Mr. Matthew Buckingham recently posted on LinkedIn that the strongest Procurement leaders today share three traits:

• (commercial) curiosity — and an understanding of where value is
• (constructive) courage — and the willingness to challenge the business
• (crystal) clarity — and the ability to simplify complexity

These are all great, and necessary, skills, but not enough to survive tomorrow where supply chains break daily, technology is in flux, and your processes can’t adapt (fast enough).

In order to survive the simultaneous supply chain (due to unpredictable, and constantly escalating, geopolitical situations) and technology (due to the Agentic AI [Hype] wave) turmoil that is coming, tomorrow’s procurement leader is also going to need:

• (colossal) creativity — to build a flexible supply chain that can change on a moment’s notice
• (constant) crusader — to convince the C-Suite that traditional Procurement is dead

The organization is going to have to

• dual/tri-source everything from at least two/three locales,
• have contracts with primary and secondary couriers in each locale,
• be aware of alternate ports / commercial air cargo carriers out of alternate airports for shipping (and have them on speed dial in case of need),
• have potential back up suppliers (who came in second) in case of supplier failure,
• near (real)-time monitoring in place not just for communications, missed communications, missed milestone dates, and other indicate KPIs but events that are likely to impact a supplier’s performance and/or availability,
• pre-defined response plans for region, supplier, carrier, [air]port, etc. availability, and
• the ability to reallocate and change plans literally overnight …
• while treating long-term contracts (or at least long-term expectations of fulfillment) as a thing of the past … there is no guaranteed supply, or even price protection, if the supplier becomes unavailable or goes bankrupt

Proactively building a supply chain and supporting technology infrastructure capable of being reactive in real time is going to take a lot more creativity and crusading than what was ever needed before in Procurement.

Curiosity, Clarity, and Courage is just the baseline.

Find a leader who’s ready!