supply chain

SUSTAINABILTY

ecosystem, where organisations can no longer use ignorance as an excuse for unsustainable or unethical behaviours in their supply chains.”

So what is the best approach when looking to be more sustainable?

Xyloyiannis concludes by breaking down the best approach into three core steps: 1. Always start with a solid data foundation.

Large manufacturers with complex supply chains need robust data that’s accessible across different services and platforms.

2. Organisations with a best-of-breed environment need the right centralised platform configuration.

3. A single-entry point for information is essential to achieving clean data.

It funnels data through one entry point down into different systems, as opposed to creating multiple different systems and then struggling to bring it all together. This will enable a single source of truth for supplier data, which will increase visibility and therefore better sourcing.

“THE PANDEMIC CAST A PRETTY DAMNING SPOTLIGHT ON WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU BUILD SUPPLY CHAINS HARDWIRED FOR COST SAVINGS AND EFFICIENCY GAINS” JONATHAN LAVERENTZ

HEAD OF DIGITAL INNOVATION, TRADESHIFT, INC

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HOW SHELL’S SOURCE 2 CONTRACT DIGITALISATION AND AI BOOSTS PRODUCTIVITY

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SHELL

WRITTEN BY: ILKHAN OZSEVIM PRODUCED BY: CRAIG KILLINGBACK

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SHELL

Through its digitalisation, automation and AI systems in procurement Shell is receiving global recognition for its productivity and growing ethical standards

L

eading a transformation to digitise and automate Shell’s S2C (Sourceto-Contract) and E2E (End-to-End) processes, Sander Voorn, the S2C Digital and Process Transformation Design Manager at Shell, discusses how the use of certain digital systems and tools have had a huge and measurable impact on their output.

“My current role is really focused on looking at how we can digitalise,” he says, “and with that, largely automate these processes.”

Voorn has been in procurement for the last 20 years, starting in an internal supply chain management consulting practice and within that role, helping to manage one of the company’s strategic supplier relationships — their technology partner for telecoms. From there, he was integral in centralising their procurement activities, moving into a role to digitalise their contingent workforce spend and activities.

How digital tools fuel Shell’s procurement process Now at Shell, and describing the interplay of procurement structures and systems that brought this transformation about, Voorn says: “Each business has a procurement function, but they fall under one Executive Vice President, and my organisation supports all of these different businesses

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centrally. We have a few key tools to carry out this function. We have our Category Management and Contracting Process framework, which lays out the requirements that everybody needs to meet, which we incorporated into the system, SAP Ariba, which has embedded DocuSign. We also have Salesforce to complement this process, and a few other systems which together operate to manage the entire end-to-end (E2E) process.”

With the rise of digital systems in business, and their inevitable impact on global procurement processes, the effects are considerable.

Voorn says: “The biggest changes have been around centralisation, and a growing awareness of the importance and value of data, and the need to structure and standardise that data in order to extract value from it. The risk-management aspect of procurement has fluctuated a little, but in the last couple of years I’ve seen a growing awareness of its importance not only from a cost perspective, but also from a differentiator perspective.

“The ability to identify viable organisations — that is, who from a risk and ESG perspective we want and do not want to be doing business with — is becoming increasingly important, and I think this trend will continue to grow.”

Growing digitalisation has unmistakable global consequences, according to Voorn: “We are now able to connect the process End-To-End (E2E) that would not have been possible in the past.”

“The key to E2E system and process optimisation and integration is to create Natural Working Teams (NWT) composed of all relevant disciplines. The core of these NWTs consists of the Process Architects from my team, our partners from IT and the 130

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“ MY CURRENT ROLE IS REALLY FOCUSED ON LOOKING AT HOW WE CAN DIGITALISE AND, WITH THAT, LARGELY AUTOMATE OUR SOURCE-TO-CONTRACT (S2C) PROCESS” SANDER VOORN

S2C DIGITAL &PROCESS TRANSFORMATION DESIGN MANAGER, SHELL

Data Analytics team. These experts make the digitalisation happen!”

One of the main systems in Shell’s entire S2C process is SAP Ariba, where they now manage all of their spend. Describing the process, he says: “From my perspective, it begins with category management. We have categories like contingent workforce, rotating equipment or consulting, for example. These categories are managed by the Category Managers (CMs) who help collect market intelligence and are responsible for providing global steer to a group of buyers.

“The CMs set up these category strategies that detail how we want to go to market.

They typically create global framework agreements, which are then made available through SAP Ariba. The next step begins when our buyers are looking to identify demand for a specific contract. They come up with a sourcing strategy, tie this into the global category strategies and leverage the information from them.”

SANDER VOORN TITLE: S2C DIGITAL & PROCESS TRANSFORMATION DESIGN MANAGER INDUSTRY: ENERGY SUPPLIER

EXECUTIVE BIO

LOCATION: NETHERLANDS Sander Voorn is the Source to Contract Digital & Process Transformation design manager at Shell where he has led the S2C digital transformation over the past 4 years.

During this time the S2C cycle-time was reduced by over 25%. Prior to this, he developed and implemented Shell’s Supplier Performance Management best practices for its Arctic operations.

Ensuring safe and efficient performance throughout its supply chain.

Sander’s first global digital transformation was in 2005 when he developed a global programme for the sourcing and management of Shell’s 10,000+ Contingent workforce. The transparency and control this enabled reduced Contingent Workforce cost

by USD 60 Mln+ annually.

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SHELL

We can already see how much of Shell’s procurement process is carried out within SAP Ariba.

“We also review and approve them within SAP Ariba,” he says, “which provides the added benefit of being able to reuse and leverage existing or prior strategies, and we then use SAP Ariba to go to market, eSourcing either auctions or tenders. “We typically provide our suppliers during the tender with our fit-for-purpose contract proposal, in order for them to base their quote on. This draft, too, is created in SAP Ariba, which is done by leveraging

the metadata or the header data of the contract, which identify things like country, commodity, dates, contract value and so on to automatically assemble a fit for purpose contract for that unique situation.”

This is where SAP Ariba’s Artificial Intelligence starts to play a greater role.

How Artificial Intelligence and Automation lead to increased productivity “Contract Authoring was a time consuming and non-compliance risk area until we were able to use SAP Ariba Contract Authoring technology. There are about 50 key data points that the system uses to automatically assemble from around 4000 different elements of clauses, in order to determine the right contract for a specific situation. We have about 6 million possible combinations, procurementmag.com

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and that's the draft that we give to our suppliers to base their bids on. Once we get the quotes back, we finalise the contract agreement, then use DocuSign to get a quick signature on those contracts.”

Once contracts have been signed, they have an automated bot – referred to as an RPA (Robotic Process Automation) – that then releases the outline agreement of the contract on the SAP ERP system, from which the volume of spending for individual contacts is monitored.

The sheer volume and complexity of data that is sifted through and analysed highlights the extraordinary productivity and efficiency that AI is able to achieve compared to its relative human elements. Shell also employs a selection of other (AI) systems to bolster and complete their operations.

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One of these is Microsoft Power BI (Business Intelligence), which is used in conjunction with SAP Ariba to allow procurement staff and stakeholders to easily follow contract journeys. A new Suite Dashboard for Shell’s Contract Management Teams (CMTs) is to be implemented into Salesforce, too, where they can see and collaborate on the contract relevant to each party.

Digital contracts, the limitations of AI and the need for human intervention Voorn’s position is that, even as part of the Shell procurement process – widely recognised as one of the most effective in the world – it is not yet perfect. And this is, he believes, due to the fact much of it still requires a certain amount of human intervention: “Presently, from a workflow

SHELL

perspective, contracts are integrated and to a degree, automated. From an Artificial Intelligence (AI) perspective, however, most of the technology that I see is quite limited, and still needs a lot of human intervention.

“AI, no doubt, is able to perform numerous activities, but in reality for many applications it only has around a 60-70% accuracy rate, which means that you still need to have a person double-checking its work, which kind of defeats the purpose.”

He adds: “Truth be told, when people talk about Machine Learning, it's really about training the algorithm. We train the algorithm what is and what is not permitted, by embedding that training (or that learning) into our regular workflows.”

“ THE ABILITY TO IDENTIFY VIABLE ORGANISATIONS – THAT IS, WHO FROM A RISK AND ESG PERSPECTIVE WE WANT AND DO NOT WANT TO DO BUSINESS WITH – IS BECOMING INCREASINGLY IMPORTANT, AND I THINK THIS TREND WILL CONTINUE TO GROW” SANDER VOORN

S2C DIGITAL &PROCESS TRANSFORMATION DESIGN MANAGER, SHELL

How AI can help to drive creativity and ethical standards The AI aspect of Shell’s procurement systems is not only able to improve costeffectiveness and operational efficiency, but is also able to free up staff from certain laborious and time-consuming tasks, enabling them to work more creatively, as well as having an impact on ethical procurement.

“If you look at our strategy at Shell ‘Powering Progress’,” says Voorn. “It consists of a number of elements, a key one being ‘Powering Lives’. This means that Shell is concerned with supporting inclusive societies, but it also means making sure that we only ever do business with ethical suppliers, and also that there is supplierdiversity, where we do a lot of supplier development which can take time.

“So, thanks to the AI and automation process, we can free up staff to spend more time finding potentially viable suppliers and to look at how Shell can help these suppliers reduce their own carbon footprint.” procurementmag.com

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SHELL

When considering ethical procurement at Shell, the company takes time to develop actions and solutions to diversify their suppliers, as well as how to ensure that workers’ welfare rights and ethical standards are not only complied with, but substantially increased.

Artificial Intelligence also plays a significant role in the quality of Shell’s health and safety standards, with Voorn saying: “As part of our process, we ask suppliers about their safety standards and worker-welfare policies. Some suppliers respond, some don't, or don’t do so quickly enough. In order to tackle this problem, we are building bots to ask these questions and to follow them up.

“Once suppliers come back with their Health and Safety and Welfare Policy documents, they need, of course, to be fully read and digested. We typically know what kind of HSE (Health, Safety and Environmental) policy their documents should cover. With AI NLP (Natural Language processing) capabilities, we can see whether this document and their policy is up to a certain standard and whether it meets our thresholds, so we can then determine where there’s a safety risk for a specific category.

Shell’s Scope 3 ambitions and data driven sustainability As an energy company, Shell is looking at its own CO2 emissions, as well as Scope 2 and 3 – which includes the CO2 footprint of their suppliers. One of Shell’s policies, implemented last year, surrounds the company’s drive to identify those suppliers who want to actively reduce their CO2 footprint, who can then register themselves in the Supplier Energy Transition Hub (a Shell-initiated programme), which Shell has made available as a public application 136

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Shell uses Whatfix to drive adoption of its S2P digital applications Shell transformed its contract management and procurement processes with SAP Ariba to keep up with the competitor landscape, streamline operations, cut supply chain costs, and meet evolving customer expectations. However, with a complex new application and outdated training practices, Shell struggled to meet its adoption goals, meaning longer process times, large amounts of support tickets, high training costs, and poor data quality.

With Whatfix’s digital adoption platform (DAP), Shell created a simple application experience with in-app content providing personalized guidance for employees. With in-app elements like step-by-step flows, task lists, and tooltips, Shell provided its contract and procurement departments with engaging onboarding and training, in the flow of work.

“Whatfix provides a great way to store information where it’s most needed, reducing the number of users' questions, and simplifying training. It’s a great way to communicate changes - ‘just follow the Whatfix flow!’”

With Whatfix, Shell launched its in-app digital assistant, SCAI, which embedded a knowledge base into SAP Ariba - allowing users to search for any applicationrelated questions.

“Whatfix enabled SCAI, which answers the majority of questions related to our contract and procurement processes, hence we don’t have to answer each support question from the frontline! Users ask SCAI anything they need on the contracting process or tool, allowing my team to focus on more important activities.”

With Whatfix, Shell created an intuitive SAP Ariba experience that supported its workforce through complex contract and procurement workflows. Whatfix provided an intuitive point-and-click digital adoption solution that accelerated its SAP Ariba adoption.

Empower your workforce with better in-app experiences and on-demand support with Whatfix!

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20% reduction in SAP Ariba support queries & 30% reduction in time spent on application-related support tickets 100% change communication to all SAP Ariba end-users 20 minute reduction in end-to-end cycle time per contract

SHELL

to which any company can join. In turn, Shell then works with these companies to reduce their carbon footprint.

“This is where you see a touch of symbiosis between our suppliers as customers, and our customers as suppliers; nobody can do this alone, what’s needed is collaboration.”

Shell is currently upgrading one of its SAP Ariba modules, called Supplier Life Cycle and Performance Management (SLP). SLP will allow Shell to develop sophisticated supplier profiles, by being able to analyse the qualifications of a supplier’s performance data from a variety of different angles and lenses. Everything from safety to delivery methods, through to their pricing, quality – and even worker-welfare – will be considered.

Voorn says: “I think that SLP capability is going to be critical in our ‘Powering Lives’ development, and as partof our Net-Zero ambitions.”

Electrifying energy: Shell’s strategy to move away from Fossil Fuels Shell has set out a strategy to accelerate the transition of our business to net-zero emissions. “Shell is working to provide more renewable and low-carbon energy options for customers through investments in wind, solar, electric vehicle charging, hydrogen, and more,” says Voorn. ‘For example, Shell is investing in lower-carbon options – from electric-vehicle charging points and solutions to fuels like hydrogen and biofuels.”

Additionally, Shell recently announced that it plans to increase the number of charging points from 80,000 to 500,000 worldwide by 2025.

“We've been recognised on a number of elements of our portfolio, from CIPS (Chartered Institute of Procurement & Supply) and others. With CIPS, it was for our end-to-end (E2E) process,” says Voorn.

“Our source to contact (S2C) digitalisation procurementmag.com

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“ I HAVE SEEN GREAT CHANGES IN PROCUREMENT OVER THE PAST 20 YEARS. THE BIGGEST HAVE BEEN AROUND CENTRALISATION, A GROWING AWARENESS OF THE IMPORTANCE AND VALUE OF DATA” SANDER VOORN

S2C DIGITAL &PROCESS TRANSFORMATION DESIGN MANAGER, SHELL

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strategy was recognised due to our global journey, but also due to our position moving forward. We have a fairly high percentage of sourcing that’s done through e-sourcing and e-auctions – when compared to the market standard – with around 88% of our contracts being signed through DocuSign. Just a few years ago, this was very uncommon. We encourage its use at Shell and, once you've used it, you know that it's a better way to go.”

Unexpected Data-Synergies and Value from Artificial Intelligence For Voorn, the Salesforce programme that Shell uses has two primary functions: it acts as both a kind of dashboard where data from different sources can be directly

pulled, as well as having the ability to jump via embedded hyperlinks into SAP Ariba to a specific task or activity.

Salesforce gives them the ability to collaborate, whereas most Source-toContract (S2C) tools have limited collaboration capabilities. It also allows them to collaborate on documents and pulls in documents and data from other systems, while also pushing these back into SAP Ariba via a systematic record–keeping function. The entire system is streamlined toward higher productivity.

Voorn says: “A big surprise to me was that data analytics with Alteryx identified activities that were being done that didn’t require doing. We then saw the number of contracts that staff could manage increase and the time

it took to complete a contract decrease.

The game changer in process optimisation through process mining was when we decided to use Alteryx. We fed the system all our SAP Ariba workflow data which we analysed to identify frictions points, waste and other inefficiencies. This generated very surprising insights that enabled us to close knowledge gaps with some of our users, take out process steps that were not needed, re-engage with key process participants that were ignoring their tasks in the system and were still using e-mail and implement many more improvements. All combined this led to a 25% shorter cycle time and very material reduction in effort by procurement staff and key stakeholders. procurementmag.com

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SHELL

“ONE OF THE MAIN SYSTEMS IN SHELL’S ENTIRE S2C PROCESS IS SAP ARIBA” SANDER VOORN

S2C DIGITAL &PROCESS TRANSFORMATION DESIGN MANAGER, SHELL

Another programme that Shell uses is Whatfix, which is a digital assistant that’s implemented inside SAP Ariba. Voorn says: “We have about 10 different features that Whatfix can do to help a user who’s, for example, using a feature that's never been used before. Or, if we change something in the system affecting a certain field, they will be notified of this change – and even explain the purpose of that field. Whatfix has enabled us to stop ‘classroom’ training and replaced this with short demos, guided tours, real time tips and similar features. So our users are much more comfortable trying new things because the system will support them. It will also detect in real-time any incongruent data, flag this to the user and guide the user to correct this, avoiding errors further down in the process.

This again leads to increased productivity.

The impact of these systems at Shell is palpable. Productivity has been increased and the company is able to react to geopolitical shifts through automation and raising ethical standards while increasing productivity.

Sander Voorn predicts that these trends will continue to grow, serving as a perfect example of the essential nature of digitisation and automation in contributing to the success of any company aiming to thrive in an everexpanding digital landscape.

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TOP 10

TOP 10

GLOBAL PROCUREMENT

SOFTWARE COMPANIES Procurement Magazine ranks its Top 10 leading procurement software companies that are driving digitalisation and global innovation WRITTEN BY: GEORGIA WILSON

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hat makes good procurement software? Choosing the right platform for your organisation can be challenging, not only due to the vast amount of solutions available on the market, but also because of key considerations such as deployment options, customisation, cost, scalability, and business value.

In this Top 10, we take a look at some of the leading global organisations operating in the procurement software space and what makes their solutions stand out.

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TOP 10

10 Icertis

Top three features: • Intelligent solutions

• Digital transformation • Seamless integration Founded in 2009, Icertis is a privately-owned software company for intelligent contract management. Icertis offers those in procurement its services for the purpose of streamlining the source-to-contract process for customers, helping them to make faster deals and reduce risk.

The Icertis Contract Intelligence (ICI) platform has helped procurement teams around the world to enhance their productivity and improve contractual governance, strengthening supplier accountability and increasing their bottom-line.

“ Icertis offers those in procurement its services for the purpose of streamlining the source-tocontract process for customers” 146

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09 Basware

Top three features: • Automation and cloud enabled • 100% visibility • End-to-end efficiency

Founded in 1985, Basware is an enterprise software company that offers a wide range of solutions for the procurement function, including P2P, AP automation, e-invoicing and eProcurement.

By automating the P2P process with Baware, procurement can drive cost savings, boost efficiencies and gain 100% visibility across its suppliers and spend.

Basware helps organisations to future proof their operations, removing the need for traditional, manual processes.

TOP 10

08

Capgemini

Top three features: • Sustainable sourcing

• Digital transformation • Compliance and transparency Founded in 1967, Capgeimini is a multinational information technology services and consulting company. For its procurement customers, the company offers its digital solutions to optimise the function, as well as drive frictionless and sustainable procurement.

Capgemini’s services help to develop, implement, and operate a successful digital procurement strategy, in addition to driving compliance, productivity, transparency and savings.

07

EPICOR Software Top three features: • Automation

• Value-added activities • A single solution for all processes Founded in 1972, EPICOR Software is a leading provider of business software, particularly in the manufacturing, supply chain and procurement industries.

EPICOR Software offers its clients in the procurement space its supplier relationship management (SRM) software to streamline the entire purchasing process and be more strategic in their sourcing.

EPICOR Software’s services include: sourcing, procurement, supplier enablement, user adoption, catalogue management, and cost savings. procurementmag.com

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TOP 10

06 GEP

Top three features: • Digital transformation

• End-to-end procurement operations • AI and cloud-enabled Founded in 1999, GEP is a leading provider of strategy consulting, software, and managed services solutions for those in the procurement and supply chain industry. Part of GEP’s offerings to those in procurement is GEP Smart, a world leading S2P platform for both direct and indirect procurement that is utilised by organisations such as Walgreens Boots Alliance’s procurement function. With the help of AI and cloud technologies, GEP helps its customers to digitally transform their end-toend procurement operations.

GEP’s services include: spend analysis, savings tracking, sourcing, contract management, supplier management, and procure-to-pay (P2P).

05 IBM

Top three features: • AI and automation

• Smart, end-to-end workflows • Value creation For more than 100 years, IBM has been innovating in the technology space. when it comes to procurement, the company helps those in the function accelerate their transformation with access to powerful data, insights and emerging technologies to enhance processes and generate greater value. IBM’s services include: source-to-pay (S2P), digital procurement, invoice to pay and analytics.

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04

JAGGAER

Top three features: • A single platform

• Flexible and intelligent • AI and robotic process automation (RPA) Founded in 1995, JAGGAER is a cloud-based business automation technology company.

For those in the procurement industry JAGGER offers its customers JAGGAER ONE – a complete procurement platform for intelligent and flexible spend management.

JAGGAER offers its customers best-in-class solutions that provide consistent visibility across all spend activities, and next generation analytics and insights for greater value.

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03

Coupa Software Top three features: • Cloud-enabled

• A single comprehensive platform • Flexibility Founded in 2006, Coupa Software is a leading business spend management solution provider.

For those that harness Coupa Software’s capabilities, the company offers a comprehensive platform for managing an organisation’s entire spend.

With its single platform, organisations can benefit from easeof-use while having the flexibility to be successful in their spend management. Also contributes towards making unprecedented savings and insights to drive measurable results.

02

TOP 10

Oracle

Top three features: • Streamlined operations and agility • Cloud-enabled automation • Spend compliance and strategic sourcing

Founded in 1997, Oracle is a multinational technology company. For those in the procurement industry, Oracle offers its customers ‘Oracle Fusion Cloud Procurement’ – an integrated source-to-settle suite.

The solution helps customers to automate their processes, create strategic sourcing capabilities, improve supplier relationships, and simplify the buying experience. In doing so, the procurement function can benefit from lower risks, improved savings and greater profitability and productivity.

Oracle’s range of services include: spend management, direct materials management, relationship management, strategic sourcing, contract lifecycle, compliance, and supplier collaboration.

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“ Remove barriers between your teams and trading partners to securely share data, get insights, and manage workflow over Ariba Network for a more efficient procurement process and greater cost control” SAP Ariba

Top three features: • In-depth spend analysis

• Efficiency, accuracy and visibility • Cloud, automation, and AI Established in 1996, SAP Ariba is a global leader in the world of procurement and supply chain solutions and software.

The company takes procurement beyond the basic processes, applying its innovations to remove obstacles, link all spend categories in a single place, and create deeper, dynamic, and end-toend collaboration.

“Remove barriers between your teams and trading partners to securely share data, get insights, and manage workflow over Ariba Network for a more efficient procurement process and greater cost control” - SAP Ariba.

SAP offers its customers a wide range of solutions for the procurement function including: strategic sourcing, procurement, supplier management, direct spend, financial supply chain, spend management and buyers.

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Realising procurement savings and added value

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TRANSUNION

WRITTEN BY: GEORGIA WILSON PRODUCED BY: MIKE SADR procurementmag.com

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Damon Ascolani, Head of Global Procurement at TransUnion

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Damon Ascolani, Head of Global Procurement at TransUnion, discusses the importance of procurement in M&A activity and how organisations can realise value

T

1968 Year founded

10.6K+

Number of employees

$3bn Revenue (2021)

ransUnion is a global information and insights company that makes trust possible between businesses and consumers and is one of the three largest consumer reporting agencies in the US. “We provide the information that makes the relationship between consumers and business possible,” says Damon Ascolani, Head of Global Procurement at TransUnion.

From credit scores to ID verification, alternative credit data, analytics, marketing, and debt collection strategies, TransUnion is the single source of information for aiding its clients in these areas.

Whilst Ascolani’s current stint at the company began in 2017, he previously worked for the company back in 1998. “I was able to see the company before it became a public organisation,” says Ascolani.

“20 years ago, the company was private and very back office. Today – and ever since it became public – TransUnion has a very entrepreneurial mindset. It’s an older company, but it acts like a startup with an open-minded and innovative culture.

Its mission statement is ‘Information for Good’, enabling financial inclusion to people everywhere in the world.”

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TRANSUNION

TransUnion: realising procurement savings and added value

“ TransUnion has a very entrepreneurial mindset. It’s an older company, but it acts like a startup with an open-minded and innovative culture” DAMON ASCOLANI

HEAD OF GLOBAL PROCUREMENT, TRANS UNION

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Procurement’s growing importance in M&A activity When it comes to mergers and acquisitions (M&A), procurement is steadily becoming an important process both before and after a merger or acquisition. “In particular, this can be seen in the due diligence process, assessing vendor footprints to build a business case for synergies,” explains Ascolani.

“There are also contractual elements, servicing rights with partial divestitures and acquisitions, and I’ve found that the more

DAMON ASCOLANI TITLE: HEAD OF GLOBAL PROCUREMENT INDUSTRY: PROCUREMENT LOCATION: CHICAGO, US

procurement is involved in M&A activities, the more value we are able to provide due to our expertise in vendor spend and dynamic product suites.

“In this scenario, TransUnion helps organisations to develop business cases for potential M&A activity – we provide the information that is valuable to that discussion. After the deal is done, its then about achieving those synergies, making sure that all vendors are integrated and that our stakeholders are getting the best rates, terms, and overall value from their spend.”

EXECUTIVE BIO

Damon Ascolani is a highly accomplished, legally trained senior procurement leader with global experience managing purchasing departments with specialties in building procurement departments, M&A, cost savings initiatives, contracts management, and process streamlining.

He received a Bachelor’s Degree in Economics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and has a law degree from The University of Illinois-Chicago John Marshall Law School and was admitted to the Illinois Bar in 2012.

Mr. Ascolani currently works at TransUnion, one of the three national credit bureaus, serving the company’s first-ever Head of Global Procurement.

Prior to that, he spent 15 years at HSBC holding a variety of senior management positions in risk and procurement.

You can’t meet today’s challenges with yesterday’s supplier intelligence Learn the most effective strategies for helping your business withstand longer-term supply chain disruption and manage supplier risks with the most comprehensive data available.

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segnellahc s’yadot teem t’nac uoY ecnegilletni reilppus s’yadretsey htiw gnipleh rof seigetarts evit cef fe tsom eht nraeL niahc ylppus mret-regnol dnatshtiw ssenisub ruoy Dun & Bradstreet and TransUnion Dun & Bradstreet/ tsom eh t htiw sksir reilppus eganam dna noitpursid TransUnion: Understanding Dun & Bradstreet and TransUnion have a long history “We’ve .elba liavofa working atad together. evisne herbeen pmoc risk and opportunity Dun & Bradstreet’s Brian Farley discusses the company’s long-standing relationship with TransUnion and what sets their it apart from others Founded in 1841, Dun & Bradstreet has been helping its customers understand risk and opportunities in business for nearly two centuries. As a provider of data and analytics, the company serves its customers by collecting information on a global scale about hundreds of millions of different business locations worldwide. “At Dun & Bradstreet, we are known for providing commercial insight,” says Brian Farley, Vice President and Business Segment Manager of Third-Party Risk and Compliance at Dun & Bradstreet.

“Two of our biggest operating areas are ownership information and financial risk. With the information we gather, we are able to provide predictive indicators and describe the future behaviours of businesses worldwide.”

mutual customers, as well as mutual suppliers for decades. Our services complement each other, with TransUnion focusing on consumer financial behaviours and Dun & Bradstreet focusing on commercial behaviours. Our history has really been about addressing specific customer problems by linking our expertise.”

ylsuounitnoc ruo revocsiD Two key areas where› Dun and ata&dBradstreet detad pu TransUnion are working together include fraud and micro-businesses. “Combining both Dun & Bradstreet’s and TransUnion’s data, we are using information to develop a strong picture of not only the business entity, but also individuals associated with the business to mitigate commercial fraud and misrepresentation of identity,” says Farley.

“We have also been working together on a broader area – micro-businesses. This is a trend that is accelerating in our market in the wake of COVID-19; there has been a significant rise in remote working and freelance workers,” he adds. “This new approach to the working model has created these micro-businesses and this is where we are working with TransUnion to combine our mutual strengths to gain a greater understanding of these businesses and how they behave in the marketplace.”

TRANSUNION

DID YOU KNOW...

NAVIGATING COVID-19 RELATED DISRUPTION AT TRANSUNION

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When it comes to navigating disruption, Ascolani explains that much of it comes down to communication.

“A lot of it is keeping tabs on all vendors that provide our strategic products and services, as well as communicating any timeline changes internally. This communication allows all stakeholders to understand the dynamics of the industry and plan accordingly,” explains Ascolani.

Initially when COVID-19 hit, it was ‘all hands on deck’ for TransUnion. “We had key third parties that supported our business that couldn’t go into the office and didn’t have work-from-home capabilities,” says Ascolani.

“We helped get laptops to many places all over the world where we had workers.

We also had one staff member physically drive out of state – Chicago, Illinois – to

July 2022

Iowa in search of masks and hand sanitiser that could be brought back to our home office. And in order to ensure that we had safe on-site meetings, we supplied testing kits for our staff.

“So, initially, it was this collaborative allhands-on-deck effort as there was not a great playbook for an event such as this; we didn’t have processes in place for this level of global disruption in the supply chain - you would never think that you would actually be living through something like this.”

Having good relationships with vendors and stakeholders, TU Procure were able to provide throughout the pandemic and mitigate the issues that arose as best as they could. “We also managed to successfully implement a custom portal for our staff to order the equipment they needed from home to continue to operate,” says Ascolani.

TRANSUNION

“ TU Procure, our internally rebranded global procurement team acts as a centre of excellence for organisations, providing them with a control point to make sure that their stakeholders are getting the best market rates, and the most up to date product and service offerings” DAMON ASCOLANI

HEAD OF GLOBAL PROCUREMENT, TRANS UNION

The need for CEO mandates in procurement “I always say: you would never review a contract from a legal perspective without sending it to your legal department, so why wouldn’t the same apply to procurement for the commercial terms?” says Ascolani.

Procurement is a hard function to integrate throughout an organisation without having topdown mandates. TU Procure, the company's internally rebranded global procurement team acts as a centre of excellence for organisations, providing them with a control point to make sure that their stakeholders are getting the best market rates, and the most up to date product and service offerings. “We drive that discussion when it comes to supplier management and assessment. As companies grow, the economic benefits and the risk management benefits of a mature procurement organisation become increasingly vital.”

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“ At TransUnion, we help organisations to navigate the noise, aggregating that data into manageable and insightful reports” DAMON ASCOLANI

HEAD OF GLOBAL PROCUREMENT, TRANS UNION

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What makes data management critical to procurement When it comes down to being successful or unsuccessful in procurement, quality data is at its core. Whether it's understanding cost savings, predicting demand or managing suppliers, data management is critical.

“An organisation can have multiple vendor relationships for a single toolset and central visibility that procurement reporting provides is the key to ensuring tail spend is well managed and vendor synergies achieved in M&A scenarios,” says Ascolani.

TRANSUNION

“At TransUnion, we help organisations to navigate the noise, aggregating that data into manageable and insightful reports. This is also important for our own supplier diversity reporting at TransUnion.

He adds: “We have a robust process for analysing our data and classifying it, so in order to make an impact, we have to be able to report against a baseline and if you don’t have good analytics, then that can’t happen.

Particularly in a growing organisation, you can quickly lose sight of third-party spend, so bringing stability to that and providing reporting is valuable to the decision-making process.”

DID YOU KNOW...

TRANSUNION AND ITS RELATIONSHIPS Critical to the success of any organisation, particularly when it comes to large-scale initiatives, TransUnion values its relationships. The company selects its relations based on their dedication to the long-term goal: the art of what is possible over time, not just the quick wins. TransUnion looks for relations with those that are innovative and will grow with the organisation.

“We have a cloud initiative, a global business system and a customer interaction tool set that we internally call ‘Project Illuminate’ that we are working on,” explains Ascolani.

“In order to successfully implement projects like these – especially global ones – you need to have strong relationships with the providers that assist you in that implementation. In my team, we have expanded multiple aspects of our procurement function. One in particular is our risk analytics capabilities, where we have just begun an automation project with the

help of Dun and Bradstreet. We went through an extensive sourcing exercise to select them, and we are very excited to be able to better screen our vendors, customers, and other third party relationships.”

Another relationship for TransUnion is Slalom, which helps it from a staffing perspective for a number of critical projects. “Their skillset pairs well with our culture and environment. They understand what we are trying to do and provide us the resources to get us there quickly,” says Ascolani.

“We also have a strong relationship with Salesforce, who support our customer journey from a business customer perspective and with whom we have a long-standing relationship. And then we have Coupa Software, our procure-topay (P2P) tool, which transformed us from a spreadsheet-based, manual processdriven organisation into a more structured, cloud-based organisation for our analytics and sourcing.”

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Realising procurement savings and added value A common struggle for many in procurement is the calculation of savings and value, as well as realising it in a way that people can really feel the benefits. “Every conference I go to, this is always a topic,” says Ascolani.

“It is not always a straightforward proposition, especially in a rapidly growing organisation such as ours, but I find that being able to realise savings so that they are felt comes down to an organisation's relationship with the finance team and stakeholders. Procurement’s value add to an organisation goes well beyond budgetary savings, but oftentimes, this type of savings is the one that feels most real to budget owners and stakeholders. So regardless of your savings methodology, tying it to the budget is key. Once you’ve established the budgetary savings with validation by your finance team, it is much easier to champion the other aspects of the value that procurement provides such as cost avoidance and tail spend management. This is critical so that all aspects of the procurement teams’ value to the organisation are recognised.”

TransUnion over the next 12 to 18 months Over the next 12 to 18 months, TransUnion will be heavily focused on navigating the complex activities that follow M&A activity. “We’ve conducted a fair amount of acquisitions and divestitures, so there is a lot of work to be done to navigate the challenges of these activities,” says Ascolani.

“But we’re up for the challenge! It’s an exciting time – there is a lot to do, we are leveraging a lot of strategic relationships during this time – and, had we not had these relationships, this process would have been significantly more difficult.

“So the next 12 to 18 months will include merging the organisations that we bought under a single, common operating model, as well as further navigating recovery from COVID-19.”

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LESSONS LEARNED FROM COVID-19 TO PREPARE FOR THE FUTURE WRITTEN BY: GEORGIA WILSON

PRODUCED BY: CRAIG KILLINGBACK

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DOKA

Doka’s Thomas Zsulits & Mirko Loos discuss lessons learned over the last two years to better prepare procurement for the future and their upcoming plans

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ith a more than 115-year heritage in the construction industry, Doka has perfected the provision of reliable, trustworthy services to customers.

“We are listening intently to understand the world through the eyes of our customers,” says Thomas Zsulits, Director of Global Supply at Doka.

“Our values provide a solid foundation for developing and selling high-quality solutions, from initial planning through to reliable implementation on site. We help our customers to build better, safer and more efficiently.”

Doka is a dynamic company in the construction industry. “Alongside our quality formwork – scaffolding solutions – Doka offers digital solutions and helpful gadgets to support those on the construction site to become more efficient,” says Mirko Loos, Head of Material Group Management at Doka.

He continues: “We are constantly developing a range of new digital solutions, tools, ideas and concepts for our customers.”

The impact of two highly disruptive years Since the outbreak of COVID-19 back in 2020, Doka Global Procurement has had to embark on a steep learning curve – and it has learned a lot from the experiences of the last couple of years. “The question for us has been what now needs to change? What has affected us the most during these highly disruptive years? And what do we take with us into the years ahead?” says Loos. procurementmag.com

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Title of the video

MIRKO LOOS

EXECUTIVE BIO

TITLE: HEAD OF MATERIAL GROUP MANAGEMENT LOCATION: GERMANY 20 years of straight procurement expertise. Started his career 2002 in the Strategic Supplier Management department at Mercedes-Benz near Stuttgart. In 2007 he moved on to join the anglo-dutch provider of online-paid content Reed Elsevier (later RELX Group), where he held different local, regional and later global roles in Procurement. In 2018, Mirko joined Doka as Head of Category Indirect and has recently taken on the role as Head of Material Group Management.

He holds a degree in Business Administration from PFH – Private University of Applied Sciences in Goettingen, and he lives with his family near Dusseldorf in Germany.

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THOMAS ZSULITS

EXECUTIVE BIO

TITLE: DIRECTOR GLOBAL SUPPLY LOCATION: AUSTRIA More than 20 years of experience in different functions along the supply chain process. Gained broad experience in global leading companies like Bosch and Mondi, as well as in mid-range organizations across the globe. Degrees in electronics and later on a Bachelor in BA supported his strong implementation and process skills. With his charismatic leadership skills he is used to being successful also in turbulent times and has proven his leadership skills in turnarounds, M&A’s, restructuring programs and more.

He lives close to Vienna in Austria with his family. Beside his passion for the job and family, he runs a diving school where he loves to give people an insight into his passion for diving.

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DOKA

“ At Doka, we offer a lot of digital solutions and helpful gadgets to support those on the construction site” MIRKO LOOS

HEAD OF MATERIAL GROUP MANAGEMENT, DOKA

Countries around the world have been affected and are reacting differently to the shortages, as well as the fluctuation of demand driven by COVID-19. “But one particularly common experience is the inability to foresee or plan any scenarios,” adds Zsulits.

He adds: “Many of the scenarios we thought would happen, didn’t come true.

And with that, we realised that it is not enough to primarily talk to our direct partners

in Tier 1. We also need to ask ourselves where risks might lie in the tier-n supply chain and monitor them regularly.”

“Today, the deeper we look into our supply chain, the less we know. This transparency is a major risk to our security of supply and a learning from the past years is that we must not leave this entirely to our Tier-1 to manage. So we are approaching our partners across the tiers to discuss potential risks together.”

With this, Doka hopes to be more flexible in some ways, while remaining stable enough to face these challenges and bringing together its partnerships as one supply stream.

Agreeing with Zsulits, Loos also speaks from an internal viewpoint: “We now collaborate a lot more than we did procurementmag.com

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DOKA

Future trends While nobody knows what is in store for the supply market, Zsulits and Loos expect the volatility of the past few years to continue. “This makes it quite hard to predict,” says Zsulits.

He adds: “We will remain in close contact with our suppliers and increase our collaboration. Doka will also focus on more than just its Tier 1 suppliers to improve our risk monitoring capabilities, transform our procurement strategies, and enable quick decision making.

“These will be key to successful operations in the future. So key trends in procurement’s future will continue to be flexibility and the ability to respond with speed.”

Doka is also working on its predictive capabilities when it comes to material prices.

“From a materials group management perspective, we are trying to predict fluctuating prices in a volatile market,” says Loos. “The market is being impacted by the likes of material shortages and price inflations, and so we are working to better predict these disruptions.”

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pre-COVID-19. Over the past two years, whenever our security of supply was at risk, we collaboratively worked together within procurement. The industry has shown great contribution and dedication to solving the industry challenges. This, in turn, has helped us to grow as a team.”

Doka’s future plans So what exactly makes the future so different from now? “More diversity,” says Zsulits.

“It’s more development of our colleagues and employees, and it’s more internationalisation. The last couple of years have shown us that being on one side of the

“We are listening intently to understand the world through the eyes of our customers” THOMAS ZSULITS

DIRECTOR GLOBAL SUPPLY, DOKA

strategy – whether its globalisation or localisation – wouldn’t have helped; in fact, it would have hit us much more.

So we have to diversify our supply market to balance the global influences.

“Don’t try to think in a common way, continuing with processes that you have done for the last 10, 20 or 30 years; think about new processes, new opportunities. You have to be brave, commit to decisions and make them fast. We discovered that fast decisions lead to success and motivates people.”

Agreeing with Zsulits, Loos adds: “We have learned that you can set up a strategy now and then have to redo it again some weeks later, but it’s important for us to think procurementmag.com

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DOKA

ahead and work on a long-term strategy, nonetheless. In procurement, there are outside influences that we need to consider such as ESG, so we need to set those longterm strategies alongside both short and medium-term goals that will get us there, and will help us to measure whether we are still on the right path. We need to start looking forward and predict what will happen in the future, where possible, and determine how these market changes could impact our business, and how we can flexibly adapt to different scenarios.”

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The importance of partnerships More and more, partnerships for Doka are becoming crucial to its operations. “In today’s fluctuating and uncertain markets, we rely on our partners' insights into the industry to stand by us and support our operations. In the next few years, we will be focusing much more closely on our partnerships and be working in closer collaboration with our most important partners,” says Zsulits.

A key partner for Doka is RENOLIT GOR S.p.A.. “We have a unique and long-term partnership with RENOLIT,” adds Zsulits.

DOKA

We also share common views on the market, as well as common values.” It is this value alignment that Zsulits states is key to success.

“Beyond the regular supplier/customer relationship, if the culture of two organisations are the same – as well as the way they approach industry challenges and their long-term targets – then chances are it becomes a valuable partnership for both sides,” explains Zsulits.

He adds: “For example, ESG is gaining significant interest in our company, not

only due to customer demands, but we are seeing the value in successfully managing our environmental impact and supporting the people around us. Not having partners that are like-minded and adopting the same approach would keep us from being successful.

“With Renolit we have that like-minded partnership we are looking for, which is great.”

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