Category Archives: rants

Vendor Scorecards DO Work – But Only if They are Done Right!

A recent guest post over Spend Matters by Andy Kohm, founder of VendOp, provided “4 reasons why supplier scorecards don’t work”, which is a terribly inaccurate and a disservice to the procurement space because

  1. They Do Work if done right and
  2. what he was describing was internal vendor surveys, NOT scorecards.

Even worse, if he had said internal vendor surveys don’t work, SI would have totally agreed and hailed the post because, frankly, internal vendor surveys don’t work. Expecting enough people to fill out enough long surveys to get statistically reliable data when everyone is overworked, underpaid, and tired of doing everyone else’s job (because no one has time to do their own) is just ludicrous. It’s not going to happen, and when it does, the data and answers are not going to be that good or reliable because the surveys will be filled out in a rush. And all the reasons provided by Mr. Kohm will hold true.

But you see, a scorecard, at least a proper scorecard, is not a survey, or a summary of soft, qualitative feedback survey scores, but a summary of hard, quantitative metrics built up from hard data over time. A scorecard summarizes hard performance metrics, KPIs, and unarguable (undisputable) incident counts, not subjective scores on reliability.

We have to remember that just like anchoring can be a problem in negotiations, it can be a problem in subjective ranking. If the last couple of interactions with the supplier were problematic, the recipient is likely to fill out a fairly negative score even if the 20 interactions before that were great and, overall, the supplier is batting 800. Similarly, if the last few interactions were particularly good (because the supplier knows their review is coming up and making extra effort just to score enough to pass), the recipient may rank the supplier very positively even though 8 out of 10 requests are ignored on average. In short, for reliability, surveys suck.

But hard scorecards, built on on time statistics, reject rates, incident counts, billing accuracy, and so on are unbiased, anchored in fact (and not fiction), and work. They allow both parties to zero in on true issues, problems, and disagreements, and work collaboratively to fix them. They are the best supplier relation management tool the average organization has at their disposal and should not ever be discounted. Proper scorecards are the solution, not the problem.

Future Trend 34: Digital Transformation

How did SI miss this one in it’s two in-depth series on the future of procurement and it’s follow up future trends expose???

This anti-trend is as old as the internet!

But let’s back up. Recently, the procurement dynamo published a piece on the digital transformation of procurement where he asked if it was a good abuse of language. In this post he started off by noting that the digital transformation expression is an overused buzzword — which is an understatement.

Secondly, as the procurement dynamo notes, no one has a proper understanding of what it actually means. the procurement dynamo attempts to rectify this by giving a clear definition of the term with respect to the also overused digitization and digitalization terminology. According to the procurement dynamo

  • digitization is the conversion from analog to digital … atoms to bits …
  • digitalization is the process of using digital technology and the impact it has and
  • digital transformation is a digital-first approach that encompasses all aspects of business

… and, in particular, digital transformation is a digital-first approach to the extent that digital can be applied.

And this means that this is yet another anti-trend in Procurement as leading organizations have been doing this ever since the adoption of e-Auctions. The best organizations have been adopting, to the extent possible, new technologies since the e-auction hit the scene 20 years ago. RFX. True e-invoicing. Supplier Information Management. Contract Management. Decision Optimization. And so on. The leaders (which are very, very few) have pushed for, and embraced, digital transformation for the last two decades.

And, to be honest, when you get right down to it, the concept of digital transformation is, as a farmer would say, hogwash. You’re either continually adopting and using the best tools and processes available to you, or you are counting down to the days your doors close. The organizations that have survived decades have embraced multiple technological revolutions. They’ve went from carbon paper to copiers to digital transmission. Digital transformation is just the latest technological revolution, and may not be the last. (If quantum tech gets perfected, you’ll have to move to technology based on qubits … a blend of atoms and bits.)

So don’t fall for the latest fad — keep focussed on the goal. Better business building.

London Bridge Has Fallen Down!

Back in October, in our post on how London Bridge is Falling Down, we brought to your attention a post by the public defender that discussed how The Garden Bridge was, again, put on hold, which it should have been given that a review did find major breaches of good procurement process. From allowing a supplier to submit a bid after the formal deadline, to a lack of documentation, to changing the evaluation process once bids were received, to treating suppliers differently – as we said, if any unsuccessful bidder had challenged in court there is no doubt that they would have won their case.

But now it seems, as per a recent post from the public defender, that we are now at the point where “The Garden Bridge Loses Treasury Support” and London Bridge has, indeed, fallen down. And maybe this time it’s for the best.

A Properly Overhauled Visa Program Will Benefit Supply Chains

In yesterday’s post, we pointed out that a properly overhauled end-to-end visa program would be much more effective in implementing President Trump’s goals than a wall or any other initiative that President Trump has to-date proposed to keep people out and make foreigners pay for his program. But we also pointed out that this would have a number of positive side effects including, but not limited to:

  • An increase in STEM capability
  • An increase in American jobs
  • An increase in blue-collar and white-collar salaries

In today’s post, we’re going to focus mainly on the first benefit, as this is not just an American centric benefit, and the one that will most benefit the supply chain.

Supply chains are getting longer and more complex, product life-cycles are getting shorter, service requirements more varied, and supply chain pirates are getting much, much more sophisticated and capable of subverting all of the advanced tracking and monitoring technology that you can bring to bear.

As a result, you need smarter mathematicians to model the supply chain, smarter engineers to keep up with the shorter life-cycles (and get it right), smarter business and linguistic graduates to figure out how to deliver varied service requirements globally, and smarter techs to increase security to keep your products, and your supply chain, safe. Not a hundred thousand additional low-end programmers writing essentially the same old code, maintaining the same old installed systems, and doing other tasks that can be done by any run-of-the-mill programmer and even outsourced.

If the visa program is revamped, only these smarter mathematicians, smarter engineers, smarter business and linguistic professionals, and smarter technologists will get the visas. That will not only benefit the US, but the US-centric supply chains that effectively run most global supply chains.

Revamping the Visa programs will not only force IT outsourcers to think smarter and go global, but benefit supply chains as a whole.

Forget the Wall, Mr. Trump; An End-to-Edd Visa Program Overhaul will be MUCH more effective!

You’ll accomplish three of your goals simultaneously:

  • Keep People Out
  • Make Foreigners Pay for Your Programs
  • Make it easier to deport people

Let’s take this one-by-one.

1. Keep People Out

If you make it so that the only way in to the country for any extended period of time, for any reason other than vacation, or from any country that is currently high risk, especially where there is no appropriate trade program in place, is a visa, then the majority of people will be kept out.

2. Make Foreigners Pay for Your Programs

If you introduce more visas, with more requirements, and cost-based processing fees, foreigners will end up paying for your programs.

3. Make it easier to deport people

If you make it so that deportation is automatic for anyone without a visa, provided you make it so that everyone who should have a visa can get one, including people who are already in the US, possibly illegally but who should be given the chance to be made legal, then, after a reasonable grace period, you’d face little opposition to automatic deportation.

But these are not the only benefits you’d see from an overhauled Visa program.

You’ll also see:

  • An increase in STEM capability
  • An increase in American jobs
  • An increase in blue-collar and white-collar salaries

An increase in STEM capability

If the H1-B Visa program is properly overhauled, as suggested by Vinnie Mirchandani over on deal architect, then instead of getting tens of thousands of displaced Indian programmers, who likely only have a Bachelors and a few years of experience, you will get Masters and PhDs with advanced education and experience and true innovation capability — especially if you resurrect Senator Cruz’s proposal to make the minimum salary of a H1-B $110,000 a year. No one’s going to pay the equivalent of a $50,000 a year (at best) graduate $110,000 — and if they have to pay above market for a programmer, they’re going to hire an American first (which will be much cheaper than importing a $110,000 outsourced worker) — but for a real genius in physics, chemistry, bio-tech, engineering, that will be cheap. Especially since there will actually be H1-B visas available as they will no longer be sucked up in their entirety by Indian outsourcing firms.

An increase in American jobs

As indicated above, just fixing the H1-B program will increase American jobs as it will deter bringing people in that can effectively be used as indentured servants at cheap wages. But, better yet, introduce more visa categories, requirements, and fees for hiring non-Americans and, presto, you’ll do more for American jobs than lowering taxes (which never stay down anyway), building walls to keep people out, or pushing “buy American” policies. After all, your average constituent at the end of the day is lazy and greedy — if it’s easier and cheaper to hire an American than a non-American, then unless that non-American truly brings unparalleled value to the company (and, indirectly, the country). they are going to hire American.

An increase in blue and white collar salaries

The majority of your voters are in the middle class, working decent paying factory jobs (which will now be more expensive to fill with Mexican and other immigrants from poorer nations) and white collar tech-based jobs (which will now be more expensive to fill with visa program candidates). As a result, the best Americans will be in sought after, demand bigger salaries, and, guess what, owe it all to you. Going back to my comment that your voters are greedy (as the dollar comes first in America), this will only help you as they won’t care about party at election time, only the one President that fattened their pay cheque while increasing their job security.

So, Mr. Trump, forget that Wall and overhaul those Visa programs. It’s about time someone did.