Wrigley Field. The Loop. Cloud Gate. Deep dish pizza (and lots of it). Chicago is a city full of icons, and it has one more to add to the list: Chicago Sourcing Leaders. Last week, sourcing professionals from the Windy City gathered at Beam Suntory for CSL’s inaugural meeting. The sourcing insights were flowing just as freely as the Jim Beam and Suntory cocktails, but here are a few of our favorites:
Get stakeholders involved.
“Involve the stakeholder every step of the way, allow them visibility into every step of the process.” – Ammar Al-Rifai, Senior Manager of Global Indirect Procurement Systems at Zebra Technologies
Work collaboratively with stakeholders and finance.
“Set expectations up front. What do stakeholders have to spend and what do they get for it? The best thing you can do is join yourself hip-to-hip with finance.” – Chris Jessen, Senior Manager of Global Strategic Sourcing at Groupon
Set ambitious goals for 2018.
“Drive procurement innovation. Hire to figure out what procurement can do to deliver value that’s not just savings.” – Brian Golden, Director of Global Procurement at Beam Suntory
Drive value beyond savings.
“Find out stakeholders’ strategies, find out their plans. Build a business case using their language.” – Katie Smith, Head of Global Strategic Sourcing & Procurement COE at Here Technologies
We’re thrilled to have a group where Chicago’s sourcing leaders can meet and share ideas. If you’d like to join Chicago Sourcing Leaders, visit the CSL LinkedIn group!
Michaela Dempsey | Tags: Beam Suntory, Chicago Sourcing Leaders, sourcing
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