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The 6th International Supply Chain Management Symposium is Almost Here

This is your friendly reminder that the 6th Annual PMAC/MeRC International Supply Chain Management Symposium is happening in two weeks. It starts with the 3rd annual Doctoral Colloquium on Wednesday, October 15 and the welcome reception that night and the main body of the conference is on Thursday, October 16 and Friday October 17.

This year, their keynotes are from Mr. Dean D. Loria from Shell Canada Limited, Dr. Terry L. Esper from the University of Tennessee, and Jason “The Prophet” Busch, the Spend Master of Spend Matters. Jason’s always an energetic speaker, Dr. Esper is rather well reknowned, and although I must confess that I don’t know the dude from Shell, I’ve never attended a bad presentation from a Shell representative. (Not that they’ve all be gems, but compared to some presentations I’ve attended, including an Ariba keynote from last year, they were never bad.)

In addition, they again have a number of tracks on timely supply chain issues that include green supply chains, health care supply chains, energy sector best practices, and remanufacturing supply chains as well as the old standby topics that include global logistics, procurement management, and negotiation. In addition, this year’s panels are on green supply chains, non-profit supply chains, and supply chain education.

As I noted in last year’s announcement, there aren’t a lot of good Supply Chain / Sourcing / Procurement conferences north of the border, and this tends to be one of the few. So, if you’re in Canada or the northern states and do business in, or with, Canada, I strongly encourage you to consider checking it out. Plus, you get to check out Cowtown this year, which might be a nice change after five years of Hogtown.

For those of you who haven’t been to Canada’s wild wild west, you can check out the the city web site, the Tourism Calgary site, the Calgary Community Events Guide, and eventhe WorldWeb.com travel guide and vacation planner. And even though the event is not being held during the annual Folk Festival, Blues Festival or during the world famous Stampede, you can always check out the Calgary Zoo and Heritage Park and see how your average Canadian still lives outside of the big nine Canadian cities (which, from east to west are: Halifax, Quebec City, Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, Winnipeg, Edmonton, Calgary, and Vancouver). In addition, you can also check out the Calgary Herald, the Calgary Sun, and The Gauntlet for the down-low on what’s going on. (And you music lovers can check out Calgary Music Lives here, Music Calgary, and the Calgary Music Special Interest Group.) And, for us bloggers, there is the Wild Rose Brewery and the Brew Brothers Brewery … so we’ll be just fine.

Reminder: (e-Sourcing, e-Procurement, and e-Supply Chain) RFP Help Is Here

I wanted to remind you that, I as indicated last month during the summer slumber, you can find RFP Help Here. When trying to piece together an RFP for your new e-sourcing, e-procurement, or e-supply chain solution, you’ll need to navigate a minefield filled with fine-print, unnecessary and useless features, maintenance and upgrade charges, and extraneous user licenses (thrown in to produce an artificially-low “per license” price) — not to mention enticing offers involving long-term commitments that you absolutely should not be making. As outlined in What Does the doctor Do … For You, one of the services I offer is RFx Construction Help, including, if necessary, a full blown Needs Assessment.

As I have indicated many times in my X-emplification series, my X-asperation series, and in various RFx posts, including Don’t Put the Cart Before the Horse, you should never — ever — use an RFI or RFP “template” from a vendor when going out to bid, regardless of what the solution is for. This isn’t to say that you shouldn’t download them and look at them, but it’s unwise to use them or base your RFx upon them. For example, the Ariba RFP template for an RFx solution consists of page after page of feature-focused questions like “does the product integrate with Business Objects”, “please list your best practice event templates”, and “does the product qualify new suppliers” — the answers to which are most likely of no use to you. Not everyone uses Business Objects, and, more importantly, if the product is good, shouldn’t it be self-contained? If you’re in food service, you don’t give a hoot about best practice templates for petro-chemical manufacturing. Furthermore, an automated tool can never qualify a supplier — only an intelligent human can.

The usefulness of a vendor RFP template for a software solution is usually limited to the headings on the functionality pages, which can help you to identify features commonly found in that solution category. For example, looking at Ariba’s proposed RFP for an RFx solution, you can be pretty confident that RFx solutions might have some type of navigation, integration support for third party systems, project management capability, supplier tracking, survey creation, reporting, RFx creation, and auction event-management capabilities — and, more specifically, that the features available from Ariba will match the questions perfectly! But that’s all you can tell. You don’t know if the features mesh in such a way to provide the actual functionality you need, or whether the whole RFP is completely off base with respect to what you’re trying to accomplish. You need to ask use-case-based questions that reflect your business and your normal operating procedures. For example, is the reporting module included with the RFx system, or is it an added-cost item? Is the solution a tar baby of interrelated modules, such that you can’t really buy one without springing for all the others, in order to get the “complete” functionality? Has the vendor focused on eye-candy gee-whiz features, to the detriment of core functionality that you’ll really need?

RFx software itself is great example of what should be a mature, smoothly-working technology. eRFx has been around for 10+ years — so it’s easy to reason that surely every vendor has to have gotten it right by now. None of the analysts or major commentators in our space even question this point. Yet, I’m aware of recent RFx efforts using “mature” technology that have nearly failed due to very basic software limitations.

As per my last post, I believe that I am in a unique position to help, given my dual background in technology and sourcing/procurement. I am able to work with you to:

  • understand what you need and do a proper Needs Assessment
  • put together an RFx that outlines the important functionality you really need, not simply produce an exhaustive list of useless features
  • review the initial RFx responses and help you identify the follow-up questions that you need to ask
  • review a potential contract in order to identify:
    • unnecessary modules
    • missing functionality
    • missing cost definitions (so you don’t get burned later on)
    • and other potential weaknesses
  • if necessary, help you select a third party to assist with implementation or associated services

So if you need help with that needs assessment, RFx, or contract, e-mail me at any time at thedoctor <at> sourcinginnovation <dot> com.

Note to anyone who doesn’t understand category tagging: yes, this is an advertisement.

Coming Soon: The 6th International Supply Chain Management Symposium

The 6th Annual PMAC/MeRC International Supply Chain Management Symposium is coming up next month. It starts with the 3rd annual Doctoral Colloquium on Wednesday, October 15 and the welcome reception that night and the main body of the conference is on Thursday, October 16 and Friday October 17.

This year, their keynotes are from Mr. Dean D. Loria from Shell Canada Limited, Dr. Terry L. Esper from the University of Tennessee, and Jason “The Prophet” Busch, the Spend Master of Spend Matters. Jason’s always an energetic speaker, Dr. Esper is rather well reknowned, and although I must confess that I don’t know the dude from Shell, I’ve never attended a bad presentation from a Shell representative. (Not that they’ve all be gems, but compared to some presentations I’ve attended, including an Ariba keynote from last year, they were never bad.)

In addition, they again have a number of tracks on timely supply chain issues that include green supply chains, health care supply chains, energy sector best practices, and remanufacturing supply chains as well as the old standby topics that include global logistics, procurement management, and negotiation. In addition, this year’s panels are on green supply chains, non-profit supply chains, and supply chain education.

As I noted in last year’s announcement, there aren’t a lot of good Supply Chain / Sourcing / Procurement conferences north of the border, and this is one of the few. So, if you’re in Canada or the northern states and do business in, or with, Canada, I strongly encourage you to consider checking it out. Plus, you get to check out Cowtown this year, which might be a nice change after five years of Hogtown.

For those of you who haven’t been to Canada’s wild wild west, you can check out the the city web site, the Tourism Calgary site, the Calgary Community Events Guide, and eventhe WorldWeb.com travel guide and vacation planner. And even though the event is not being held during the annual Folk Festival, Blues Festival or during the world famous Stampede, you can always check out the Calgary Zoo and Heritage Park and see how your average Canadian still lives outside of the big nine Canadian cities (which, from east to west are: Halifax, Quebec City, Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, Winnipeg, Edmonton, Calgary, and Vancouver). In addition, you can also check out the Calgary Herald, the Calgary Sun, and The Gauntlet for the down-low on what’s happening. (And you music lovers can check out Calgary Music Lives here, Music Calgary, and the Calgary Music Special Interest Group.) And, for us bloggers, there is the Wild Rose Brewery and the Brew Brothers Brewery … so we’ll be just fine.

(e-Sourcing, e-Procurement, and e-Supply Chain) RFP Help Here!

Here’s irony for you: as a Purchasing and Procurement professional, some of the most complex products and services you will source are the very tools that you have to acquire in order to be successful. That’s right, I’m talking about e-Sourcing tools and e-Procurement systems.

If you’re a regular reader of Sourcing Innovation, you know that I don’t pull my punches when it comes to reviewing e-Sourcing and e-Procurement tools. I’ve seen it all, and I can assure you that there are very real differences between them — differences that can and will have a profound impact on your success.

I can help you find the tools and solutions that are right for your company and your needs.

Unlike industry analysts, who are paid by the very vendors they “review,” I do not have any skin in the game with regard to a particular approach or a particular vendor. And, unlike armchair “experts” who opine on technology without having any technology background, I am a technologist by training (a PhD computer scientist, in fact) who cannot be fooled by a pretty user interface or a piece of Marketing drivel. When I get a vendor brief, I insist on looking inside the cookie jar. I’m not satisfied just admiring the glaze on the outside. If the vendor won’t open the jar, I assume the worst, and I’m usually right. (And they don’t get a nice blog entry on Sourcing Innovation either!)

There are numerous mistakes that are easy to make in the RFI/RFP process. You should not be embarrassed if you have made some of them, because both vendors and analysts are aggressively pushing strategies that ultimately benefit them, not you. It’s very hard not to fall into the traps they’ve set for you.

For example:

  • Never, ever, use an RFI or RFP “template” from a vendor. At best, this is just a way for the vendor to sell you the exhaustive, but often mostly useless, set of “features” they happen to have. At worse, it is a way for the vendor to sow “poison pills” that other vendors will have difficulty answering, so that the scoring algorithm on the RFx will cause them to appear better than the competition, whether or not this is true.
  • Never use an analyst’s report to generate a list of “features” that the analyst believes a product should have. The analyst doesn’t know anything about you or your business, and typically knows very little about the products, either (other than what he or she has been told by the vendors who are paying him or her or his or her company).
  • Never use vendor marketing materials to decide on the “key features” that you need. Vendors often compete with each other on irrelevant points that have no bearing on the functionality that your business requires, and analysts tend to repeat these irrelevancies until they achieve a life of their own.
  • Never assume that a product is “stable” or “bullet proof” just because it’s been out there for years. I’ve seen mature RFP software utterly fail, when RFP software (after years and years of development!) ought to be a slam dunk. I’ve seen “enterprise” e-procurement systems where the price actually charged by the vendor does not match the catalog price (you’d think they could at least get that right!). By the way, neither of these examples involve small vendors.
  • If a claim seems outrageous, it almost always is. For example, no static report can replace an opportunity assessment from a trained professional. Don’t imagine that you can base a procurement strategy on the output of an automated tool.

Fortunately for you, I’m in a unique position to help. With my dual background in technology and sourcing/procurement, I can work with you to:

  • understand what you need and do a proper Needs Assessment
  • put together an RFP that outlines the functionality you need, not an exhaustive list of useless features. Vendors want you to focus on irrelevancies; you need to focus on core value.
  • review the RFP responses and help you identify the questions you need to ask, like I did generically last year in my X-emplification and X-asperation series
  • review a potential contract in order to identify:
    • unnecessary modules
    • missing functionality
    • missing cost definitions (so you don’t get burned later on)
    • and other potential weaknesses

So if you need help with that needs assessment, RFP, or contract, e-mail me at any time at thedoctor <at> sourcinginnovation <dot> com. No job is too big or too small as I know that you don’t put the cart before the horse.

P.S. Yes, as per the categorization, this is an advertisement for the doctor‘s services. I’d hoped I wouldn’t have to state the obvious, especially since I classified it as such, but it appears I have to.

What Does the doctor Do … For You?

In What Does the doctor Do?, I gave you a high-level overview of what the doctor does — Innovation for the Real World — and how it came to pass. Then, in What Does the doctor Do? … For Executives, I outlined what the doctor can do for sourcing & procurement technology and/or services providers and for enterprises looking to acquire sourcing and procurement technology and/or services for their day-to-day operations.

In this post, I’m going to outline some of the specific services that I offer.
Quick Links:
Investment Firms and Companies Doing Acquisitions
Technology & Service Companies
Buying Organizations


Investment Firms and Companies Doing Acquisitions

Technology Due Diligence
the doctor has not only been a CTO, but has done literally every job in a technology organization under the CTO role and with his deep academic background can, and has on multiple occasions, literally done an entire technology due diligence on his own – architecture, infrastructure, security, code review, roadmap, etc. – and can do it all for you if you are considering acquiring a small company with a small product portfolio. (Not that he can’t do a large product portfolio on his own, but given that exclusivity windows these days are short, it’s impossible for one person to do a large portfolio on their own with sufficient certainty no matter how well trained, experienced, and skilled they are.)

Product Due Diligence
the doctor has deep expertise in multiple areas of e-Commerce, Sourcing, Procurement, and Supply Chain technology, as well as deep expertise in advanced technology, especially in the areas of RPA, optimization, analytics, ML, and AI.  If you are looking for deep insight into product maturity, competitiveness, direction, and potential capability, and the product overlaps one of the doctor’s market areas of expertise and advanced technology, the doctor can offer you deep insight and analysis in a short timeframe.

 


Technology & Service Companies

Assessments

Total Solution Assessment
the doctor will spend approximately three days to two weeks on your site, meeting with your senior staff, depending on the depth and breadth of your solution.  Together, we’ll explore your technology offering, services offering, training and education materials, product roadmap, messaging, positioning, and current marketing strategies. I’ll then provide you with a written high-level assessment that captures where you are, how that compares to the market, and, if appropriate, what you could be doing to be more competitive. After you’ve had a chance to digest the report, I’ll conduct one or more one to two hour conference call to discuss it in depth.

Technology Roadmap Assessment & Recommendations
the doctor will spend approximately two days to two weeks taking a deep dive into your technology offering, depending on the depth and breadth of your solution.  I will assess functionality, architecture, platform, and UI; compare it to the state of the practice; assess it with respect to customer needs; and then prepare a detailed written assessment that captures where your solution is with respect to the market, what improvements might need to be made, and what enhancements could be made to differentiate it. After you’ve had a chance to digest the report, I’ll conduct one or more one to two hour conference call to discuss it in depth.

Product / Technology (Management) and Roadmap Advisory Services
the doctor will review specific modules, current or planned, and specific aspects of the product and roadmap and provide advisory services as appropriate.  This can include architecture, delivery infrastructure, stack, algorithms, and other technology components.

Research / Advisory Services
the doctor is a Ph.D. in Computer Science with a degree, and advanced training, in Mathematics.  As such, for certain products / technology endeavours, he is uniquely qualified to provide research and research-based advisory services on a short, or long, term basis.

Public Label Writing

Solution Whitepapers
the doctor will work with you to create a co-branded expository white paper relevant to your solution domain that explains what the problem is, why it needs to be addressed, and what the benefits of addressing it can be. The first step in selling a solution is making sure that people understand they have a problem. A sponsored white paper is a powerful way to get your salespeople over that first hurdle.

Sourcing Innovation Illuminations
Sourcing Innovation Illuminations, like the briefs and perspectives offered by analyst firms, will serve to elucidate a service or technology need and the state of the market with respect to that need. However, unlike the briefs and perspectives offered by many of the analyst firms, these pieces will be written by someone with a strong understanding of technology, and will clearly define how technology (or the technology-based solution offering) can help, what the current capabilities of the relevant (underlying) technologies are, and what a buyer should look for.

What’s the difference between White Papers and Illuminations?
a) Co-branding – Illuminations can be sponsored by, but are not co-branded
b) Distribution – you can distribute the white-papers for lead-gen on your site, but Illuminations are only distributed by SI
c) Focus – white papers can lead up to a specific solution, Illuminations focus on generic needs and do not lead up to specific solutions

  1. d) Cost – Illuminations cost less, but the topic and editorial discretion is entirely at the discretion of the doctor

Private Label Writing

Marketing Brochures
the doctor will help you to prepare your marketing brochures. I have a strong understanding of technology, supply chain needs, and the space as a whole, and I can help you focus on messaging that succinctly summarizes the problem, the solution you’re offering, and the particular benefits of your solution that are most relevant to a buyer.

Published Articles
the doctor will ghost-write articles on your solution space and how your solution addresses problems in that space. These articles can be submitted to traditional and on-line publications, which will publish vendor-specific content if it is broadened appropriately for general consumption.

 


Buying Organizations

Needs Assessment

the doctor will spend up to three days meeting with your team to identify what your problems are, where you are on the process and technology curves, and what solutions would be best for your organization. I will then prepare a written report that summarizes your challenges, your current processes, your current technology, what you need to look for in a technology and/or service solution, and what benefits you can expect to receive.

RFX Preparation

If you need a new technology(-based) solution, the doctor will help you create the RFx that you need to be sending out to make sure you get the information that is relevant to your needs, which is essential to selecting the right solution. It’s hard to write an RFx for a solution you don’t yet fully understand, and every day dozens (if not hundreds) of companies are sending out RFxs for sourcing and procurement technology solutions that don’t effectively communicate the solution the company actually needs. There’s no need for you to be one of these. the doctor can help.

As he co-created the Spend Matters Solution Map and Tech-Match solutions, he can also work with you to take maximum advantage of those solutions (which can be used to verify the vendors you are sending the RFI to are relevant and that their solution meets at least a market average level of appropriate technical and product maturity), thereby allowing you to focus your RFI on the key technical capabilities that are most important and/or unique to your organization and the service, culture, security, roadmap, and other requirements not captured in a relatively useless feature/function checklist that most RFIs end up becoming due to a lack of appropriate expertise on the buying organization’s part).

Solution Assessment

the doctor will helping you assess proposals from potential vendors, and prepare a formal recommendation on the strengths and weaknesses of each proposal, as well as follow-up questions to consider asking.

Train the Trainer

the doctor has a background in both academic education and industrial training, and in select cases can assist you in training your power users and star performers on change management, best practices, new processes and even new technologies. The goal will be for these key resources to achieve the level of understanding and proficiency necessary to be able to disseminate their knowledge to the rest of the organization, thus making your organization independent of vendor and other third-party services personnel and consultants.

E-mail thedoctor <at> sourcinginnovation <dot> com for details!