This is a preview of Ops Digest, our monthly newsletter for operations teams. This month, we're talking about the role of AI in procurement, with an eye towards intake. Subscribe and receive this newsletter in your inbox every month!
The pressure on procurement teams to create strategic business value for their organizations has never been higher.
Yet old problems persist. Most modern procurement processes are complex, which is one reason few employees actually follow procurement processes as they’re designed. Accounting for the sheer number of moving parts in the supply chain remains incredibly difficult, as well. And there are always additional variables to contend with, like legacy databases and layers of approvals from disparate stakeholders.
So how can procurement professionals succeed?
One way is to embrace innovative technology. The modern procurement tech stack is full of new tools—and many of them are empowered by AI.
We went in-depth about how to use AI safely and effectively in procurement in this blog post, but here are the bulleted highlights you need to know:
AI holds a great deal of promise, but it’s just a set of tools. However, in the right hands—procurement professionals with knowledge, vision, and a strategic mandate—these technologies can help you make a huge impact on your procurement processes.
Read this blog to go deep on AI in procurement. And check out Tonkean’s ProcurementWorks to get a hands-on understanding of the ways AI-powered procurement tools can make an impact for your organization!
Up next in this newsletter: the latest news about the industry.
If you have some insightful news or knowledge about the world of Ops to share, let us know!
The role of the chief procurement officer (CPO) has never been more important. The pandemic highlighted how volatile the supply chain can be and how critical it is to predict and navigate disruptions. As is usually the case, though, those difficult times were an opportunity for leading CPOs to learn, adapt, and ultimately thrive.
According to the latest edition of Deloitte’s Annual Global Chief Procurement Officer Survey, leading CPOs are seizing that opportunity in three primary ways: prioritizing talent management, rethinking their operating models, and embracing process orchestration as a pillar for digitization.
The big takeaway: CPOs are becoming mission-critical leaders inside their organizations by placing renewed focus on people, processes, and using technology effectively.
Deloitte calls these successful procurement leaders “Orchestrators of Value.”
These are people who look beyond achieving short-term financial wins in favor of making a broader, longer-term impact on their organizations—and they get everyone else on board, too.
It’s not just about tactically scoring the best prices anymore; the new world of procurement is chess, not checkers. What these “orchestrators” do aligns with process orchestration (and more specifically, procurement orchestration) and how it’s playing a prominent role in today’s procurement tech stack.
Here’s how Deloitte laid out these priorities:
Technology is necessary and central to all of the above. Fortunately, the modern procurement tech stack is full of a growing spate of powerful tools, especially process orchestration tools that pull them all together.
It also means that more than ever, procurement requires exceptional human talent. Today’s procurement requires strategic thinking, creativity, holistic views into processes and how people use and adopt them, and more. Technology’s role is to empower those people by automating tasks and processes that AI can handle and by providing intelligence that humans can interpret and act upon.
Check out this blog post for the full story. And see for yourself what procurement orchestration can do for you.
Tell us about clever solutions and success stories you want your Ops peers to know about for future newsletters!
On this episode of Modern Business Operations, host Sagi Eliyahu is joined by Alex Dussurgey, Head of Procurement at Sastrify, to talk about the ever-changing world of SaaS tools in procurement.
Subscribe to the Modern Business Operations podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.
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