Optimism Abounds

After five days in southern California with sourcing and outsourcing leaders and advisors across all industries, I am once again rejuvenated and inspired. What a great week! Our Global Leadership Summit was all we hoped it would be and more. We partnered with the University of San Diego’s Supply Chain Management Institute and offered four days of workshops, breakout sessions, general sessions and networking events and since returning to my office, I’ve heard nothing but great feedback.During the week, we heard from Angel Mendez of Cisco-a powerful speaker-on Value Chain Excellence. We heard case studies from companies like Ace Insurance who have successfully used a global multi-vendor strategy in application outsourcing. We heard from leading edge companies like Microsoft and Target on topics ranging from strategic sourcing at a tactical level to outsourcing from a global perspective. We heard some great thought leadership from companies like A.T. Kearney on strategic sourcing in the new economy and Genpact on redefining source-to-pay. We had appearances from wannabe (or could be) actors who looked surprisingly like characters from the series “24″ but delivered a great session on category management transformation and the importance of strategic partnerships. We had a session on cloud computing and the future of enterprise IT. We had a fabulous session where we discussed leadership as a way of life, which was a comparison between the Marine Corps and corporate leadership…what an inspiring session! After hearing Alsbridge CEO Ben Trowbridge and Lt. Col. James Szepesy of the USMC, I was ready to enlist…or at least to recognize the importance of my leadership skills and what I can do to constantly improve upon them. We even had a lighter moment with The Powerpoint Guy who brought some humor to our week!And through it all, several themes emerged…companies are cautiously optimistic that the economy is rebounding…risk management and strategies for mitigating risk are top-of-mind…and sourcing and outsourcing leaders are excited about the opportunities ahead. I, for one, am ready to approach 2010 head on with an optimistic outlook! I hope you are too.