And it’s not just because we don’t have enough, as the doctor pointed out in his post on how It Would Be Great If Future CEOs Were Past CPOs (which isn’t happening because we’d need 90% of companies to fail to have enough CPOs for the CEO role), it’s because without them, we are getting lost in a see of sound-bite driven, fact-free marketing, hype, and FOMO relentlessly pushed upon us by vendors, analysts, consultants, and now influencers with next to no one left to cut through the noise and no one to lead you through the land of confusion.

As THE REVELATOR commented on the doctor‘s Top 10 Ways to be a Procurement Influencer on LinkedIn!, in a perfect world,

A “true influencer” would be driven by a single purpose – to get it right versus being right.

A “true influencer” would never look to gain consensus but to stimulate meaningful dialogue, leading to greater individual and collective understanding.

A “true influencer” would build a community of active engagement beyond token gestures of likes and thumbs up.

A “true influencer” would actively look to build a diverse community that challenges them and other members to think differently and see a subject or issue through a wider lens.

A “true influencer” would be insatiably curious and always open to new ways of thinking and doing.

A “true influencer” would be someone who has been around long enough to have witnessed first-hand the events that create the needed context to understand how we are where we are today.

Finally, a “true” influencer would stimulate thoughts and ideas, leading to practical and measurable outcomes.

Of course, today’s influencers don’t measure up to any of that, and as they exist only to build their fame and fortune, they never will.

However, true Procurement Leaders, who believe in education (and not hype-based sound-bite marketing), measure up to all of this. And that’s why we need more Procurement Leaders!

• True leaders care about getting it right, they don’t care about being right.
• True leaders understand you will almost never have consensus across the board, but if you let everyone speak, and take all views into account, they’ll respect the decision and change course as necessary for the greater good.
• True leaders build a team who actively engages with them and each other, not a team who just does what they are told without question (as that team is lazy or scared, and neither indicates a work environment conducive to success).
• True leaders embrace diversity in their team and their suppliers (to the extent possible, they don’t confuse outcomes with opportunity and force quotas that don’t make sense and just alienate their teams; e.g. if you only have 25% of women in STEM, you can only expect 25% of women in your technical positions; if you locate your office in a 98% caucasian neighbourhood, it’s going to be awfully hard to achieve a 15% African American or a 20% Latino workforce).
• True leaders want to learn, want you to learn, and want to find practical, measurable solutions that work for everyone.

True Leaders (and a return of True Educators) are what we need to take Procurement forward. Will The Real Slim Shady please stand up?