PERT Chicago Quarterly Meeting- July 2018

Optimal Organizational Design for Procurement (Including a  Center of Excellence)

Centralized, Decentralized / Consulted or Center-Led?  Which organization structure is considered Next Practice?  What exactly is a Center of Excellence(COE)?  Regardless of the industry you are in or whether you are doing Strategic Sourcing or have matured to Category Management, any or all of these structures can work.  We spend so much time paying attention to the boxes and titles that we lose sight of what we are really trying to accomplish – developing a structure that allows us to meet our goals in an efficient and collaborative way.   Designing an organization should not be an exercise in “boxology”; rather an attempt to organize your talent to leverage their skills and competencies to maximize effectiveness.  In other words, it’s more important to define what happens between the boxes than drawing the perfect picture.

 The Procurement function is unique because we function as a shared service that may play different roles in different categories.  We may centralize certain areas of spend like office suppliers / equipment, may decentralize / consult on other categories like HR and may create a Center-led model for areas of spend like Information Technology.  How do you decide?  You will need to come to this workshop to explore the possibilities.  In this workshop we will explore:

 The attributes of the various organization structures

• Role/design and implementation of a COE.
• A model to help you decide the right organization structure
• How to ensure accountability across the various models
• The skills and competencies required for success
• How to create organization design principles

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You definitely do not want to miss this workshop

Global Sourcing In the New Global Political Realities

Whether you are procuring goods or services, your supply chain is global.  If not your Tier 1 suppliers, then your Tier 2 suppliers are dependent on global supply chains and therefore the global geo-political landscape is of significant importance to you. Acting on growing competitive pressures, many companies have developed supplier relationships and relocated manufacturing operations or services to Global Markets – lured primarily by the low labor costs AND revenue potential.  While increasing procurement expenditures in Global Markets have yielded significant savings, many companies are finding that they face unexpected risks and major supply chain challenges which may offset the benefits.

 
Establishing a supplier relationship management program that allows you to apply effective risk management principles and analyzing total costs is instrumental in building a successful Global Market operation.  Today, the greatest potential may be in India or China while tomorrow it may be Russia or other eastern European countries.  Successful organizations recognize this and are developing professionals that have the business savvy to identify and capitalize on arbitrage opportunities globally. 
We will cover topics including:

• The competencies needed to develop a strategic approach to Global sourcing
• Challenges of managing suppliers• Risk identification and mitigation
• Internal change management issues
• Development of a sourcing process to manage Global Sourcing