This White Paper investigates the different values and behaviours held and exhibited by the people that develop and manage contracts, based on a study of 688 participants who completed the Cullen Group’s online profiling instrument during the month of November 2011, to explain why some of the conflict exists and offer solutions.
Today’s procurement organisation is under constant change, as organisations move from a traditional pyramid structure to a diamond-shaped one. Strategic sourcing, category management, and supplier relationship management are all part of today’s procurement kit bag. Not only does procurement need to buy better, manage demand better, and understand markets better, it now has to manage the contracts that it puts in place. It no longer stops halfway through the contract lifecycle.
Although offshoring has existed in a variety of forms for decades, its controversy continues unabated. The debate includes whether offshoring actually saves money or not, what activities are and are not good candidates for offshoring, and most controversial of all, its effect on employment in the
consuming countries. This Executive Report discusses the offshoring phenomena in an historical context, investigates whether offshoring has actually resulted in IT-related job losses, and examines its effect on IT-related occupations in the US and Europe.
Organisations that have the CEO and a multidisciplinary team involved in sourcing strategy and supplier configuration make more effective decisions. In this report we focus on the supplier selection process and acquiring the right supplier competencies and people. Our research consistently shows that where these supplier capabilities are absent, CEOs leave themselves exposed to significant problems –however good the strategic thinking was, and however strong the contract drawn up.
Outsourcing – properly planned, resourced and managed – can deliver significant competitive advantage to companies and organisations in all sectors. However, this is only when the CEO plays a key role – taking crucial strategic decisions, creating vital capabilities, putting in place integrated management processes and applying effective monitoring and evaluating mechanisms.
The outsourcing enterprise
Fifteen years’ worth of research into information technology and business process outsourcing has produced a basic body of knowledge about outsourcing. But the focus has now shifted to what makes one outsourcing deal more successful than another. In this paper we show that overall strategic business intention must determine the nature of the relationship and the contract.