Procurement Study Pays Attention to Younger Generation

As reported here earlier this week, the ROSMA Performance Check Benchmarking Study collects the financial performance of procurement as reported by participating CPO organizations. A.T. Kearney began ROSMA Performance Check benchmarking in 2009.

The study’s authors also note that procurement organizations have the opportunity to attract millennials if the profession is willing to make changes regarding performance tracking and accountability.

Millennials are a generation that prefers to join organizations with value-management practices, specifically where there is transparency, accountability, and recognition of their achievements. Procurement offers millennials the opportunity to learn the business from end-to-end, secure executive access and exposure, and have a significant impact on business performance.

But the study also has its skeptics. SCMR columnist Robert A. Rudzki, who is President, Greybeard Advisors LLC, says benchmarks may not be that critical at this point:

“The fundamental question is this: do we really need another framework, or do we just need to do a better job connecting to the financial metrics that are already being used by the CEO and CFO to manage the business?”

“In our experience,” says Rudzki,, CPOs can dramatically improve their internal credibility with the executive staff by relating their proposed agenda (including the need to transform supply management) to the metrics that the senior staff and the Board of Directors already monitor.

According to Rudzki, such key metrics as ROIC, cash flow and EPS, are highly visible and relevant metrics.

“ Rather than having Procurement introduce a new metric for itself (which may come across as self-serving), we have generally found it to be more productive — and quicker at achieving credibility — to relate the proposed CPO agenda directly to the particular metrics currently in use by the company's senior management,” he says.

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