Now don’t you give me all that JIVE about code I used before you’s alive
Cause this ain’t nineteen ninety five — ain’t even two thousand and five
Now I’m the guy named Lamoureux and Spend is the one thing that I know
So every year, in summer time, I’ll celebrate it with a rhyme!

Gonna save it, gonna shave it, gonna make it good,
Gonna take it all down through your neighbourhood.
Gonna wring it, gonna sling it till it’s understood.
My rap’s about to happen, like the knee you was slappin;
Or the toe you been tappin’ on a hunk of wood.
‘Bout a two fisted dude, with a friendly attitude
and a sack full of savings for the people on the block.

He’s an old grey beard, maybe looks kind of weird,
and if you ever seen him he could give you quite a shock.

Now people let me tell ya about this guy
the dude who’s still slicing spend through July
Now his wit is out, his gloves on the ground,
best you stay to watch him cut it down.
When this dude gets to work on your spend block,
you will be glued to just one spot,
as the master works at a solid pace,
…
get a taste of the waste thrown in your face.
…
this old spend slayer will lay down a heavy layer
of his spend mapping rhythm to a cross-mapped beat
he don’t need no database, just a chunk of spend to trace
and a family of vendors that will roll up neat

I was in a quiet mood, which was good for a brood
as not a sound did abound as he ploughed through the mound

and you will utter a gasp as he slices through the past
lays your mav’rick spend bare faster than a white hare
while you’re up in the attic dealing with the static
that your current spending tool is programmed to give
he’s got an all new app that don’t give a cr@p
about where your data’s from or what form it is in

It’s quick, it’s sharp, and always on the mark
Delivering success on his chinny, chin, chin
it does away with “cubes”, and OLAP attitudes
and treats the spend as a set to be mapped on whim
He’s cool for a fool throwin’ out every rule
every hour of the day when the hot sun shines
Though the beard was-a cleared, I still have never cheered
like I did on that day when he discovered cloud nine

You know I’m right, your spend’s a fright
you need a guide to help you lay it out right
So if you ask him nice, once or twice
he might just show you the hand of sleight
How he syncs disparate data in real time
Whether ERP, Flat File, or API
Without AI or one hundred thousand rules
At a speed that’s so fast, no time to drool

When he gets down to work, this fine old gent
Whips up live reports that are heaven sent
Built on cross-linked filters that stay in sync
As he cross-drills down through multiple data sinks

There are just no words that are fit to describe
How this expert makes your data come alive
The tricks he employs are out of the realm
Of what you will get unless he’s at the helm
You’ve just never seen spend insight like this
When you map your data with his clever twists
Your old Ford engine is now a Mercedes AMG F1
The power at your fingers is second to none

This old spend dude never left the keys
up late till all’s where it should be
But if he were posting here today
he’d say Truthful Spending and to all a good day!

Long time readers know that Sourcing Innovation used to have a Spend Rappin’ holiday tradition until Opera Solutions Acquired BIQ. But even that couldn’t stop the old spend dude, who, after some time off and some contemplative thought, got back to the keys and came up with a whole new approach for do-it-yourself spend analysis that is really so easy your grade schooler could do it (and, sadly, probably do it better than you).

If you haven’t checked it out yet, check out Spendata. As per the doctor‘s deep dive over on Spend Matters (Part 1 and Part 2, registration required), it really is a leap forward in D.I.Y. Spend Analysis. Easy creation and propagation of views using a new concept called filter coins, no more static reports (as every view is a report that can be exported at any time), and no more traditional time-consuming ETL — map, cleanse, enrich on the fly, in real time, in any sequence you like, across any data sets you like, and cross-join and sync ’em all using whatever scheme makes sense to you. Nonsense you say? All we can say is this isn’t grandpa’s spend reporting tool.

It’s Christmas in July. Hence our new Spend Rappin’ tradition begins!