Category Archives: Miscellaneous

NewsFlash: PR Perp, I Don’t Care What You Think! (Blogger Relations Part V)

It’s no secret. the doctor doesn’t like PR pros. To be specific, the doctor does not like “professional” PR pros who work for PR Agencies who believe that all they need to know to do their jobs is “best practice” PR techniques and that subject matter knowledge is not required. This really bugs me because even the best salesman knows that you have to have both some understanding of the product and a customer’s desire if you want to sell it. Thus, in order for a PR “pro” to sell a story to publisher, would it not stand to reason that she should, at a minimum, understand the product or service she is pushing as well as the interests of the publishers she is pursuing?

Apparently not. Apparently SI wants to write about website building using glorified Facebook profiles, physical therapy, the average ball player’s salary, lipstick, reality TV, and PR agency press releases! Anyone who took fifteen seconds of time to look up SI (and scan any post in the Blogger Relations series or any entry in the FAQ) would realize that the doctor disdains social media for the sake of social media (if you want to take selfies and poke, prod, and farmville your life away, go for it, but leave me out of it), only writes about supply chain, and has a general disdain for PR agencies so the last thing the doctor wants is to write about your recent press release on how you just released a new social media tool that is going to revolutionize the business world (not), how you just ran a campaign for client X that was revolutionary (and probably had no impact on actual sales), or how you just hired more more PR “pros” to increase the number of publishers you can spam with inane, irrelevant, bullsh!t on a daily basis.

And to make matters worse, they all have outreach press release syndication engines that not only blast you with the most ludicrous story idea you can think of, but that send two to four follow-up e-mails on a scheduled basis where they remind you of how great the story idea was, in case you missed it the first time. If you’re lucky, it will include an unsubscribe link, but it won’t matter, because they set these engines up with a thousand lists, and every time they get a new e-mail address, immediately syndicate to all of the other engines in their PR network, so that way, even if you manage to unsubscribe from the Reality TV in Atlanta list, you’ll still get the same story from the Reality TV in New York list, that cross-runs all of their stories from the Reality TV in Atlanta list to make sure all stories get as wide a reach as possible. In other words, these PR pros have taken the art of spamming to a whole new level! (the doctor bets that even the Nigerians are impressed!)

But even this isn’t what’s currently driving the doctor mental. What’s currently driving the doctor crazy is how every ridiculous story (which is an accurate term because this is the word many people use to describe fiction, which is probably the most accurate term for a good portion of what SI gets pitched, which is another accurate term because this is what should be done with most of the content suggestions sent SI’s way) comes preceded by the words I think this is a great story for SI because …

PR Pro: What You Think Doesn’t Matter! Not in the least. No one gives a sh!t. All the company paying you cares about is that you promote their product or service. And all the publisher cares about is bringing quality subject matter on topic to their audience. SI isn’t being consulted by beauticians who want lipstick advice, isn’t being consulted by agents to professional athletes who want insights on how much their clients should be getting paid, and I certainly hope that SI isn’t being read by PR Pros who want insights on how to do their jobs even more annoyingly! (Although it’s possible that with this rant SI just gave a few amateurs a few ideas they shouldn’t have …)

And at least where SI is concerned, you have an archive of over 4,000 posts to search to determine whether or not SI has ever written about the topic, a detailed 20+ (or is it 30+) page FAQ that answers many of your questions, and a Blogger Relations series that, if read appropriately, makes it quite clear on how to NOT be an idiot. So if you can’t get the clue that all SI wants is Supply Management / Supply Chain related stories* and keep sending him stories about lipstick and baseball, expect him to unsubscribe to every list associated to your agency and blacklist you — permanently. (And this means that if you ever do get a great story in Supply Management, just like no one would listen to the boy who cried wolf, no one here is going to listen to you!)

So please shape the hell up and put a little intelligence and insight into your job or get lost. Seriously.

*SI is quite willing to be pitched loosely-related stories that have a 1 in 100 chance of being written about as long as there is some, clear, relation to Supply Management / Supply Chain.

CPOs Deserve to be in the C-Suite

And the general belief is that because Supply Management is so important to organizational success, CPOs should report to the CEO. And while this should be the case in theory, should it be the case in practice?

According to a recent study by A.T. Kearney (as highlighted over on S&DC Exec) conducted in association with CIPS and the ISM, only 10% of procurement functions have established recognition with their CFOs regarding how procurement contributes value and that the benefits are real and measurable. Ouch! Reading this make one wonder if maybe the CPO should be reporting to the CFO.

Why? Because if the CPO is a direct report, it might convince more CFOs to spend more time trying to understand the ways of Procurement and convince more CPOs to spend more time trying to understand the ways of Finance. The joint effort might result in more CFOs and CPOs coming to a joint understanding, which might result in more CFOs understanding the true value of Procurement.

Right now, as per a recent Cap Gemini Survey (available at this link), 20% of CPOs report to Finance. It’s unfortunate that we don’t know how many of these CFOs are among the 10% of those that understand the value of Procurement. Because if the majority of CFOs who understand the value of Procurement were those who had the CPO as a direct report, then the answer would be simple. Have the CPO sit at the table but report through the CFO on a daily basis until such time that Finance understands the true worth of Procurement. However, if the percentage of CFOs with direct CPO reports who understand the value Procurement brings is only in the 20% range, then having the CPO report to the CFO makes no difference.

Any thoughts on the issue?

Procurement Trend #30: Continued Margin Pressure

We still have twenty-seven (27) trends to go, so we need to get back to our discussing in detail each and every trend we debunked in our Future of Procurement series so that you understand not only why the historians are still talking about these trends, but why they are still relevant to many Procurement organizations that are stuck in the past with the historians.

The goal is that, at the end of this thirty part series, you will not only know what you need to do to prevent staying in the past with your organizational “peers”, but what you need to do to not only stay in the present but start marching towards the future, which is coming faster than you think.

As per our original series, ever since the beginning of the modern industrial age and the introduction of the first mass production factories, customers have wanted lower prices. And when efficiencies gave customers these lower prices, they wanted the prices to be lowered even more. With end customers putting continued pressure on retailers to lower prices, these retailers are putting continued pressure on manufacturers to lower prices, and these manufacturers are, in turn, putting pressure on raw material providers to lower their prices. Margin pressure has always been with us and it’s not going away any time soon.

So why do so many historians keep pegging it as a future trend? There are a number of reasons, but among the top three today are:

  • Multiple global recessions in a short-time frame
    In the early noughts, mid-noughts, and late noughts in the US; Turkey, Greece, Ireland, Portugal, Spain, and Cyprus in Europe; Palestine and Egypt in the Middle East / North Africa, and so on over the last decade and a half …
  • High rates of joblessness in many first world countries
    including Greece at 26%+, Spain at 25%+, Portugal and Cyprus at 15%+, Italy at 13%+, Ireland and France at 10%+, India at 9%-, Sweden and Egypt at 8%+, Canada at 7%+, and a US U6 Unemployment rate of 12%-!
  • Hyper-competition in hot markets
    because less consumers working means less consumers with money to spend which translates into more companies chasing a smaller market, which, with the return of inflation and increasing interest rates, has less money to spend — net result, hyper-competition just to stay in business!

So what does this mean for you?

Multiple global Depressions in a short-time frame

Markets are still recovering, and even where people have cash to spend there is still apprehension. Plus, until we recognize the inherent warning that as long as we continue to let bankers rule the world, this is just the beginning. So, for the time being, don’t be too ambitious where projects are concerned, be realistic and look for flexibility and the ability to do more JIT if demand escalates (as the last thing you want is to be stuck with millions of dollars of excess inventory).

High Rates of Joblessness in Many First World Countries

This is not only prolonging the depression, but is reducing the number of people who have cash to spend and your organization’s potential market. This means sales prices need to be maintained, if not cut, which means that costs need to be maintained, if not cut as well. And if they can’t be cut, value needs to be added — for free. A significant amount of supply base development may be required.

Hyper-Competition in Competitive Markets

About the only way a new product is going to sell these days is if it is different and provides more value to the consumer than the competitor’s product. This means that Procurement needs to identify suppliers who can add value at little or no incremental cost in product design, manufacturing, or experience. Value added services are just the beginning of what Procurement needs to look for.

Four down and twenty-six to go!