Hopefully you know by now what the doctor is talking about, but if not, as per the Sourcing Innovation article from two months ago, PROCUREMENT STINKS and we should not deny it anymore.

In a nutshell, and just is just the tip of the garbage heap:

1. Case studies are ranker than expired fish in a microwave on high.
2. Approximately 85% of companies are AI-washing everything.
3. The Gen-AI claims that it will deliver Procurement to the enterprise are FALSE.
4. Intake/Orchestration is totally useless on its own.
5. Consultancies are often more in the dark than the Procurement departments they are claiming they can help.
6. DEI is being misused to push agendas and sometimes to Do Extra-legal Initiatives,

And, as per a poll put out by THE REVELATOR, we are especially concerned with the fact that 14% of practitioners would rather trust a salesperson or a marketer than a consultant or an analyst! (Now, part of this is probably due to the lack of independence from the Big X who continually pushed their vendor “partners” on the client whether or not the “partner” was the best solution, but still, it’s not ideal. [And, hopefully, as a result of the bloodbath, the consultants who weren’t offering value to their clients were the first to go.])

As far as the doctor is concerned, the most trusted advisors in the space should be:

1. analysts
2. independent consultants

and that’s it! No sales people, no marketers, no influencers, no made up positions. Sales people are paid to sell, not to solve problems, and marketers are paid for leads and, in some organizations, there is no correlation between “leads” and the sales funnel.

So how can those of us not at a Big X, where we would be joined at the hip to preferred partners or subsidiaries (and not recommending them results in a pink slip), dispel some of the stink and regain some trust?

The first thing the doctor wants to state is that he has even less ideas here than he does for his fellow analysts. In fact, the ideas he does have should be pretty obvious.

1. Disclose any (formal) relationships we have with vendors that are recommended.

Even if a partner is the best recommendation for the client, we must still disclose the relationship, especially if there is any additional benefit we get from the recommendation (and definitely if the benefit is financial). (In addition, we should make extra effort to demonstrate that we did thoroughly evaluate the identified alternatives and have a number of reasons for the partner recommendation that are specific to the client’s needs).

2. Create RFPs based on identified needs, not free vendor templates or analyst map outlines.

It’s critically important that we don’t take shortcuts here because vendor templates are designed to ensure that the vendor who gave the template away always comes out on top (by focussing in on the requirements that the vendor executes best) and analyst map requirements focus on a set of requirements that the analysts can use to compare vendors on the same scale, not on a set of requirements that is relevant for selecting a platform for a specific customer, or even a customer of a specific size in a specific vertical.

3. Recommend vendors based on technical fit and hard requirements, not cultural fit and soft requirements.

Just like it’s not an analyst’s job to judge cultural fit or other soft factors in their analysis (as that varies too much by company to even take a shot in the dark), it’s not our job to tell clients who is a good fit — that’s for them to decide. We’re there to tell them which companies can provide a good solution, and let them decide who they are comfortable with as they will be stuck with the vendor for 3, 5, 7 or more years (not us)!

4. Make recommendations on expected ROI for the customer, not follow-on work potential.

At the Big X, where the consultant is often joined at the hip to partners (and must use/recommend their solution if it can be force-fit), they are often also pressured to making the recommendation that will lead to the most follow-on work and engagement extensions (and, preferably, long drawn-out implementations and integrations). As far as the doctor is concerned, this is one of the most egregious things you can do. Especially considering that, in Procurement, work is never done and the client will always need more advice, new technology, and more help.

If we focus on the technology that will deliver the most ROI, then we are enabling the client to generate funding for additional projects and, hopefully, make us their consultant of choice in the process by focussing on them before us. The reality is that there isn’t a Procurement organization anywhere, not even in the upper quartile of Hackett Group top performers, that has all of the resources, technology and knowledge it needs. So we should never think it’s a one-and-done situation if we do well (and, moreover, do it at a fair price-point where we deliver an ROI).

5. Don’t take on projects we’re not qualified to do.

While this would get you fired at a Big X where the motto is the traditional consulting motto of “sign now, figure it out later“, we need to be better. If we’re approached with something that’s not in our wheelhouse as a consultant, we take it to the rest of the company. If it doesn’t fit anyone’s wheelhouse, we need to politely decline the work. If it means we never get asked again, then we know that’s a client we wouldn’t want to work for as any client with working brain cells would be impressed and honoured to know a consultant who didn’t just say yes but instead thought about whether or not they could deliver enough value relative to their price tag before accepting the work.

Furthermore, if we take the time to educate the client on what our services are and where we could help, we should be the first call they make when they have the right project, and maybe even get it in a sole-source negotiation if the project doesn’t cross a mandatory public bid threshold. People worth working for value honesty, and are very likely to come back to you, either at their current company or their next company, if you are honest about what you can and can’t do and what value you can provide. (Furthermore, if you investigate the company and can identify something you could do to help them, nothing stops you from proposing that project and working with them to close that project while helping them find the right consultant for the project you can’t do.)

At the end of the day, no one ever ruined their reputation by saying no to work they weren’t suited for — they ruined their reputation by taking on work they weren’t qualified to even talk about and then f6ck1ng it up royally.

the doctor‘s not sure it’s enough, but it’s a start, and if other independent consultants make an effort to figure out how to restore our reputation, maybe we’ll find the answer, provide the value that we are engaged to provide, and get back the trust we should have.