Confessions of a Corporate Shopaholic

Developing procurement talent is an art by itself, particularly when I still see many leaders having a less than adequate understanding of how this profession has evolved.  It is a highly fluid practice and it requires professionals with great adaptiveness and agility.  Paul Teague, US contributing editor of Procurement Leaders, published a blog post recently on the topic that is worth sharing.

“How to Develop Procurement Talent

By Paul Teague

Stephen Hester, vice president and CPO of Smith International, was the first to raise the issue at a recent Procurement Leaders roundtable on risk management,sponsored by Emptoris. Procurement, especially in the oil and gas industry from which he hails, has a people problem. Specifically, he said, the need is to develop the next generation of procurement professionals, to groom executives who will have the broad knowledge and international savvy required for success in a global economy.

One by one, the other roundtable members echoed his sentiments when talking about the risks they face. You can read what they said in a report on the Roundtable in the next issue of Procurement Leaders.

I heard similar views expressed at a previous roundtable sponsored by AT Kearney on data analytics. Ahmet Hepdogan, vice president of procurement at Fresh Start Bakeries North America, called for a new generation of procurement executives with “holistic” knowledge.

There have been whole conferences on  talent development, including Procurement Leaders’ Forums. Procurement Leaders formed a knowledge group on talent management. Recently, the Procurement Intelligence Unit called talent management a key priority for CPOs. Google even has a special project on people skills, specifically management skills.

I thought of all that when I read the US News and World Report magazine’s most recent ranking of the best US colleges for studying supply chain management. Here are some of the courses those “top schools” will teach future procurement and supply chain leaders: finance and accounting (Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Pennsylvania State University), law and marketing (Pennsylvania State) and negotiations (Michigan State University), all areas of knowledge procurement professionals need. But, I saw only one course each in global supply chain management (Michigan State) and international business and finance (The University of Michigan).

Gadzooks! Given the globalization of business, the apparent lack of recognition among some of the curriculum planners of the importance of international studies is stunning. Even the Harvard Business Review touted the importance of international experience and knowledge for procurement and supply chain management. I guess the rest of the proverbial ivory tower has no windows through which to look at the world.

So what should the ideal curriculum include? Introductory courses in engineering concepts (to give them an appreciation for product design and manufacturing); corporate finance (so they will see how CFOs look at a business); business law, marketing and advertising, personnel management, and logistics (so they can truly understand the issues those functions face); risk management (think of commodity-price fluctuations, Middle East turmoil and Japanese earthquakes and tsunamis); computer science and statistics (to get them used to using software for analytics); and, especially, courses in international relations/culture/communications (because the world really is flat).

And, rather than study versions of those courses tailored for procurement and supply chain management, they should attend the same classes that engineers, finance students, political science majors and others who will make their careers in those disciplines attend. May as well get them used to collaborating with those folks early.

Oh, and once they get their first job in procurement, I suggest assigning them to those other functions for three to six months each to further appreciate the roles of the people they will serve.

Maybe the best academic program is not one entitled “supply chain management,” but a broad, interdisciplinary program called “business-cycle management.” That may better reflect the role future practitioners will play.”

One thing for sure, those who are trained following Paul’s prescription will no longer be labelled as just a “buyer”.  Let’s announce to the rest of the world how much value we can add.