Clyde Dornier is a familiar and hugely respected figure within the global sourcing and procurement community, having served as CPO for both Visa and the Freeman Companies. We got together with Clyde at April's SIG Summit in Orlando, Florida, to get his thoughts on the key trends driving change within procurement globally - and to ask him to design the perfect organisation...
Only imagination limits the opportunities available from our rapidly connected world. It’s hard to think of a household product or work device that could not have some benefit from being connected to another application via the internet of things (IoT), which adapts based on data from another source. Unsurprisingly, Gartner identified that the number-one strategic technology trend for 2016 would be the so-called device mesh: the ever-expanding set of end points that people can use to find information and communicate online.
From the invention of the wheel and steam engine to fax machines and desktop computers, technology has always shaped the way we work - but in the last few decades, the pace of innovation has sped up exponentially, forcing employees and those who lead them to constantly blaze new ground and determine new paradigms for the way things are done. The biggest recent change in work and workplace culture is the introduction of robots.
Budgeting for IT has always been an uphill battle, with the boardroom tending to try and cut back on spending whenever possible, despite a driving desire for the competitive advantage strong tech investment brings. This is especially true for cybersecurity, which has always been hobbled by the difficulty in proving its day-to-day value. It’s only when an attempted attack occurs that the value of security investment overtakes the “it won’t happen to us” mentality.
With the United Kingdom set to leave the European Union, the impact on the Polish outsourcing market looks likely to be both positive and negative. The full extent on outsourcing is yet to be determined, but some predictions can be made based on various scenarios.
If Polish talent leaves the UK
Wipro’s KR Sanjiv is a busy man. As CTO, he has the weighty task of making sense of tomorrow’s disruptive technologies - today - then enabling Wipro to compete and win in these areas. We met him to hear how his team thinks about the future, and where RPA and AI fit into their roadmap.
Vast forests of digital trees have been sacrificed to the topic of sourcing. While the incessant stream of white papers, articles, blogs, tweets and posts we’re bombarded with are certainly helpful, don’t they all start sounding the same after a while?
Outsource: Nipun, welcome to Outsource. As is customary with our Q&As, let’s begin with some scene-setting: could you please tell our audience a bit about Enlighta and your own role within the organisation?
Nipun Sehgal: Enlighta is a leading provider of supplier performance, risk and compliance, and relationship management solutions enabling enterprises to derive more business value from global and local supplier relationships.
Organisations that enter business process outsourcing (BPO) transactions inevitably experience challenges with BPO providers – often resulting from unmet expectations, difficult transitions and erratic steady state delivery. While it is reasonable to expect the value promised by a provider to be delivered quickly and consistently, walking a mile in a BPO provider’s shoes can help buyers understand the typical challenges BPO providers face when taking over execution of business processes from their clients.
Sourcing and procurement (S&P) leaders continue to reference efficiency, effectiveness and continuous improvement of operations as a high priority. Most will admit that continuous optimisation is not a destination, rather a journey that has become increasingly complex. Today, an agile S&P organisation that effectively aligns with the needs of the business is critical to establish. S&P organisations want to embrace accelerated decision-making, improve productivity and spend visibility, and implement tighter controls for supplier performance.
Dictation being forced in Afghanistan,
Revolution in South Africa taking a stand,
People in Eurasia on the brink of oppression,
I hope it’s gonna be alright.
‘It’s Alright’, Pet Shop Boys
“Take your time” isn’t a phrase field engineers expect to hear when a client requests a site visit. These customers are looking for a rapid resolution, which is why a high first-time fix rate is crucial to a business’s success. But simply fixing a problem quickly isn’t enough. Clients want a positive customer experience. They want to feel the field engineer is listening to their needs, and they want assurance that the field service organisation is capable of fully meeting those needs.
We often hear stories of business relationships that appeared strong suddenly turning sour. These relationships may even have existed for some time. So what is going on? It is likely acts of opportunism.
